How Will You Observe May Day?

The title of this post may seem rather senseless to most of you, for in all likelihood you have no plans to observe May Day at all. But there are people in countries around the world who will be observing May Day with great earnestness. 

In the U.S., May Day in the past was often observed with May Day baskets of flowers hung on the doorknobs of family/friends and with dances around a Maypole—but I won’t be writing any more about that. (If you want to reflect on that type of May Day observance, click here.)

Observing May Day in 1967

On May 1, 1967, I had lived in Japan exactly eight months. Even though it was a Monday, since it was an unofficial holiday in Japan, June and I had the day off from language school where we were students. That gave me the chance to see May Day observed as I had never seen it observed before.

The mission house into which my family and I moved in September 1966 was 20-minutes by foot from the Yoyogi National Stadium that was part of the venue for the 1964—and the 2020—Olympics. On that May Day, I decided to walk over there and see what was going on.

Before reaching the Stadium, I encountered masses of people—largely blue-color laborers—holding rallies and protesting what they considered injustices in Japanese, and world, society.

While the rallies were mostly related to domestic labor issues, there were also protests against the Vietnam War and against the presence of U.S. bases in Okinawa which were supporting that war. There were also appeals / demands that Okinawa be returned to Japan.

I don’t think I saw one other gaijin (foreigner) at those May Day rallies, and I was later told by gaijin friends that I was foolish for going there as I might have been accosted/injured. But it was a most interesting experience, and I am still glad that I learned some about that type of May Day then.

International May Day 2022

Although I didn’t know it then, in many countries around the world May Day is also known as International Workers' Day or Labour Day. The reason for May 1 being chosen as a day of advocacy for workers of the world goes back to 1886.

Two years earlier, a convention held by the organization of labor unions that later took the name American Federation of Labor (AFL) unanimously set May 1, 1886, as the date by which an eight-hour workday would become standard.

On that fateful Saturday, thousands of workers went on a general strike in support of the eight-hour workday, and rallies were held throughout the United States. The strike in Chicago led to the deadly Haymarket Riot on May 4.

Because of those events in Chicago, a few years later in Europe, advocates for laborers there and across the world chose May 1 as International Workers' Day. It is now a public holiday in some 80 countries around the world.

Here is a link to a 4½-minute video showing how six countries (beginning, interestingly, with Ukraine and including Russia and France) observed International May Day in 2017.  

And here is a link to a 2-minute video titled “Join the 2022 International May Day Online Rally this May 1!” It is by David North, an American Marxist theoretician who serves as the national chairman of the Socialist Equality Party (SEP) in the United States.

SEP opposes both “the ruthless imperialist ambitions of NATO,” and “rejects the national chauvinism with which the Putin regime defends its desperate invasion of Ukraine.” The online May Day rally will also be advocating for greater equality for the workers of the world.

Despite strong opposition to socialism by many USAmericans, why shouldn’t we, especially those of us who claim to be followers of Jesus Christ, be more concerned about the suffering and even exploited workers of the world?

Let’s observe May Day this year by at least giving some thoughtful consideration to how we might help working people struggling because of low-paying jobs that are inadequate for meeting their basic needs.

_____

** For a closely related viewpoint, I encourage you to read Celebrating Labor Rights, on May Day and Beyond, an article by Adam Russell Taylor in the May 2022 issue of Sojourners magazine. 

Thank God for the Quakers!

Growing up in rural northwest Missouri and then going to two small Baptist colleges in the state, I had no opportunity to know any Quakers. But long before I knew a Quaker personally, I came to have great admiration and appreciation for those known by that name. 

Quaker Origins

The beginning of the Quaker movement goes back to Englishman George Fox (1624~91) and the “openings” (revelations) he experienced 375 years ago, in 1646. A few years later, the Religious Society of Friends was the name settled on by Fox and his followers. They were also called Quakers.

In spite of considerable opposition, the number of Quakers in England grew quite rapidly, and by 1655/6 the first Friends arrived in North America, where there was also great opposition and great growth.

