I miss those heady early days of the Shuttle program, especially when they were first figuring out stuff like autolanding.
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I miss those heady early days of the Shuttle program, especially when they were first figuring out stuff like autolanding.
Posted at 04:17 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)
With Jim Crow 2.0 in full force this week, I cannot forbear a brief note about Andrew Johnson's rejection of the Civil Rights Act of 1866 on this date. There is a great deal of racist stupidity all through his veto message, but his assertion that the bill "afford[s] discriminating protection to colored persons" does seriously heavy lifting.
In response, Senator Trumbull of Illinois, co-author of the 13th Amendment, ably laid out the myriad flaws of Johnson's objections. Of particular note:
Can human ingenuity point out where [it] discriminates in favor of colored persons? It says, in effect, that no one shall subject a colored person to a different punishment than that inflicted on a white person for the same offense. Does that discriminate in favor of the colored person?
Why sir, the very object and effect of the section is to prevent discrimination, and language, it seems to me, could not more plainly express that object and effect. It may be that it is for the benefit of the black man because he is now in some instances discriminated against by State laws; but that is the case with all remedial statutes.
They are for the relief of the persons who need the relief, not for the relief of those who have the right already; and when those needing the relief obtain it they stand upon the precise footing of those who do not need the benefit of the law.
But see, for white supremacists, providing relief to people who need it takes away from their superior position in society. It's a zero-sum game in their eyes.
Regardless, the Senate overrode the veto 33-15 on April 6, with the House following suit on April 9, 122-41. Of course, that was back when the Party of Lincoln actually cared about civil rights.
Posted at 08:27 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)
The Continental Navy (all of 2 frigates to start) was formed in late 1775, mere weeks before the USMC was created.
Alas, most of it was sunk or captured by the mighty British Navy. Once we were victorious in the Revolution, our "fleet" was pretty much neglected, and completely nonexistent after the sale of the frigate Alliance (which has an amazingly weird pedigree) on August 1, 1785.
But then bullies started picking on us, and Congress found "the depredations committed by the Algerine corsairs on the commerce of the United States, render it necessary that a naval force should be provided for its protection." Thus, the Naval Act was signed into law on this date in 1794, ordering 6 new frigates (or whatever configuration the president thought wise with no ships smaller than 32 guns).
Interestingly enough, construction was halted because of a self-limiting clause in the Act that was executed when peace broke out. Would that the AUMF had a similar feature.
In that vein, one hopes Congress sees the wisdom of passing SJRes10:
Whereas authorizations for the use of military force that are no longer necessary should have a clear political and legal ending
Also, too, let's pass the Department of Peacebuilding Act.
Posted at 12:45 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)
So glad Sitting Bullshit is no longer our president.
Happy Gigaton Release Day! I haven't enjoyed a new album as much as this in so very long. Love the jams, lyrics, and track flow, and it dropped last year at precisely the right time in my life flow.
In addition to the anthem above, I was immediately captivated by Dance of the Clairvoyants, as well as Alright and Who Ever Said, but they're all just awesome. It will be played a lot today as the kids and I engage in some spring cleaning (it's all hands, hands on deck).
Posted at 09:38 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)
I let my neighbor know beyond the hill;And on a day we meet to walk the lineAnd set the wall between us once again.We keep the wall between us as we go.To each the boulders that have fallen to each.And some are loaves and some so nearly ballsWe have to use a spell to make them balance:‘Stay where you are until our backs are turned!’We wear our fingers rough with handling them.Oh, just another kind of out-door game,One on a side. It comes to little more:There where it is we do not need the wall:He is all pine and I am apple orchard.My apple trees will never get acrossAnd eat the cones under his pines, I tell him.He only says, ‘Good fences make good neighbors.’Spring is the mischief in me, and I wonderIf I could put a notion in his head:‘Why do they make good neighbors?
If only they'd had the Internet, and access to a discussion of the sociopolitical significance of this ambiguous proverb.
Posted at 08:10 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)
You're a dumb one, Congressman Grinch:
Dr. Joyce is a strong supporter of local libraries and the importance of reading. Since 2019, he has visited 20 public libraries across nine counties in Pennsylvania’s 13th Congressional District to deliver hundreds of books from the Library of Congress. These books, including a vast number of children’s selections, are now available to readers across southwestern and southcentral Pennsylvania.
In recent weeks, classic authors, including Dr. Seuss, have been criticized for materials deemed to be offensive by the media. The GRINCH Act would protect authors and literature from the cancel culture that has become intertwined with public education.
This legislation would prohibit states and local government agencies from receiving funding under the Student Support and Academic Enrichment Grants program if they ban books.
Of course, nobody's banned Dr Seuss. But anyway, he helpfully linked to HR2147:
[A] State or local educational agency that has in place any law or policy that prohibits the availability of books or other written materials to students, teachers, or schools within such State or local educational agency based on a determination that such books or materials contain offensive or outdated language or images shall not be eligible to receive funds under this subpart.
This performative bullshit is good news for Captain Underpants, a girl named George, and a little penguin named Tango.
Posted at 11:01 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)
Our Indians came to us, and much rejoyced at our victories, and greatly admired the manner of English mens fight : but cried mach it, mach it ; that is, it is naught, it is naught, because it is too furious, and slaies too many men.
