Why is this an issue again?
Here’s the encore post of the original 2006 post quoting Jefferson on the topic of religious freedom, and what it means.
Can we lay off Obama now? It’s no slam on America that he knows U.S. history better than most of us. It’s encouraging.
34 Comments | 
America's founding, Barack Obama, Bill of Rights, Civil Rights, First Amendment, History, Religion, Religious Freedom, Thomas Jefferson | Tagged: Barack Obama, Bill of Rights, Christian nation, First Amendment, History, Religion, Religious Freedom, Thomas Jefferson | 
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Posted by Ed Darrell
Extra credit or field experience for your history students: Viewing of a coming PBS program on the Trail of Tears, and a panel discussion featuring R. David Edmunds, one of the advisors to the PBS American Experience crew that made the film.
The story of Saturday, May 26, 1838, a day which began an event the Cherokees would call Nu-No-Du-Na-Tlo-Hi-Lu, “The Trail Where They Cried,” will be told from a new perspective at the premiere of “Trail of Tears” at 7:30 p.m., Tuesday, March 10, in the Davidson Auditorium at the School of Management.
Production background information is available on the PBS We Shall Remain site. The third film in the five-part We Shall Remain series produced by PBS’ American Experience, “Trail of Tears” takes a new look at the United States government’s forced removal of thousands of Cherokees from their homes in the Southeastern United States, driving them toward Indian Territory in Eastern Oklahoma.
Admission is free; seating is first come, first served. The film premiere will be followed by a panel discussion with We Shall Remain executive producer Sharon Grimberg; Native American filmmaker Chris Eyre; and series adviser Dr. R. David Edmunds, the UT Dallas Anne and Chester Watson Professor in American History.
Especially for AP history students, this panel should provide a lot of grist for the thinking mills on questions about civil rights, genocidal actions, duties of citizens, and migration, immigration and settlement of the U.S.
North Texas high school teachers and students have great luck living in an area that includes the University of North Texas, Texas Christian University, Southern Methodist University, the University of Texas at Dallas, the University of Texas at Arlington, and the University of Dallas. This film premiere is one more piece of that luck.
University of Texas at Dallas history professor, Dr. R. David Edmunds will take part in a panel discussion following the premiere of Trail of Tears.
It’s a compelling story that is often mistold. According to UTD’s press office:
For years, the Cherokee had resisted removal from their land in every way they knew. Convinced that white America rejected Native Americans because they were “savages,” Cherokee leaders established a republic with a Euro-American style legislature and legal system.
Many Cherokees became Christians and adopted Westernized education for their children. Their visionary principal chief, John Ross, would even take the Cherokees’ case to the Supreme Court, where he won a crucial recognition of tribal sovereignty that still resonates.
Though in the end the Cherokees’ embrace of “civilization” and their landmark legal victory proved no match for white land hunger and military power, the Cherokee people were able to build a new life in Oklahoma, far from the land that had sustained them for generations.
Edmunds, who is of Cherokee descent, is proud to be a part of the We Shall Remain crew because the series breaks with typical portrayals of Native Americans.
“The thing that sets the We Shall Remain series apart is its ability to get away from two of the biggest stereotypes of Native Americans: the Indian as a warrior and the Indian as a victim,” said Edmunds. “The portrayal of warfare between Native Americans and whites is abandoned for a view of the very civilized, very adaptive ways of the Cherokees, as they try to assimilate to imported culture in order to remain on their lands.
“Additionally, when you see ‘Trail of Tears,’ you’ll see Native Americans as actors in their own destiny. You’ll see them make decisions, which sometimes work and sometimes don’t, but it’s all part of the American experience.”
Leave a Comment » | Civil Rights, History, History video sources, Native Americans, Texas | Tagged: Cherokee, Genocide, History, History Films, Native Americans, Trail of Tears, University of Texas at Dallas | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
Is it an unprecedented coincidence? 200 years ago today, just minutes apart according to some unconfirmed accounts, Abraham Lincoln was born in a rude log cabin on Nolin Creek, in Kentucky, and Charles Darwin was born into a wealthy family at the family home in Shrewsbury, England.
