Juneteenth, celebrated on June 19, is the name given to emancipation day by African-Americans in Texas. On that day in 1865 Union Major General Gordon Granger read General Order #3 to the people of Galveston. General Order #3 stated “The people of Texas are informed that, in accordance with a proclamation from the Executive of the United States, all slaves are free. This involves an absolute equality of personal rights and rights of property between former masters and slaves, and the connection heretofore existing between them becomes that between employer and hired labor. The freedmen are advised to remain quietly at their present homes and work for wages. They are informed that they will not be allowed to collect at military posts and that they will not be supported in idleness either there or elsewhere.”
Large celebrations on June 19 began in 1866 and continued regularly into the early 20th century. The African-Americans treated this day like the Fourth of July and the celebrations contained similar events. In the early days, the celebration included a prayer service, speakers with inspirational messages, reading of the emancipation proclamation, stories from former slaves, food, red soda water, games, rodeos and dances.
The celebration of June 19 as emancipation day spread from Texas to the neighboring states of Louisiana, Arkansas and Oklahoma. It has also appeared in Alabama, Florida, and California as African-American Texans migrated.
In many parts of Texas, ex-slaves purchased land, or “emancipation grounds,” for the Juneteenth gathering. Examples include: Emancipation Park in Houston, purchased in 1872; what is now Booker T. Washington Park in Mexia; and Emancipation park in East Austin.
Celebration of Juneteenth declined during World War II but revived in 1950 at the Texas State Fair Grounds in Dallas. Interest and participation fell away during the late 1950’s and 1960’s as attention focused on expansion of freedom for African-Americans. In the 1970’s Juneteenth revived in some communities. For example, in Austin the Juneteenth celebration returned in 1976 after a 25 year hiatus. House Bill no.1016 passed in the 66th legislature, regular session, declared June 19, “Emancipation Day in Texas,” a legal state holiday effective January 1, 1980. Since that time, the celebration of Juneteenth continues across the state of Texas with parades, picnics and dancing.
Texas State Library Reference Services 3/95
Celebrations across Texas started last Saturday, and will continue for another three or four days, I gather. Thought it’s an official State of Texas holiday, few people take it off. So celebrations are scheduled when they can be.
Wilson’s history is remarkable. He is not the only university president ever to have been elected president of the United States — Dwight Eisenhower and Charles James A. Garfield also served in that capacity (any others?) — but his election to the Princeton post marked an unusual rise in an essentially non-political career that would lead Wilson to the White House through the New Jersey governor’s mansion.
Wilson’s thinking, writing and thinking about how to make colleges and universities more democratic, and therefore more useful as fountains of leadership for the nation, propelled him forward. This makes him unusually American in the way he worked for national service, and so was called to higher service.
“On June 9, 1902, Woodrow Wilson was unanimously elected president of Princeton University, a position he held until he resigned in 1910 to run for governor of New Jersey. As university president, Wilson exhibited both the idealistic integrity and the occasional lack of political acumen that marked his tenure as the twenty-eighth president of the United States (1913-21).”
“Wilson served on the faculties of Bryn Mawr College and Wesleyan University before joining the Princeton faculty as professor of jurisprudence and political economy in 1890. A popular teacher and respected scholar, Wilson delivered an oration at Princeton’s sesquicentennial celebration (1896) entitled ‘Princeton in the Nation’s Service.’ In this famous speech, he outlined his vision of the university in a democratic nation, calling on institutions of higher learning ‘to illuminate duty by every lesson that can be drawn out of the past.'”
“Wilson began a fund-raising campaign to bolster the university corporation. The curriculum guidelines that he developed during his tenure as president of Princeton proved among the most important innovations in the field of higher education. He instituted the now common system of core requirements followed by two years of concentration in a selected area. When he attempted to curtail the influence of the elitist “social clubs,” however, Wilson met with resistance from trustees and potential donors. He believed that the system was smothering the intellectual and moral life of the undergraduates. Opposition from wealthy and powerful alumni further convinced Wilson of the undesirability of exclusiveness and moved him towards a more populist position in his politics.”
While attending a recent Lincoln celebration I asked myself if Lincoln would have been as serviceable to the people of this country had he been a college man, and I was obliged to say to myself that he would not. The process to which the college man is subjected does not render him serviceable to the country as a whole. It is for this reason that I have dedicated every power in me to a democratic regeneration.