In 1681, 340 years ago, British King Charles II granted a land charter to William Penn, a Quaker, and that was the beginning of what became the state of Pennsylvania—and a period of significant Quaker influence in North America.

Quaker Beliefs/Practices

According to Quaker.org, “Quakers are a worldwide, global community of people who are diverse in every way, including what they believe and practice. There are Quakers who are progressive Christians, there are Quakers who are Evangelical, and Friends who are . . . even atheist.”

A foundational belief of Quakers from their beginning is that there can be direct, unmediated relationship with the Divine. Fox emphasized there is “that of God in every person,” and through the centuries since their beginning, Friends have stressed the Light Within or the Inner Light.

Because of that basic belief, Quakers originally, and many still, reject having clergy, creeds, or sacraments/rituals (including baptism and Communion).

Quaker Contributions

Even though there are many differences among contemporary Quakers, the historic contributions of the Religious Society of Friends are considerable. They include the following:

1) Their consistent emphasis on peace and opposition to violence. 

Perhaps that is the position for which they are best known, and that is one reason I developed such a good opinion of the Quakers in the 1970s, when I learned about the work of the American Friends Service Committee (AFSC).

AFSC’s current website gives this vision statement: “A just, peaceful, and sustainable world free of violence, inequality, and oppression.” They also state that their mission is to work “with communities and partners worldwide to challenge unjust systems and promote lasting peace.”

2) Their emphasis on equality and opposition to the subordination of women and to slavery.

Margaret Fell (1614~1702) was one of the co-founders of the Religious Society of Friends, and she was prominent in the early years of the Quakers in England. (More than ten years after the death of her first husband, she married George Fox in 1669.)

In the U.S., the Quakers were the first religious body to protest slavery publicly. In 1790 they presented a petition to Congress calling for the abolition of slavery, and the Quakers are positively mentioned in Uncle Tom’s Cabin.

Several of the most prominent advocates of both the abolition of slavery and women’s suffrage in the U.S. were Quaker women: Sarah & Angelina Grimké, Lucretia Mott, Susan B. Anthony, Alice Paul, and others.

3) Their emphasis on simplicity and opposition to ostentation and unnecessary consumption.

Friends have traditionally believed that people should use their resources, including money and time, deliberately in ways that are most likely to make life truly better for themselves and others. 

“Live simply so that others may simply live” is a saying often attributed to Mahatma Gandhi. But long before Gandhi was born in 1869, simple living was a cornerstone of Quaker practice.  

So, even though I have some misgivings about the underpinnings of Quaker theology, I say, emphatically, Thank God for the Quakers and for their 375 years of emphasis on peace, equality, and the simple life! The world now would be better off if there were more of them and more of us like them.

_____

** In background preparation for writing this article, I found Thomas D. Hamm's The Quakers in America (2003) to be helpful. And now I am looking forward to reading J. Brent Bill's brand new book Hope and Witness in Dangerous Times: Lessons From the Quakers on Blending Faith, Daily Life, and Activism, which is scheduled to be delivered to my Kindle tomorrow.

Tyranny of the Majority or Tyranny of the Minority?

Do you believe in majority rule? That is, should a 51% (or even 50.1%) affirmative vote decide who wins an election or what decisions pass a legislative body? That’s how we usually expect democracy to work. But 41 Senators can keep Senate bills from passing. Is that right?  

Protection from the Tyranny of the Majority?

As the “filibuster rule” now stands, 41 Senators can keep most Senate bills from coming to a vote. That is, it takes 60 Senators to vote cloture of a filibuster, and without that “super-majority” vote, the bill under question is not voted on.

The main argument in favor of the present system is that it protects the minority from the “tyranny” of the majority, which now, by the slimmest of margins, are Democrats.

Ross K. Baker, a distinguished professor of political science at Rutgers University, wrote an opinion piece published last week in USA Today. His point was that “it is not a good idea to get rid of the filibuster and thus enfeeble minorities and empower very slim majorities.”

Even when the bellicose language of “tyranny” is not used, the filibuster rule is seen by some, such as Sen. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.), as a way to encourage bipartisanship and cooperation in passing bills for the greater good of the country.