Gutzon Borglum’s 1908 bust of Abraham Lincoln in the Crypt of the U.S. Capitol – Architect of the Capitol photo
Lincoln would become one of our most endeared presidents, though endearment would come after his assassination. Lincoln’s bust rides the crest of Mt. Rushmore (next to two slaveholders), with George Washington, the Father of His Country, Thomas Jefferson, the author of the Declaration of Independence, and Theodore Roosevelt, the man who made the modern presidency, and the only man ever to have won both a Congressional Medal of Honor and a Nobel Prize, the only president to have won the Medal of Honor. In his effort to keep the Union together, Lincoln freed the slaves of the states in rebellion during the civil war, becoming an icon to freedom and human rights for all history. Upon his death the entire nation mourned; his funeral procession from Washington, D.C., to his tomb in Springfield, Illinois, stopped twelve times along the way for full funeral services. Lying in state in the Illinois House of Representatives, beneath a two-times lifesize portrait of George Washington, a banner proclaimed, “Washington the Father, Lincoln the Savior.”
Charles Darwin statue, Natural History Museum, London – NHM photo
Darwin would become one of the greatest scientists of all time. He would be credited with discovering the theory of evolution by natural and sexual selection. His meticulous footnoting and careful observations formed the data for ground-breaking papers in geology (the creation of coral atolls), zoology (barnacles, and the expression of emotions in animals and man), botany (climbing vines and insectivorous plants), ecology (worms and leaf mould), and travel (the voyage of H.M.S. Beagle). At his death he was honored with a state funeral, attended by the great scientists and statesmen of London in his day. Hymns were specially written for the occasion. Darwin is interred in Westminster Abbey near Sir Isaac Newton, England’s other great scientist, who knocked God out of the heavens.
Lincoln would be known as the man who saved the Union of the United States and set the standard for civil and human rights, vindicating the religious beliefs of many and challenging the beliefs of many more. Darwin’s theory would become one of the greatest ideas of western civilization, changing forever all the sciences, and especially agriculture, animal husbandry, and the rest of biology, while also provoking crises in religious sects.
Lincoln, the politician known for freeing the slaves, also was the first U.S. president to formally consult with scientists, calling on the National Science Foundation (whose creation he oversaw) to advise his administration. Darwin, the scientist, advocated that his family put the weight of its fortune behind the effort to abolish slavery in the British Empire. Each held an interest in the other’s disciplines.
Both men were catapulted to fame in 1858. Lincoln’s notoriety came from a series of debates on the nation’s dealing with slavery, in his losing campaign against Stephen A. Douglas to represent Illinois in the U.S. Senate. On the fame of that campaign, he won the nomination to the presidency of the fledgling Republican Party in 1860. Darwin was spurred to publicly reveal his ideas about the power of natural and sexual selection as the force behind evolution, in a paper co-authored by Alfred Russel Wallace, presented to the Linnean Society in London on July 1, 1858. On the strength of that paper, barely noticed at the time, Darwin published his most famous work, On the Origin of Species, in November 1859.
The two men might have got along well, but they never met.
What unusual coincidences. Today is the first day of a year-long commemoration of the lives of both men. Wise historians and history teachers, and probably wise science teachers, will watch for historical accounts in mass media, and save them.
Go celebrate human rights, good science, and the stories about these men.
Resources:
Charles Darwin:
Abraham Lincoln:
10 Comments | Abraham Lincoln, Charles Darwin, Civil Rights, Civil War, Evolution, History, Holidays, Human Rights, Politics, Science | Tagged: Abraham Lincoln, Charles Darwin, Darwin, Emancipation, Evolution, History, Lincoln, Politics, Science | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
Four young men turned a page of history on February 1, 1960, at a lunch counter in a Woolworth’s store in Greensboro, North Carolina.
Ezell A. Blair, Jr. (now Jibreel Khazan), Franklin E. McCain, Joseph A. McNeil, and David L. Richmond, sat down at the counter to order lunch. Because they were African Americans, they were refused service. Patiently, they stayed in their seats, awaiting justice.
On July 25, nearly six months later, Woolworth’s agreed to desegregate the lunch counter.
From the Smithsonian Institution: "Ezell A. Blair, Jr. (now Jibreel Khazan), Franklin E. McCain, Joseph A. McNeil, and David L. Richmond leave the Woolworth store after the first sit-in on February 1, 1960. (Courtesy of Greensboro News and Record)"
News of the “sit-in” demonstration spread. Others joined in the non-violent protests from time to time, 28 students the second day, 300 the third day, and some days up to 1,000. The protests spread geographically, too, to 15 cities in 9 states.
