The Value of Civic Literacy

In May and June of 1959, the Supreme Court heard and decided Lassiter v. Northampton County Board of Elections. Louise Lassiter, a Black citizen of North Carolina, argued that the law that denied her the right to vote was unconstitutional.  That law required that the prospective voter "be able to read and write any section of the Constitution of North Carolina in the English language.”  The Court that heard her case was the Warren Court, arguably the most liberal Supreme Court in American history.  This Court had ruled 9-0, just a few years before, in Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka, in favor of Brown.  One might have expected Lassiter to prevail.  But the Supreme Court ruled that the law was constitutional and not discriminatory, because it tested everyone regardless of race (laws that did discriminate, and were thereby unconstitutional, had grandfather clauses that exempted those <whites> who already had a voting history).  Justice William O. Douglas, arguably the most liberal justice ever to serve on the Court, wrote the majority opinion.  That majority was 9-0.  Congress subsequently prohibited literacy tests as part of the Voting Rights Act of 1965.  Such civic literacy laws were constitutional – but they were rendered illegal by Congress.

All Riots are Caused by Police

Quite a title, huh?  Provocative, yes?  Hear me out, let me make my case. 

This piece was inspired by the movie The Trial of the Chicago 7.  It is a dramatization (partly fictional) of a real event, the trial of a bunch of "radicals" who came to Chicago to make a statement against the Vietnam War, and against the Democratic nominee for president Hubert Humphrey, who had not distanced himself from President Lyndon Johnson, the Democratic president who had aggressively expanded America’s participation in the war.   The year was 1968.

The Chicago 7 (Chicago 8 at the beginning) were charged with a “federal crime to use interstate or foreign commerce routes or facilities (such as by crossing state lines or through mail, use of the Internet, or phone calls) to incite a riot, organize, promote or participate in a riot or to extend activities of a riot" (Title X of the Civil Rights Act of 1968).  Five were found guilty of this crime (by a jury), mostly because of the judge's partiality.  All of the convictions were reversed by the United States Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit on the basis that the judge was biased in his refusal to permit defense attorneys to screen prospective jurors for cultural and racial bias, and the FBI surveillance of the defense lawyers' offices.  But it took 33 months to do so.

Drugs

The inspiration for this piece was an idealistic young man who was collecting donations for an organization called Law Enforcement Against Drugs, or L.E.A.D. for short.  (Let me say right now that the goals of L.E.A.D. are 1000% admirable, prevent youngsters and teens from being trapped by drugs).  Now, I admit I like to argue, and I am not above pontificating, so I approached this young man, and I began thus: laws against drugs are a cure that is worse than the disease.  We tried Prohibition and it didn’t work, so we repealed it.  Laws against drugs discriminates against minorities, because the drug of choice of middle- and upper-class white America is alcohol.

But here are a bunch of old arguments against the criminalization of drug use.

Showing Up

Democracy

Winston Churchill famously spoke: “Indeed it has been said that democracy is the worst form of Government except for all those other forms that have been tried from time to time.…”

What is a “democracy”?  Nothing more or less than “the people rule.”

For my part, any other form of government – monarchy or aristocracy – is a form of tyranny, no matter how well-meaning.  Which is not to say there is no good argument for them – they may have their place – but they are still tyranny.

"One person, one vote" democracy, a failure

However, democracy – our brand of democracy, our Constitutionally limited representative democratic republic – has utterly failed us.  If you don’t see this, don’t waste your time reading Ben Paine.  The self-evident reason behind its failure is democracy’s easy corruption by the influence of money.  I have written about this at great length.  The other problem is: the people in "We the People” are clearly not up to the task.

Whose America Is It, Anyway?

We Americans need to get a grip.

Many white Americans identify with the Pilgrims, with Jamestown settlers, with our Founding Fathers.  But most white Americans are descendants of much more recent immigrants.  Most white Americans' ancestors did NOT arrive on these shores via Plymouth Rock, most white Americans’ ancestors did NOT fight in our Revolutionary War, most white Americans’ ancestors arrived here in the last 150 years.  But even these children of immigrants choose to identify with Puritans rather than later immigrants.  Many white Americans would like to ignore the black experience, even though the first generation of blacks arrived here well before their European ancestors.  Many white Americans would like to ignore the indigenous experience, even though they populated the Americas for 10,000 years before the first Europeans set foot on these shores.