That may well have been largely true when Manchin (b. 1947) was a young man. But most probably it is, sadly, not effective now at this time of toxic polarity.

The views of the minority should, certainly, be listened to carefully and taken seriously. But should the minority have the power to determine what bills are voted on?

Protection from the Tyranny of the Minority?

As most of you readers know, I lived in Japan for 38 years and was a regular participant in university faculty meetings and in church business meetings.

Japanese culture places great emphasis on wa (group harmony). Thus, decisions were, ideally, made by consensus rather than by a vote—or by a vote after consensus had largely been reached.

Even in meetings of more than 100 faculty members, strong opposition from just a few vocal opponents of some motion on the floor could lead to postponing a decision or even withdrawing the motion.

One of my closest faculty colleagues complained more than once about such situations. That, perhaps, is when I first heard the term, “the tyranny of the minority.”

With the recalcitrance of the current 50 Republican U.S. Senators, it seems as though the U.S. Senate can often be aptly charged with being “guilty” of the tyranny of the minority.

What Can/Should Be Done?

The U.S. House this year passed, by the narrowest of margins but by a majority vote, the For the People Act (H.R. 1), which “addresses voter access, election integrity and security, campaign finance, and ethics for the three branches of government.”

Currently, unless the filibuster rule is changed, that bill is likely not to come to a Senate vote. The minority Party will kill the bill.

As it stands now, the same is true for the Equality Act (H.R. 5), the bill that “prohibits discrimination based on sex, sexual orientation, and gender identity . . . .”

Both of those bills not only procured the majority vote in the House, but public opinion polls also indicate that a majority of the adults in the U.S. agree with the provisions of those bills.

Those who advocate doing away with the filibuster have a strong case. But those who think the filibuster should be preserved, have arguments that must not be taken lightly. Something between all or nothing is called for.

In considering the matter of equality for all and protecting voting rights, though, surely the tyranny of the minority should not be seen as an acceptable course of action.

For the good of the country, the Senate must soon find a suitable position between the tyranny of the majority and the tyranny of the minority.

_____

In addition to Baker’s article linked to above, here are some of the opinion pieces I found to be instructive. (Some of these may be behind a paywall for non-subscribers.)

** Ruth Marcus, “Kill the filibuster — and reap what you sow” (The Washington Post, March 19)

** Zack Beauchamp, “The filibuster’s racist history, explained” (Vox, March 25)

** Jennifer Rubin, “Republicans’ big lie about the filibuster” (The Washington Post, March 25)

** John Fea, “The longest filibusters in U.S. history were launched to stop the Civil Rights Acts of 1957 and 1964” (Current, March 28)

Does Equality Vitiate Religious Freedom?

The U.S. Democrats want equality. The Republicans oppose equality because they want to protect religious freedom. But does equality vitiate (= destroy or invalidate) religious freedom? Or does/should religious freedom vitiate equality? Those are questions now confronting the polarized U.S. Senate. 

From BreakPoint's website, 
which strongly opposes the Equality Act

The House-Passed Equality Act

On February 25, the U.S. House of Representatives passed the Equality Act, a far-reaching measure that has been decades in the making and would prohibit public discrimination based on sexual orientation or gender identity.

Prior to the House vote, on Feb. 19 Pres. Biden issued this official statement: “The Equality Act provides long overdue federal civil rights protections on the basis of sexual orientation and gender identity, locking in critical safeguards in our housing, education, public services, and lending systems.”

Leaders from groups like the ACLU and Human Rights Campaign argue that the Equality Act ensures that gay and transgender Americans are no longer fired, kicked out of their housing, or otherwise discriminated against due to their sexuality or gender identity.

The Equality Act of 2021 was passed in the House of Representatives by a vote of 224-206. Every Democrat in the House voted for it, but only three Republicans did.

The Senate-Opposed Equality Act

As things stand now, the Equality Act is not likely to be passed by the U.S. Senate. That is because of the filibuster rule that requires 60 votes to pass most legislation. Far more than 40 of the 50 Republican Senators are opposed to the House-passed bill.