Smithsonian Institution: "On the second day of the Greensboro sit-in, Joseph A. McNeil and Franklin E. McCain are joined by William Smith and Clarence Henderson at the Woolworth lunch counter in Greensboro, North Carolina. (Courtesy of Greensboro News and Record)"
Part of the old lunch counter was salvaged, and today is on display at the Smithsonian Institution’s Museum of American History. The museum display was the site of celebratory parties during the week of the inauguration as president of Barack Obama.
Part of the lunchcounter from the Woolworth's store in Greensboro, North Carolina, is now displayed at the Smithsonian's Museum of American History, in Washington, D.C.
Notes and resources:
3 Comments | Bill of Rights, Brown v. Board, Civil Rights, Heroes, History, History images, History museums, Human Rights, Nonviolent protest, U.S. Constitution | Tagged: Civil Rights, February 1, Greensboro NC, Heroes, Lunchcounter, Nonviolence, Sit-in | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
Old Glory and the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. - "Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., addresses the crowd outside the United Nations, April 15, 1967," by Benedict J. Fernandez
Our flags get a double shot of exercise this week. Flags fly on the third Monday of January in honor of the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
Tomorrow, the flags fly in honor of the inauguration of the president of the U.S., a once-every-four-years event. Back-to-back flag fly dates.
We live in a brief period when history piles up deeply, so quickly it is almost beyond our ability to take it in, let alone appreciate the experience. 41 years after the death Martin Luther King, Jr., we prepare to swear in an African-American as president.
For the first time in U.S. history, we fly flags in honor of two different African-Americans, on consecutive days, with sanction from the Congress and laws of the United States.
P. Z. Myers wonderfully reflects on the legacy and thoughts of King here, “There are good reasons to honor Martin Luther King, Jr.,” letting King speak for himself. History is Elementary features a good sampling of materials teachers can use on King, here, “King Day, 2009.” Farm School hightlights King’s advocacy of nonviolence with a good focus on his Nobel Peace Prize acceptance speech.
So, go put your flag up today, and fly it tomorrow, too.
Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr., and President Lyndon B. Johnson, at the White House, on December 3, 1963 - photo by Yoichi Okamoto; public domain, LBJ Library/National Archives
12 Comments | Civil Rights, Flag etiquette, Fly your flag today, Heroes, History, Martin Luther King, Nonviolent protest | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
::cue up Sam Cooke in the background, “A Change Is Gonna Come”::
Remember Lilly Ledbetter’s story?
A chastened 111th Congress might give President Obama a chance to make things right, very soon; the House of Representatives already approved the bill:
Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act of 2009 – Vote Passed (247-171, 15 Not Voting)
I apologize — I do not have a citation for this next chunk of material (I’m looking):
First Victory for Women and Working Families in the 111th Congress!“It’s a one-two punch for women, that could knock out many pay inequities,” said NOW President Kim Gandy as the U.S. House of Representatives passed two bills today that would advance fair pay for women. In a vote of 247-171 the House passed the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act (HR 11) to address the setback delivered by the U.S. Supreme Court last year for women victims of pay discrimination, and in a 256-163 vote they passed the Paycheck Fairness Act (HR 12).Thanks to the leadership of Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.), Rosa DeLauro (D-Conn.) and George Miller (D-Calif.), these bills were on the schedule for the opening days of the 111th Congress and serve as an encouraging sign for things to come. Women voted overwhelmingly to elect President-elect Barack Obama, who said during his presidential campaign that he would make pay equity a priority in his administration. Women voters also helped to elect a Congress that is more women-friendly than it has been in over a decade. We have worked for and have been waiting for this day in the House.The Ledbetter legislation, which was blocked in the Republican-led Senate last year, will essentially reverse the Supreme Court decision that requires workers to file charges on a pay discrimination claim within the first six months of receiving their first discriminatory paycheck. The Court’s decision in Ledbetter v. Goodyear gave employers the go-ahead to discriminate as long as they weren’t caught in the first six months after the onset of their illegal actions.
The companion bill, the Paycheck Fairness Act, which did not even make it to the Senate floor last year, closes loopholes that allow employers to pay men and women discriminatorily and provides consequences.