The American college must become saturated in the same sympathies as the common people. The colleges of this country must be reconstructed from the top to the bottom. The American people will tolerate nothing that savors of exclusiveness.
Woodrow Wilson, president of Princeton University, “Address to Alumni,” April 16, 1910.
Woodrow Wilson, circa 1913 (in the Oval Office?) - Library of Congress image
Spread the word; friends don't allow friends to repeat history.
Memorial Day, traditionally observed on May 30, now observed the last Monday in May, honors fallen veterans of wars. Traditionally, family members visit the cemetery where loved ones are interred and leave flowers on the grave.
On Memorial Day itself, flags on poles or masts should be flown at half-staff from sunrise to noon. At noon, flags should be raised to full-staff position.
When posting a flag at half-staff, the flag should be raised to the full-staff position first, with vigor, then slowly lowered to half-staff; when retiring a flag posted at half-staff, it should be raised to the full staff position first, with vigor, and then be slowly lowered. Some people attach black streamers to stationary flags, though this is not officially recognized by the U.S. Flag Code.
1. Memorial Day was first officially proclaimed by a general officer. His name was: A. Robert E. Lee; B. John A. Logan; C. Douglas MacArthur D. George Washington.
2. The first state to officially recognize Memorial Day was A. Virginia; B. Rhode Island; C. New York; D. Georgia.
3. The use of poppies to commemorate Memorial Day started in A. 1870 B. 1915 C. 1948; D. 1967.
4. The original date of Memorial Day was A. May 30; B. July 4; C. May 28; D. Nov 11.
5. Which U.S. Senator has tried repeatedly to pass legislation that would restore the traditional day of Memorial Day observance? A. John McCain B. Ted Kennedy C. Saxby Chambliss D. Daniel Inouye.
The answers, again provided by the Tifton Gazette:
OK, now for the answers. General John Logan, national commander of the Grand Army of the Republic, proclaimed May 30, 1968 as Memorial Day in his General Order Number 11, issued on May 5, 1868. The purpose was to honor the dead from both sides in the War Between the States. Subsequently flowers were placed on the graves of both Union and Confederate soldiers in Arlington National Cemetery on May 30 of that year.
New York was the first state to officially recognize the Memorial Day, in 1873. Southern states, though paying tribute to their dead on separate dates, refused to use May 30 as the official date until after World War I, when the holiday was broadened to honor those who died in any war.
In 1915 a woman named Moina Michael, inspired by the poem, “In Flanders Fields,” (by Canadian Colonel John McRae) began wearing red poppies on Memorial Day to honor our nation’s war dead. The tradition grew and even spread to other countries. In 1922 the VFW became the first veterans’ organization to sell the poppies made by disabled veterans as a national effort to raise funds in support of programs for veterans and their dependents. In 1948 the US Post Office issued a red 3-cent stamp honoring Michael for her role in founding the national poppy movement.
As stated above, May 30 was the original Memorial Day. In 1971, with the passage of the national Holiday Act, Congress changed it so that Memorial Day would be celebrated on the last Monday of May. Some citizens feel that turning it into a “three-day weekend” has devalued the importance and significance of this special holiday. In fact, every time a new Congress has convened since 1989, Senator Daniel Inouye of Hawaii has introduced a bill to the Senate calling for the restoration of May 30th as the day to celebrate Memorial Day.
In his 1999 introductory remarks to the bill, Senator Inouye declared:
“Mr. President, in our effort to accommodate many Americans by making the last Monday in May, Memorial Day, we have lost sight of the significance of this day to our nation. Instead of using Memorial Day as a time to honor and reflect on the sacrifices made by Americans in combat, many Americans use the day as a celebration of the beginning of summer. My bill would restore Memorial Day to May 30 and authorize the flag to fly at half mast on that day.
In addition, this legislation would authorize the President to issue a proclamation designating Memorial Day and Veterans Day as days for prayer and ceremonies honoring American veterans. This legislation would help restore the recognition our veterans deserve for the sacrifices they have made on behalf of our nation.” (from the 1999 U.S. Congressional Record).
I can’t believe there are still people out there who argue that President Obama is not eligible to be president, and who still refuse to look at the evidence.
Here’s a measure of how far down in the barrel they have to scrape to keep this issue alive: Check out this blog by a New Mexico paralegal who is a source for World Net Daily. A nation loaded with good Constitutional scholars in law schools, history departments, political science departments and public affairs and management schools, and WND finds an obscure paralegal in New Mexico instead, to get the lowdown on U.S. law on citizenship.