Perhaps the main reason for the Republican opposition is their unwillingness to approve anything favored by Democrats. But the primary reason given publicly for their opposition centers around “religious freedom” concerns.

If full equality of LGBTQ persons becomes the law of the land, religious leaders and/or institutions can no longer discriminate against, or denounce, such people.

Such discrimination or denouncement is based on religious beliefs that homosexual activity and gender transitioning are contrary to God’s will, the Bible, and/or traditional religious practices.

Does Equality Vitiate Religious Freedom?

I have been a long and persistent advocate for religious liberty. People should be free to hold religious beliefs and to engage in religious activities without interference by others, including—or especially—governmental interference.

But what if one’s religious beliefs/practices infringe upon the civil rights of other people? Shouldn’t the civil rights of all take precedence over the religious rights of some?

The U.S. Civil Rights Act of 1964 prohibited discrimination on the basis of race, color, religion, sex, or national origin. That was a good and important bill that has helped eliminate much—but, unfortunately, not all—harmful discrimination in this country.

But there were those who thought that that bill impinged upon their freedom of religion.

For example, ultra-conservative Bob Jones University in South Carolina, which thought that the Bible opposes the mixing of the races, as most Southerners thought from before the Civil War, continued to oppose racial equality until the year 2000.

In a radio broadcast on Easter Sunday in 1960, Bob Jones Sr., the school’s founder, explained: “If you are against segregation and against racial separation, then you are against God Almighty because He made racial separation in order to preserve the race through whom He could send the Messiah and through whom He could send the Bible.”

Jones had the right and the constitutional freedom to make such a statement. But the government had the right to champion the civil rights of all citizens, and eventually Bob Jones University had to enroll Black students and then even permit interracial dating.

Bob Jones Sr. and Bob Jones Jr. didn’t have to change their religious beliefs, but they did have to change their school’s practices because of its negative impact on other people.

Isn’t it the same now with regards to LBGTQ people? People should be free to hold whatever religious beliefs they wish. But in practice, civil rights, the right of full social equality, must be upheld for all people.

Equality doesn’t vitiate religious freedom. But the religious freedom of some must never be allowed to vitiate the civil right of equality for all.

_____

Here are some pertinent online articles that deal with the central issue of this post:

Equality Act stirs passions about the definition of religious liberty and RFRA’s role (Mark Wingfield, Baptist News Global, March 8)

LGBTQ rights bill ignites debate over religious liberty (David Crary, Religion News Service, March 8)

What’s in store for the Equality Act, and why do some religions want a revision? (Yonat Shimron, Religion News Service, Feb. 26)

Do No Harm Act (Human Rights Campaign, Feb. 25)

Hopes for the Biden Presidency

Barring unforeseen events, at noon today, January 20, 2021, Joseph R. Biden will be sworn in as the 46^th President of the United States. My first hope for the Biden presidency is that it will, indeed, begin with an inauguration unblemished by violence and bloodshed. 

Here are some of my main hopes for the Biden presidency.  

* Bringing the covid-19 pandemic under control

The first daunting challenge the Biden administration faces is the ongoing and even worsening covid-19 pandemic. There have now been over 400,000 coronavirus-related deaths in the U.S. Bringing this tragic disease under control must be a top priority for the new President and his administration.

On Jan. 14, Biden announced a massive, $1.9 trillion plan for combatting the pandemic and the economic problems caused by it. Dubbed the “American Rescue Plan,” that bold proposal was soon panned by some GOP politicians and will face much opposition. But I truly hope the Biden administration’s anti-covid efforts will be successful.

* Working to combat global warming

My first blog post of 2020 was about climate change, which I contended was the greatest challenge of the new decade. The last four years have seen a significant weakening of the government’s efforts to confront the global warming crisis.

The new President needs to lead the U.S. to rejoin the Paris Agreement, as he has promised to do. He also needs to restore many of the EPA regulations gutted by the Trump administration. This work is not for his own political benefit in the coming four years, but for the benefit of future generations.