“NOW has been working since our founding over 40 years ago to end wage discrimination against women. We celebrate this day and look forward to the Senate’s upcoming vote on both bills,” said Gandy. The bills will go as a package to the Senate and Majority Leader Harry Reid has promised that “pay equity” legislation is at the top of his to-do list.
http://www.now.org/press/01-09/01-09.html
Background on Lilly’s case:
http://www.law.cornell.edu/supct/html/05-1074.ZS.html
Your votes for a new Congress and a new party in the White House appear to have had some effect “business as usual.”
See an Obama campaign video on Ledbetter, below.
(See more, here.)
Tip of the old scrub brush to Kathryn and Judith.
1 Comment | Bill of Rights, Civil Rights, Equal Rights, Human Rights, Law, Leadership, President Obama | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
This is just so, so, so delicious.
Look at this photo. It’s a shot of the crowd gathered in St. Louis on October 19 to see and hear Barack Obama — about 100,000 people. Study the buildings in the photo.
Supporters of Barack Obama rally in St. Louis, Missouri, on October 19, 2008
See the building with the green dome? Recognize it?
Elizabeth Kaeton wrote at Telling Secrets:
If you look in the distance there, you can see a building with a greenish-copper dome. That’s the Old St. Louis Courthouse. For years and years, slaves were auctioned on the steps of that courthouse.
The Old Courthouse used to be called the St. Louis State and Federal Courthouse.
Back in 1850, two escaped slaves named Dred and Harriett Scott had their petition for freedom overturned in a case there. Montgomery Blair took the case to the US Supreme Court on Scott’s behalf and had Chief Justice Roger Taney throw it out because, as he wrote, the Scotts were ‘beings of an inferior order, and altogether unfit to associate with the white race, either in social or political relations, and so far inferior that they had no rights which the white man was bound to respect.’
Hard to imagine, isn’t it?
What is rather uplifting is that, 158 years later, the man who will most likely be the first black US President was able to stand outside this very same courthouse and gather that crowd. Today, America looked back on one of the darkest moments in its history, and resoundingly told Judge Taney to go to hell.
That case is the first one I thought of when Sarah Palin got caught by Katie Couric unable to explain Supreme Court decisions with which she might have disagreed. In re Dred Scott is right at the top of my list, and generally on the tip of my tongue. We fought a great and bloody war to overturn that decision, amended the Constitution, bore another 100 years of atrocities, then passed the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Voting Rights Act of 1965, all to blot out the dreadful decision those conservative, activist judges wrought on the nation.
Kaeton posted the photo and comments last Saturday, before Freedom Tuesday when we voted as nation to clean up even more of the mess of the Dred Scott case.
History teachers: I’ll wager that’s a photo you can get cheap, to blow up to poster size for your classrooms. You ought to do it. Students should not only understand history, they ought also be able to take delight in watching it unfold, especially when justice comes out of the unfolding.
Found the photo and post, with a tip of the old scrub brush to Blue Oregon, while looking at the astounding number of literary and history allusions in Obama’s unique victory speech, in which he talked about Americans trying to “bend the arc of history.” I knew I’d heard that line before. It’s from Martin Luther King, who saidm “The arc of history is long, but it bends toward justice.” (Where did he say that? When?)
Those allusions, and the speech, may be a topic for another post.
Resources:
11 Comments | 1861-1865, Barack Obama, Civil Rights, Civil War, DBQ sources, Elections, Freedom - Political, History, History images, Human Rights, Obama 2008 | Tagged: Barack Obama, Civil Rights, Civil War, DBQ sources, Dred Scott, Elections, freedom, History, Human Rights, Slavery, St. Louis | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
Would George Wallace, the late segregationist Governor of Alabama and one-time threat to win the presidency, have voted for Barack Obama?
Ask George Wallace’s daughter, Peggy Wallace Kennedy. You might be surprised.
Wallace’s politics were a southern response to what was perceived as Washington’s abandoning of the southern states. Bush’s policies, especially in the wake of hurricanes that destroyed New Orleans and many other communities in the south, look the same to many southerners.
So, which way would Wallace have voted?
1 Comment | 1968, Barack Obama, Civil Rights, Elections, History, Human Rights, Politics | Tagged: Change, Elections, George Wallace, History, Human Rights, Obama, Politics, Segregation | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
Saint Louis Art Museum, St. Louis, Missouri George Caleb Bingham (American, 1811–1879). The County Election, 1852. Oil on canvas. 38 x 52 in. (96.5 x 132.1 cm). Gift of Bank of America.