There’s a sucker born every minute, but WND’s philosophy is that anyone can act like a sucker if you work hard enough at it. WND is working very hard.
[Google Video version is not showing or playing for reasons I don’t know; fortunately the National Archives (NARA) has uploaded a version to YouTube]
“A Challenge to Democracy,” by the War Relocation Board. This film defends the relocation of 100,000 Japanese Americans during World War II.
Japanese-descended American citizens harvesting crops they grew during internment during World War II. Screen capture from “Challege to Democracy.”
“These people are not under suspicion,” the narrator says. “They are not prisoners, they are not internees. They are merely dislocated people, the unwounded casualties of war.”
A Springfield blogger is accused of threatening the life, limbs and lower alimentary canal of a Secret Service agent.
James T. Cuneo, 43, was indicted Thursday on charges of making a series of threats against Special AgentRonald Brown in the course of his official duties.
This was strange turnabout for Brown, whose job in the agency’s Presidential Protection Division is mainly to thwart threats against the commander in chief. For the first time in his 15-year career, Brown wrote in federal court papers, someone was repeatedly harassing him.
There’s a difference between a dog on a bone and a psychotic; some of the Obama denialists appear to have blurred the difference. Cuneo’s complaint appears to revolve around the same issue that set off Texas Darlin’ and a fewdozen others. Cuneo escalated the thing; let’s hope no others do the same.
On Oct. 16, Brown and Springfield police detectives dropped in on Cuneo to chat about threats he had allegedly made about Google executives on his Internet blog: walkndude.wordpress.com. (WordPress has taken the site offline for violation of its terms of service.)
“Cuneo was extremely belligerent, refused to answer questions and became increasingly threatening,” Brown wrote in an arrest affidavit. “We left the driveway of Cuneo’s residence without further incident.”
Cuneo then began to phone the Secret Service office in Portland, threatening Brown and others, the government alleges. “Cuneo,” Brown wrote, “seems to think that we are aiding and abetting the ‘illegal U.S. President’ and that he and others need to arrest us for not doing our job.”
Brown says Cuneo phoned him in January and, with a colorful series of expletives, threatened him with physical harm, including execution by hanging, electric chair or firing squad. Those threats — and Cuneo’s history of violence — concerned federal officials, according to Brown’s affidavit.
Time to get back to real issues. 2010 is around the corner, 2012 is not much farther.
And, by the way, a federal judge in the District of Columbia issued an order dismissing one of the many nuisance suits filed by the denialists (styled Hollister v. Soetoro) , stating clearly that the suits are nuisances and asking for a showing of why sanctions under Rule 11 of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure should not be applied. In short, the judge has ruled that the case against Obama’s eligibility is so rank and utterly without substance that any lawyer of average intelligence and sound mind should know better than to trouble a court with it. I think this is from the court’s order:
Because it appears that the complaint in this case may have been presented for an improper purpose such as to harass; and that the interpleader claims and other legal contentions of the plaintiff are not warranted by existing law or by non-frivolous arguments for extending, modifying or reversing existing law or for establishing new law, the accompanying order of dismissal requires Mr. Hemenway [the attorney of record] to show cause why he has not violated Rules 11 (b) (1) and 11 (b) (2) of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, and why he should not be required to pay reasonable attorneys fees and other expenses to counsel for the defendants.
Crazier fringes of the anti-Obama guild claim that a letter from Obama’s attorneys asking that the suit be dropped is “threatening.” It’s not threatening to tell the schoolyard bully to straighten up. How much ozone have these people depleted?
Update: Yes to Democracy also carries news on the March 24 action by Judge Robertson. When do the denialists finally wake up, smell the coffee, smell the stale beer cans, pinch themselves, take a shower and get on with life? So, to sum up: A judge in Washington, D.C., has dismissed the suit and called the bluff of the plaintiffs and stealth plaintiffs; Huffington Post revealed the financial stake of WorldNet Daily in continuing to finance the suits, and in pushing the suits improperly; and a federal prosecutor won an indictment of a blogger who started rumbling about taking violent action in favor of the Birthers, and who failed to heed warnings to tone down his vitriol. Have the birthers figured it out yet?
A television station in College Station-Bryan, Texas, KBTX (Channel 3, a CBS affiliate) ran a poll on what Texas schools should be doing about evolution in biology classes. After hearing for days from the creationists on the State Board of Education that most people think creationism should be taught, the results are a little astounding:
Results: How do you think science should be taught in Texas schools?