* Supporting control of nuclear weapons

In addition to rejoining the Iran nuclear deal, the Biden administration needs to show support for the U.N.’s Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons (TPNW), which goes into effect just two days from now, on January 22.

The U.S. and the other nations with nuclear weapons have not yet signed the TPNW. But in addition to global warming, the widespread presence of nuclear weapons in the world poses a serious threat to the well-being of all people now and in the future. I hope that will change during the Biden presidency.

* Working for a society with greater economic and racial equality

There is much that needs to be done to overcome the societal structures that favor wealthy people at the expense of the middle class and those struggling in poverty and that favor white people to the disadvantage of people of color.

The USAmerican goal has long been “liberty and justice for all.” ‘For all” means all individuals living in this country regardless of gender, race, economic status, political ideology, or religious background. I strongly hope the new administration will, indeed, lead the nation closer toward reaching this goal.

* Restoring political bipartisanship to the Capitol

In order to fulfill these hopes, there needs to be much greater bipartisanship among elected U.S. politicians. For especially the last twelve years there has been far too much polarization and lack of politicians seeking the common good.

I certainly hope President Biden can cultivate the cooperation needed for there to be good governance.

Much more needs to be said about each of the above hopes, and these are just a few of many other hopes I have for the Biden presidency.

Please note that these are not “political” hopes in support of one political party. They are hopes for the benefit of the American people and for the wider world.

What hopes do you have for the Biden presidency in place of or in addition to the matters I have listed above?

Votes for Women: The Battle of August 1920

As is being widely publicized this month, women in the U.S. were given the universal right to vote 100 years ago this week, on August 18, 1920, when Tennessee became the 36^th state to ratify the 19^th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. 

June posing as a 1920 suffragist

Women’s Voting Rights before 1920

Women in most of the U.S. states did not have the right to vote in presidential elections before 1920.

For example, my paternal grandmother was born in 1881, so she turned 21, the voting age for men back then, in 1902. In the presidential election of 1904, though, she could not go to the polls with her husband George, whom she had married earlier that year.

Grandma Laura Seat was also unable to vote in the elections of 1908, 1912, or 1916. In the Declaration of Independence, the words “all men are created equal” still meant men instead of people 140 years later.

At the July 1848 Seneca Falls Convention, Elizabeth Cady Stanton adopted the motto, “All men and women are created equal,” and they demanded the right to vote. That still hadn’t happened 68 years later when Grandma Laura was not legally permitted to vote in 1916.

But the situation changed in August 1920.

The Suffs and the Antis in 1920

The U.S. Congress passed the 19^th Amendment on June 4, 1919—but it had to be ratified by 36 of the 48 states in order to become part of the Constitution. The battle for and against ratification in Tennessee, the 36^th state, was fiercely fought in August 1920.

That battle between the “Suffs” (those for women’s suffrage) and the “Antis” (those opposing suffrage, which included many women) is engagingly told in Elaine Weiss’s 2018 book The Woman’s Hour: The Great Fight to Win the Vote. And what a battle it was!

The strong women Antis emphasized several dangers the 19^th Amendment posed, including the dismantling of “white supremacy, states’ rights, and cherished southern traditions” (Weiss, p. 44).

Somehow, I had not previously realized how so much of the opposition to women’s suffrage was by southerners, still indignant over the outcome and effects of the Civil War and adamantly opposed to Black women gaining voting rights.

The Antis also included many women who were part of the conservative Christian evangelicalism of the South and linked with the fundamentalism that was growing in strength throughout the 1910s.

Among many other things, the Antis attacked the Suffs because of Elizabeth Cady Stanton’s Woman’s Bible (1895, 1898).

On the other hand, the Suffs were single-minded in their advocacy for women’s suffrage—and, regrettably, because of that single-mindedness they compromised on other matters of social justice, especially with regard to the rights of African Americans.

But, could the 19^th Amendment have been ratified otherwise? Perhaps not. Thankfully, it was ratified by Tennessee on August 18 and took effect on August 26, 1920. Surprisingly, though, most women didn’t vote in the November election that year.