Every polling place should be flying the U.S. flag today. You may fly yours, too. In any case, if you have not voted already, go vote today as if our future depends upon it, as if our nation expects every voter to do her or his duty.
Today the nation and world listen to the most humble of citizens. Speak up, at the ballot box.
The whole world is watching.
Leave a Comment » | Art, Citizenship, Civil Rights, Democracy, Democracy in action, Elections, History, History and art, History images, Museums, Politics, Voting Rights Act | Tagged: Art, Citizenship, Elections, History, Politics, Voting Rights Act | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
This one’s safe for work:
This one, not safe for work (profanity, usually mild – democratic ideas), but much funnier, and much more serious at the same time — I wish I’d known about it two months ago. Not nearly enough people have watched these, according to the YouTube counts:
If I can get five readers of this post, we’re home free, right?
Tip of the old scrub brush to UBZonker.
10 Comments | Campaigns, Citizenship, Civil Rights, Democracy, Democracy in action, Elections, Humor, Politics, U.S. Constitution, Voting Rights Act | Tagged: 5 Friends Vote, Campaigns, Citizenship, Constitution, Democracy, Elections, Humor, Politics, Voting Rights Act of 1965 | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
Law professor Stanley Fish tackled the issues around teachers wearing campaign buttons in the classroom, at his blog with the New York Times.
Fish says teachers don’t have a free speech right to wear buttons supporting their favorite candidates.
My point is made for me by William Van Alstyne, past President of the AAUP and one of the world’s leading authorities on the first amendment. In a letter to current president Nelson, Van Alstyne corrects his view that faculty “have a first amendment right” to wear campaign buttons. “I have no doubt at all,” he declares, “that a university rule disallowing faculty members from exhibiting politically-partisan buttons in the classroom is not only not forbidden by the first amendment; rather, it is a perfectly well-justified policy that would easily be sustained against a faculty member who disregards the policy.”
Right! It’s no big deal. It’s a policy matter, not a moral or philosophical matter, and as long as the policy is reasonably related to the institution’s purposes, it raises no constitutional issues at all. On Oct. 10, the United Federation of Teachers filed suit to reverse the button ban, claiming that the free speech rights of teachers had been violated. If that’s their case, they’ll lose.
I think he’s right — check out his post, and tell us what you think.
4 Comments | Campaigns, Citizenship, Civil Rights, Classroom management, First Amendment, Free speech, Freedom - Political, Politics, U.S. Constitution | Tagged: Classroom campaigning, Constitutional Rights, Election 2008, First Amendment, Free speech, Politics, Teachers | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
This is where we are: Marylanders who exercised their rights guaranteed under the First Amendment, peacefully gathering to call for changes in law, were labeled “terrorists” by the Maryland State Police, and reported to federal databases that way.
Do you wonder why you get searched every time you fly? Remember that letter you wrote to your Congressman complaining about high taxes? Remember that phone conversation with your brother-in-law over whether either of you would serve in the military today, without the threat of a draft?
Remember that time you taught the Cub Scouts how to fold the flag?
All of these things used to thought of as patriotic participation in government by citizens. But not any more.
All of these things are protected under the First Amendment. But if you use those First Amendment rights, and you’re in Maryland, watch out.
The abuses of the system were discovered and exposed by the Maryland attorney general.
And if you don’t live in Maryland? That doesn’t make you safe. It only means your state’s attorney general has not investigated what the cops are doing.
Your vote on November 4 is important.
You can also vote in a poll at the Baltimore Sun, asking whether such surveillance is okay. (No, it’s not.)
Below the fold: The New York Times editorial on the issue. Also, the editorial from the Baltimore Sun.
Leave a Comment » | Civil Rights, Dissent, First Amendment, History, Politics, U.S. Constitution | Tagged: ACLU, Civil Rights, Dissent, First Amendment, History, Maryland, Police, Spying, Terrorism, U.S. Constitution | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
Banned Books Week flies by way too fast. So many banned books, so little time.
Was it appropriate for Sarah Palin’s only debate with Joe Biden to come in Banned Books Week? Or, was it fate?
Liam Sullivan at Panorama of the Mountains had a great idea, running a list of good blog posts on banned books, “Banned Books Week 2008” — I’ll try to encourage readership at his blog by not repeating any of his listings here. That will make this little impromptu carnival shorter by a lot, and challenging to me to compose.