“In 2008, there were 20 scouts across the county who had gotten all 121 merit badges. I’m adding my name to that list,” Wes says.
But Weaver’s accomplishments don’t end with badges. The teen also earned his Eagle Scout award by building a 112-foot bridge over a creek bed in Lake Murray State Park. It was no easy task with the rugged terrain
“Just digging the holes I was thinking I’m never going to be done. All my weekends are going to be spent out here digging holes,” Wes says.
“It was scheduled to take between two to three months. It ended up taking a year and 6 months,” says Wes’s father, Rusty Weaver.
Rusty helped his son plan out the bridge and construct it, along with the rest of Troop 112. Now all kinds of area bicyclists, hikers and outdoor enthusiasts can enjoy the state park a little more. [video available here]
Keeping with an interesting if perplexing tradition, bugling was the last merit badge he earned. Weaver had aimed for 121 since he first became a Boy Scout, and his Scoutmaster, David Mannas challenged the troop to earn their Eagle rank and then go beyond the 44 merit badges Manass had earned.
Many of Weaver’s merit badges were earned in the traditional fashion, at the many summer and winter camps he attended over the years. Weaver’s father, Rusty Weaver, became the Scoutmaster of Troop 112 and is a Climbing Director for Arbuckle Area Council. “My dad would be at camp two to four weeks a summer so I stayed at camp and took all the merit badge classes I could. Before I knew it, I had 80 merit badges.”
He attends Plainview High School concurrently with Oklahoma School of Science and Mathematics, Regional Center and looks forward to finalizing his college plans.
Weaver was recognized for his rare achievement at the Arbuckle Area Council Annual Recognition Banquet, Feb. 28 at Camp Simpson in Bromide. His parents are Trish and Rusty Weaver, Ardmore.
Some guy who goes by Joeyess seems to be the one who put this together — wrote the song? Performed?
Call it sequencing. Students often ask — at least once a week — whether I was a hippie. They figure that’s a possibility since I don’t like much of the rock of the ’80s, and they don’t know much history of the ’50s and ’60s. They don’t believe me when I tell them I thought college was a better idea. They look confused when I tell them I was a plainclothes hippie.
Noodling around the radio dial the other day, I wondered how an antiwar movement could work with ClearChannel running so much of the radio formats, and none of the formats being exactly friendly to the slightest political commentary.
So, take a look. Tell us what you think in comments.
Political folk music in the Internet Age, Pete Seeger channeled through Lawrence Lessig (profanity in lyric makes it NSFW, NSFC, alas):
Last month science won a victory when members of the Texas State Board of Education (SBOE) agreed to strip creationist, anti-science language out of biology standards.
New Texas Science Standards Will Be Debated and Voted Upon March 26-27 in Austin by the Texas State Board of Education — Public Testimony is March 25
Radical Religious-Right and Creationist members of the State Board of Education will attempt to keep the unscientific amendments in the Texas science standards that will damage science instruction and textbooks.
THE TEXAS SCIENCE STANDARDS SHOULD BE ADOPTED UNCHANGED!
Hallucinations would be bad enough, but what do you have to smoke to see hallucinations other people were supposed to have had, but didn’t?
Looking at the docket of the Supreme Court, I don’t see that any of the anti-Obama suits got an order for certiorari. Will the dismissal of the wingnut lawsuits make the wingnuts go away?
Spread the word; friends don't allow friends to repeat history.
Spend at least a full minute looking at that photograph.
Wow!
Look at every single face. Each face is the verse of an epic poem. Each expression is a note in a symphony. Here are a hundred eyes full of excitement and joy, and..(though these kids don’t know it yet their parents and grandparents do)..hope. This is the kind of Hope that straightens paths, brightens colors, and builds bridges to possibilities. It is the kind of Hope that I feel so grateful to have been able to witness, and even feel in my own heart.
But, just look at these kids! Whatever I might feel is peanuts compared to the smiles, laughter, and amazement of these young ones.
By many accountings, these are dark days for the United States. Those faces show the light of the future — they may be the light of the future.
Nice catch, Mr. Weber.
Spread the word; friends don't allow friends to repeat history.
Here’s a good story we missed back in September. This is one more example of outstanding achievement by a good kid, a Scout, that slips by largely unremarked.
Amarillo Scout Coleman Carter got his 121st merit badge in his troop’s court of honor. He had earned his Eagle Rank in September 2004.