What About 2016 & 2020?

It is reported that in the 2016 presidential election, 63.3% of eligible women voters went to the polls but only 59.3% of eligible men voters did.

Given the 72-year struggle (from 1848 to 1920) for voting rights, though, why would nearly 37% of women not vote in the last presidential election? Perhaps some of them still agreed with the Antis of 1920, although surely almost all women today think they should have the right to vote.

If just a small percentage of those women who didn’t go to the polls had done so, the 2016 election would likely have turned out differently, for of those women who did vote, 54% of them voted for Clinton whereas 53% of men voted for Trump.

In this centennial year of women’s suffrage, many of us are hoping that a far greater number of women will vote on November 3. “Votes for women” didn’t elect a woman president in 2016, but voting women can (and probably will!) make Senator Kamala Harris the first female vice president in U.S. history.

The 14th Amendment, the “Second Constitution”

To state the obvious, race relations in the U.S. are not good at the present time. The shootings of two black men by police officers and the “revenge shootings” this month of on-duty police officers in Dallas and Baton Rogue are indicative of the racial tensions within the country.

As bad as things are, however, they are not nearly as bad as they were 150 years ago, in 1866. And largely because of what Congress did in June of that year, things are much better now than they were then—in spite of lingering problems.

My July 5, 2013, blog article was titled “Celebrating the Ninth of July” (see here), and it was largely about the ratification of the 14^th amendment to the U.S. Constitution on that date in 1868. But I know a lot more about that amendment now than I did then.

I know more now largely because of reading the detailed book by Garrett Epps, Democracy Reborn: The Fourteenth Amendment and the Fight for Equal Rights in Post-Civil War America (2006).

Epps’s highly regarded book describes the torturous path toward drafting the 14^th amendment and getting it passed in June 1866. The Senate passed the new amendment by a vote of 33 to 11 on June 8 and five days later the House of Representatives passed it with a vote of 120 to 32.

Regarding the latter vote, Epps points out that no Democratic voted for it and no Republican voted against it (p. 239). (As I keep pointing out, today the positions of the two parties are completely reversed.)

The new amendment granted citizenship to “all persons born or naturalized in the United States,” which included former slaves recently freed by the 13^th amendment. In addition, it forbids states from denying any person “life, liberty or property, without due process of law” or to “deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.”

Connecticut promptly ratified the proposed amendment on June 30, followed by New Hampshire on July 6. Somewhat surprisingly, Tennessee, one of the states that seceded, was the third state to ratify the new amendment—and it was the only southern state to ratify it until forced to do so.

Since the other former Confederate states refused to ratify the amendment, Congress passed the Reconstruction Act, which imposed military government on those states until new civil governments were established and which also declared that each former Confederate state must ratify the 14^th amendment before “said State shall be declared entitled to representation in Congress.”

So, finally, the 14^th amendment to the Constitution was ratified on July 9, 1868, and that was of great significance—although much of it was not implemented fully for nearly 100 years.  

Even though a part of the deliberations about the 14^th amendment, voting rights for black men were not granted until the ratification of the 15^th amendment in 1870. And although discussed in connection with both the 14^th and 15^th amendments, voting rights for women of any color were not granted until 1920!

Still, in the words of Wake Forest University law professor James E. Bond, “The fourteenth amendment is a second American Constitution, the ‘new birth of freedom’ for which Lincoln had prayed at Gettysburg” (see here).

It was not, however, until the Brown v. Board of Education decision of the SCOTUS in 1954, the Civil Rights Act of 1964, and the Voting Rights Act of 1965 that provisions of the 14^th amendment were implemented for many African-American citizens.

And, sadly, now more than 50 years later racial discrepancies still persist. 

What Does “Of the People, By the People, For the People” Mean?

It is sobering to visit Cemetery Hill in Gettysburg, Pennsylvania—as I did for the first time last week.

Cemetery Hill is the name of the place where a private cemetery was started in 1854. Nine years later, from July 1-3, 1863, it became the site of one of the most important battles of the Civil War.