Let’s start with some of the big dog blogs.
Window display at the Twin Hickory Public Library in Glen Allen, Virginia, for Banned Books Week. via Boing Boing
A display showing live humans reading may become even more rare over the next few years, as the No Child Left Behind Act begins to affect Americans.
Jesus’s General noted the same display, but with a banner that shows the necessarily political character of standing up for books and knowledge in an era that tries to discount education as “elitism,” and smart and educated people as “elitists,” as if “elite” didn’t mean “the best.” Which brings up a sore point with me: How have the book banners been so successful in stamping out dictionaries? Dictionaries are great books to promote freedom — but just try to find a good one in most homes, or in school classrooms. My father and mother kept a dictionary on their desk at the store they owned; a good dictionary used to be a great high school graduation gift for a student off to college. When was the last time you saw such a thing used as such a gift? I digress.
Banned Books Week banner found at Jesus' General
Jesus’ General said:
Books can be dangerous. Many contain ideas. Sometimes unpopular ideas. Ideas that may make one think. Ideas that engage and transform us. Ideas that set off our imaginations. Ideas that can change the way we see the world. Ideas that may make decide to help change the world for the better. Clearly books can be subversive. And we can’t have that! An informed and imaginative people could do incredible things.
Paper Cuts, a book blog at the New York Times site, asks “What are you doing for Banned Books Week?” it features a nice photograph of the public library in Wasilla, Alaska. Barry Gewen offers great insights into Banned Books Week.
One of the most informative of these lists is “Banned and/or Challenged Books from the Radcliffe Publishing Course, Top 100 Novels of the 20th Century” — because it provides background on various censorship efforts over the years. It’s also the most amusing list, though it’s hard to laugh after your jaw has dropped.
George Orwell’s “1984” was challenged in Jackson County, Fla., because it was considered “pro-Communist.” Who would have imagined that the Wichita, Kans., public library would, ayatollah-like, challenge Salman Rushdie’s “Satanic Verses” for being “blasphemous to the prophet Mohammed”? In 1973, “Slaughterhouse Five” was actually burned in Drake, N.D. And Lindale, Tex., banned “To Kill a Mockingbird” from a school reading list in 1996 because it “conflicted with the values of the community” — leading one to wonder just what Lindale’s values are, and why anyone would want to live there.
Farm School, in honor of Banned Books Week, does a bang up job of nailing down the facts on the charge that Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin tried to ban books, when she was mayor of Wasilla (not exactly, but the details — truth is in the details).
Abby the Librarian carries another rundown of posts about Banned Books Week, including one from Mommy Madness that notes that banning books takes away a parental responsibility, giving it to the government. (Did you catch that, Joe Leavell?)
Everybody’s Libraries carries an explanation of “Why Banned Books Week matters.”
I’m Here, I’m Queer – What the Hell Do I Read? notices an uncomfortable trend, that several of the most-challenged books are challenged because they discuss homosexuality in non-condemning terms.
Cover of Ray Bradbury's Fahrenheit 451, via Maia's Blog - Just Add Coffee
Maia’s Blog – Just Add Coffee discusses Bradbury’s Fahrenheit 451 and the irony of banning a book about banning books, in “Banned Books Week, Day 6.” As you might imagine, this is the sixth in a series of posts. The other books covered are Brideshead Revisited, Ivanhoe, Sons and Lovers, The Phantom Tollbooth (challenges coming, I presume, from the Taliban, al Quaeda, and Dick Cheney), and The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn.
Another roundup of Banned Books Week posts, at Books Worth Reading.
Chez Namastenancy rounds up even more, and points especially to a quiz about banned books at the venerable on-line site of the venerable British newspaper, The Guardian. (English teachers: Can you say “bellringer?”)
Notes from Evil Bender discusses the importance of keeping ideas on the shelves of libraries, especially those ideas that some find “offensive” to “family values.”
School Library Media Activities Monthly carries this simple quote:
“Banning books is so utterly hopeless and futile. Ideas don’t die because a book is forbidden reading.”- Gretchen Knief, librarian, protesting a proposed 1939 ban against The Grapes of Wrath
Which posts about Banned Books Week sang out to you, that I’ve missed noting here? Comments are open — please share.