Amarillo Eagle Scout Carter Coleman - Amarillo Globe photo
Earning every merit badge in the book is just one of Carter’s achievements, however. He’s a National Merit Scholar, ranked #1 in his class at Tascosa High School, and studentbody president. You can read several of his acheivements here, in the Amarillo Globe-News— and remember, this was before his junior year (he’s a senior this year).
Mr. Coleman is not the first to accomplish this feat, nor will he be the last, I suspect. I do wish that troops, districts and councils would do more to spread the news of such outstanding feats by Scouts. A press release kept online, with photos, would have been nice. (While we’re ranting, would it be so difficult for the Amarillo Globe-News to put its name on its website? Or has the Globe-News gone out of business?)
Spread the word; friends don't allow friends to repeat history.
From Oceanside, Long Island, New York, we get brief reports of an Eagle Scout, Shawn Goldsmith, who earned all 121 merit badges offered by the Boy Scouts of America. He finished work on his last badge, for bugling, in November.
Eagle Scout Shawn Goldsmith, Troop 240, Greater New York Council - Goldsmith earned all 121 Merit Badges - Photo from GNY Council
Goldsmith says he took about five years to earn his first 62 badges and then nearly doubled that number in a matter of months. He did it with the encouragement of his grandmother, who died shortly before he reached his goal. He was awarded his final badges on Dec. 19.
Goldsmith is a freshman at Binghamton University and hopes to become a businessman and politician.
Shawn is a member of Troop 240, Greater New York Council (Bronx), whose chartered organization is Riverdale Presbyterian Church. Shawn was editor of his high school’s newspaper, and he served as an intern in the Long Island office of U.S. Sen. Charles Schumer.
Because we know Obama has a U.S. passport, we can be quite sure his draft status was verified before it was issued — which puts to bed any issue about his registering for the draft (which he wouldn’t have been required to do in any case until 1980 — draft registration had been suspended in 1973 until the Afghanistan/Soviet crisis).
Obama’s a lawyer; the National Conference of Bar Examiners, or the Illinois Bar, would have checked on any problems that surfaced when verifying his fitness to practice law.
Obama was a U.S. senator; as a matter of course, the FBI does a background check on every U.S. senator to verify they may view top secret material. Security clearances are absolutely necessary for members of the Intelligence Oversight Committee, the Foreign Relations Committee, and the Armed Services Committee. Obama was a member of the Foreign Relations Committee, chairing the subcommittee that deals with U.S. relations with NATO — a post that requires top secret clearances.
Obama has been getting the full national security briefing every day that the president gets; CIA and Homeland Security would have to verify his top secret clearances, and then some. There is absolutely no indication that this top, top check was not carried out.
Perhaps most important, Obama posted an image of his birth certificate on-line in June; experts who checked the actual document verify it is real, and therefore authoritative.
Each of these six circumstances creates a rebuttable presumption that Obama is a citizen, and a natural born citizen under the somewhat ambiguous requirements of Article II of the Constitution. In order to make a case that Obama is ineligible, contestants would need to make a strong showing, with clear evidence, to rebut the presumptions created by by these official actions.
Professional poker player Leo Donofrio has made no such evidentiary showing, anywhere, at any time. Nor has any other Obama critic presented any evidence to overcome any of these six presumptions.
Or, until that account is unsuspended by the forces supporting Donald Trump: Follow @FillmoreWhite, the account of the Millard Fillmore White House Library
We've been soaking in the Bathtub for several months, long enough that some of the links we've used have gone to the Great Internet in the Sky.
If you find a dead link, please leave a comment to that post, and tell us what link has expired.
Thanks!
Retired teacher of law, economics, history, AP government, psychology and science. Former speechwriter, press guy and legislative aide in U.S. Senate. Former Department of Education. Former airline real estate, telecom towers, Big 6 (that old!) consultant. Lab and field research in air pollution control.
My blog, Millard Fillmore's Bathtub, is a continuing experiment to test how to use blogs to improve and speed up learning processes for students, perhaps by making some of the courses actually interesting. It is a blog for teachers, to see if we can use blogs. It is for people interested in social studies and social studies education, to see if we can learn to get it right. It's a blog for science fans, to promote good science and good science policy. It's a blog for people interested in good government and how to achieve it.
BS in Mass Communication, University of Utah
Graduate study in Rhetoric and Speech Communication, University of Arizona
JD from the National Law Center, George Washington University
Posted by Ed Darrell 
Millard Fillmore's Bathtub 