That was also the place where in November of that year President Lincoln delivered what we know as the Gettysburg Address, a speech that took about two minutes. In the picture below you see June looking at the bust of Lincoln. His entire talk is engraved on the bronze plaque behind her. 

In some of the most widely quoted words from Gettysburg Address, Lincoln expressed his strong desire that “the nation shall have a new birth of freedom, and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.”

Those words are generally taken as a clear call for democracy—and surely that is correct. But there is almost no one in this country, regardless of political party, who does not advocate or support democracy. 

For some reason, though, more than one speaker at the meeting of the Faith and Freedom Coalition meeting (that I wrote about here) thought it important to cite Lincoln’s words—and to emphasize that he was a Republican.

Some say that Lincoln was making a clarion call for equality among all people of the nation. Those words were spoken after the Emancipation Proclamation was issued on Jan. 1, 1863. Still, that proclamation only freed slaves in the Confederate States.

Moreover, it would be another 57 years before women of any color could participate equally in the democratic process by voting.

Others may point out that a government “for the people” is one that actively promotes the “general Welfare,” as stated in the preamble of the Constitution.

That, though, seems to be at odds with a major emphasis of the Republican Party since the days of President Reagan, who emphasized that “government is not the solution to our problem; government is the problem.”

It is somewhat puzzling that in his inaugural address of 1981, Reagan went on to say, “From time to time we’ve been tempted to believe that society has become too complex to be managed by self-rule, that government by an elite group is superior to government for, by, and of the people.”

Republicans now repeatedly talk about smaller government, states’ rights, and decisions made locally rather than in Washington.

Lincoln’s words, though, were spoken in the midst of the Civil War, fought first of all to keep the Union together. He was surely talking about a federal government “for, by, and of the people.”

If it had been left up to the individual states, or to local governments, how long would it have taken for the slaves of the South to be freed? Another 50 years? Another 100 years? Perhaps.

As it was, it took almost a hundred years for the Civil Rights Act to be passed in 1964 and the Voting Rights Act to be passed in 1965—and those two extremely important pieces of legislation were enacted by a Democratic Congress and signed by a Democratic President.

Basic positions of the Democratic and Republican parties in the 1960s were almost completely reversed from those of the 1860s—and people who fail to note that change misconstrue American history.

So, I want a federal government of, by, and for the people—just like Lincoln did. 

Honoring a Good Bond

Monday was the federal holiday honoring the birth of Martin Luther King, Jr. My previous article, posted on January 15 (his actual birthday), was partly about King and the Nobel Peace Prize acceptance speech he gave in 1964.

This article is about Julian Bond, one of King’s younger co-workers in the civil rights struggle. Bond was born on January 14, 1940, the day before King’s 11^th birthday. In addition to being a premier civil rights leader, Bond was also a politician and a college professor. He died on August 15, 2015.

Like King, Bond went to Morehouse College in Atlanta. While a student there in 1960, Bond helped establish the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC). Because of his extensive involvement in the civil rights movement and his political activities, he didn’t graduate from Morehouse until 1971.

After passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and Voting Rights Act of 1965, Bond was one of eleven African Americans elected to the Georgia House of Representatives. Even though he had not yet finished college, he ran for a House seat in November 1965 and won.

But the Georgia House overwhelmingly refused to seat him in January 1966. They took that action because Bond had publicly endorsed SNCC’s strong opposition to the country’s involvement in the Vietnam War.

Bond and MLK Jr. cast their ballots in Atlanta

to fill Bond’s “vacant” seat for the Georgia House.

Not only did Bond approve of SNCC’s anti-Vietnam War statement, he was a pacifist—as he publicly stated that same month on “Meet the Press.” In that interview he said he developed his pacifist views at the Quaker high school he had attended.

Since the Georgia House declared that Bond was not suitable to be seated, an election was held to fill the vacancy. Bond was elected again. The House refused to seat him again, so another election was held. And guess what: Bond was elected for the same seat a third time!