5 Comments | Books, Censorship, Civil Rights, Education, Free press, Freedom - Political, Freedom of Information, Freedom of the Press, Libraries, Politics | Tagged: Banned Books Week, Books, Education, First Amendment, Freedom of the Press, knowledge, Libraries, literacy, Politics, reading | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
As we ponder how to keep freedom in America in the middle of Banned Books Week, I worry about the dangers of vigilantes acting to effect a ban on a particular book, despite official actions.
How to fight these anti-reading, anti-American vigilantes? People in Lewiston, Maine, came up with the fantastic idea of simply buying more books.
Vigilantes sometimes check out the books they want to ban, and then simply don’t bring the book back to the library. If there’s no book on the shelf to be checked out, they reason, no one else can check it out. One such vigilante in Lewiston, an activist in favor of homophobia it appears, refused even a court order to return the book she wanted to ban, Robie Harris’s It’s Perfectly Normal.
Cover of Robie Harris's children's health book, It's Perfectly Normal
Jail time for the vigilante? Oh, the law would allow that. But instead, freedom fighters purchased four more copies of the book for the library.
Voting with ideas. What a concept!
Full text of the American Library Association press release, below the fold.
54 Comments | Banned Books, Books, Civil Rights, Education, First Amendment, Free press, Freedom - Political, Freedom of Information, Freedom of the Press, Human Rights, Libraries, literacy, Literature, Politics, U.S. Constitution | Tagged: Banned Books Week, Books, Education, First Amendment, freedom, Human Rights, Libraries, Media, Politics, Vigilantes | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
William K. Wolfrum writes “satire and commentary.” This would make great satire — but, darn it, it’s not: “Bush unleashes surge in War on Americans.”
What sort of riots does Bush expect? When?
Is there a Poe’s Law of politics? Can we impeach someone who follows that law, and quickly, please?
The 3rd Infantry Division’s 1st Brigade Combat Team has spent 35 of the last 60 months in Iraq patrolling in full battle rattle, helping restore essential services and escorting supply convoys.
Now they’re training for the same mission — with a twist — at home.
* * * * *
They may be called upon to help with civil unrest and crowd control or to deal with potentially horrific scenarios such as massive poisoning and chaos in response to a chemical, biological, radiological, nuclear or high-yield explosive, or CBRNE, attack.
Training for homeland scenarios has already begun at Fort Stewart and includes specialty tasks such as knowing how to use the “jaws of life” to extract a person from a mangled vehicle; extra medical training for a CBRNE incident; and working with U.S. Forestry Service experts on how to go in with chainsaws and cut and clear trees to clear a road or area.
The 1st BCT’s soldiers also will learn how to use “the first ever nonlethal package that the Army has fielded,” 1st BCT commander Col. Roger Cloutier said, referring to crowd and traffic control equipment and nonlethal weapons designed to subdue unruly or dangerous individuals without killing them.
“It’s a new modular package of nonlethal capabilities that they’re fielding. They’ve been using pieces of it in Iraq, but this is the first time that these modules were consolidated and this package fielded, and because of this mission we’re undertaking we were the first to get it.”
The package includes equipment to stand up a hasty road block; spike strips for slowing, stopping or controlling traffic; shields and batons; and, beanbag bullets.
“I was the first guy in the brigade to get Tasered,” said Cloutier, describing the experience as “your worst muscle cramp ever — times 10 throughout your whole body.
“I’m not a small guy, I weigh 230 pounds … it put me on my knees in seconds.”
The brigade will not change its name, but the force will be known for the next year as a CBRNE Consequence Management Response Force, or CCMRF (pronounced “sea-smurf”).
“I can’t think of a more noble mission than this,” said Cloutier, who took command in July. “We’ve been all over the world during this time of conflict, but now our mission is to take care of citizens at home … and depending on where an event occurred, you’re going home to take care of your home town, your loved ones.”
You read it right. The Army is coming to “take care of you in your home town.”
Were they being deployed to rebuild New Orleans, I’d regard it as a noble undertaking. Am I wrong to worry about what is up with this?
Whatever happened to the posse comitatus nuts?
Comments are open. What do you think?
Resources:
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Posted by Ed Darrell
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Ed Darrell on Texas's Colorado River
Come on in, the water's fine. Come often: Cleanliness is next to godliness.
Millard Fillmore's Bathtub 