The standoff was settled when the U.S. Supreme Court unanimously ruled that Bond’s First Amendment rights were being violated and that he could not be barred from serving in the Georgia House. So Bond was finally seated as a state representative.

Bond served in the Georgia House for nine years and then went on to serve in the Georgia Senate from 1975 to 1986. During his tenure in the state legislature, Bond wrote over 60 bills that were ratified as law.

His political career came to an end in 1986 when he narrowly lost his bid for the U.S. House to John Lewis, the seat that Lewis still holds after 30 years.

In 1971, the year he graduated from college, Bond co-founded the Southern Poverty Law Center with Morris Dees, a lawyer, and served as the president from its beginning until 1979. Then toward the end of his career, Bond was chairman of the NAACP from 1998 to 2010.

Bond began his teaching career in 1988. He taught as several different universities, but mainly at the University of Virginia from which he retired, and was made professor emeritus, in 2012.

Yes, Julian was a good Bond who deserved the many honors he received, including 28 honorary degrees and a 2008 Library of Congress Living Legend Award. His contributions to racial equality and social justice in this country were significant, indeed, and I am happy to honor his memory here.

But from what I heard at MLK Jr. programs over the past weekend, there still is much that needs to be done for racial equality and justice.

The Levellers

This article is being posted on the 370^th anniversary of a battle you may never have heard of as an excuse to write about a group you may never have heard of. But there is some value in knowing about First Battle of Newbury (fought on Sept. 20, 1643) and especially about the group known as the Levellers.
 

(The group I am writing about, though, is not to be confused with the English rock band founded in 1988 and named the Levellers.)

While most USAmericans know quite a bit about the Civil War in the U.S., most of us don’t know much about the English Civil War, which was fought in the 1640s. One of the major battles of that war was fought at Newbury, about 60 miles west of London.

That First Battle of Newbury was led by King Charles I, who ended up losing his head (literally, in Jan. 1649) in the civil war. He was the leader of the Royalist forces, but the Parliamentarian forces won the battle.

Thomas Prince was on the side of the Parliamentarians in the English Civil War, and he was badly wounded at the Battle of Newbury. In the late 1640s, Prince, along with John Lilburne and Richard Overton, became a leader of a political movement that came to be known the Levellers.

If you have read “A Thicker Jesus: Incarnational Discipleship in a Secular Age,” Glen Harold Stassen’s 2012 book, you know something about these matters, for he narrates how Overton and the other Levellers were “pioneers of democracy.”

Stassen also explains that the Levellers group was one of the “free-church sects,” along with the Anabaptists, Baptists and Quakers, which had considerable influence on the development of democracy in England and then in New England and the other Colonies.

While there is some confusion about the origin of their name, it is clear that the Levellers believed all people should be equal before the law; that is, the law should equally protect the poor and the wealthy. They were also advocates of the complete freedom of religion.

Overton (1599-1664) was a Baptist during the “contentious days” of the English Civil War. According to Stassen, “He strongly advocated the human right of religious liberty on the biblical basis of following Jesus” (67-68). In 1647 Overton published the first comprehensive doctrine of human rights.

Overton first made a confession of faith and was baptized at the Waterlander Mennonite Church in Holland in 1615. (The Waterlanders had broken off from the main Mennonite branch in 1555, and by 1615 they were comprised of about 1,000 baptized believers in Amsterdam.)

But back in England he became a Baptist, and also became friends with Roger Williams, it seems. Williams left England for Boston in 1630 and founded the first Baptist church in North America later that decade. In the 1640s he was writing the same sort of thing about religious liberty in New England that Overton and the other Levelers were writing in England during that same decade.

Stassen links the central emphases of Overton to the American Pledge of Allegiance, saying that the words about “liberty and justice for all” were central in Overton’s writings. (It is estimated that Overton wrote about fifty pamphlets arguing for political and religious liberty.)

Thinking about the Levellers and their emphasis on equality and justice reminded me of this cartoon, which you may have seen on Facebook where I found it.

Or maybe there is not much difference between equality and justice, if you are talking about eye level rather than where one’s feet are.