- John Underhill, Newes from America
You should go read Ben Railton's discussion of literature about the Mystic Massacre of 1637. One snippet I'd like to focus on is about the image to the right:
[I]t captures another and even more complex historical detail: the second circle of attackers are Native Americans, an attempt to include in the image the hundreds of Mohegan, Narragansett, and Niantic warriors who took part in the massacre as allies to the English and/or enemies to the Pequots. That Native American participation does not excuse the English in the slightest, neither for their overall impetus for the attack nor for their particular actions during it. But it does remind us of the quantity and variety of Native American tribes within even a relatively close geographic area, and of the individual and at times conflicting situations and needs facing each tribe (at any historical point, but doubly so in the post-contact era of course). That’s part of the story of Mystic as well, and one that the woodcutting accurately highlights.
Yeah, besides bringing plague, European conquerors also disrupted American political relationships by using indigenous communities as pawns against others (and, admittedly, vice versa). Also, too, they started an arms race.
Anyway, as I followed links in Dr Railton's post, I found the recorded accounts interesting in how they justified what was, objectively, a goddamned war crime. Most appear to be in the vein of, "they had it coming."
William Bradford recounts:
They approached ye same with great silence, and surrounded it both with English & Indeans, that they might not breake out; and so assualted them with great courage, shooting amongst them, and entered ye forte with all speed; and those y' first entered found sharp resistance from the enimie, who both shott at & grapled with them; others rane into their howses, & brought out fire, and sett them on fire, which soone tooke in their matts, &, standing close togeather, with yo wind, all was quickly on a flame, and therby more were burnte to death then was otherwise slain; it burnte their bowstrings, & made them unservisable.
Those y' scaped ye fire were slaine with ye sword; some hewed to peeces, others rune throw with their rapiers, so as they were quickly dispatchte, and very few escaped. It was conceived they thus destroyed about 400. at this time.
It was a fearfull sight to see them thus frying in ye fyer, and ye streams of blood quenching yo same, and horrible was ye stinck & sente ther of; but ye victory seemed a sweete sacrifice, and they gave the prays therof to God, who had wrought so wonderfuly for them, thus to inclose their enimise in their hands, and give them so speedy a victory over so proud & insulting an enimie.
All our genocide was simply a legitimate response to savages, an historical fact as told by the victors. For example, see this excerpt from History of New England (1882):
The reader is impatient to turn from a scene so distressing to humanity. Never was a war so just or so necessary, that he who should truly exhibit the details of its prosecution would not find the sympathy of gentle hearts deserting him as he proceeded.
Between right public policy and the suffering which sometimes it brings upon individuals there is a wide chasm, to be bridged over by an argument with which the feelings do not readily go along. When, for urgent reasons of public safety, it has been determined to take the desperate risk of sending scores of men into the field to encounter as many hundreds, and to be set upon, if they should be worsted, by as many thousands, the awful conditions of the case forbid being dainty about the means of winning a victory, or about using it in such a manner that the chance shall not have to be tried again.
At all events, from the hour of that carnage, Connecticut was secure. There could now be unguarded sleep in the long-harassed homes of the settlers. It might be hoped that civilization was assured of a permanent abode in New England.
The sweet repose of the righteous, never troubled by a little mass murder. America in a nutshell.
Posted at 12:06 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)
LOL:
Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) claimed during a hearing Wednesday that Democrats' signature voting rights bill, the "For the People Act," is unnecessary because "states are not engaging in trying to suppress voters whatsoever."
Sounds familiar.
Subscribe to Democracy Docket to keep updated on the continuing battle against disenfranchisement.
Posted at 09:44 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)
Posted at 08:19 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)
Posted at 09:59 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)
Dog, by Lawrence Ferlinghetti:
The dog trots freely in the streetand has his own dog’s life to liveand to think aboutand to reflect upontouching and tasting and testing everythinginvestigating everythingwithout benefit of perjurya real realistwith a real tale to telland a real tail to tell it witha real livebarkingdemocratic dogengaged in realfree enterprisewith something to sayabout ontologysomething to sayabout realityand how to see itand how to hear it
Dude lived a good, long life. I'll just note that Old Man Mex is technically older than Ferlinghetti was when he died last month, and thankfully, still hanging in there for a bit longer...
Posted at 08:24 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)
[T]he indispensable necessity of complete authority at the seat of government, carries its own evidence with it.
- James Madison, Federalist 43
All the bullshit justifications to deny DC statehood brings to mind the Pennsylvania Mutiny of 1783, when Congress still sat in Philadelphia:
This even took place in June, 1783, and was the cause of great excitement and controversy. Its importance in the history of the country is great, for from it may be dated the first decided intimation of a fixed and permanent seat of government; in other words, the necessity of a National Capital City, under the sole and exclusive control of the Congress, and independent of all State government and influence.
Its immediate effect was the removal of Congress from the city of Philadelphia; and though the Confederation continued to exist for five years longer, and every effort was made by the authorities of Pennsylvania to induce it to resume its sessions within her domain, Congress persistently refused to return to that city. Sessions were held at Princeton, Annapolis, Trenton, and New York, but never again in Philadelphia during the continuance of the Confederation.
It is true that before the occurrence of the events detailed above the idea of the establishment of a permanent seat of government had been suggested. A motion was made that Congress should hold open sessions, the postponement of the consideration of which was urged until Congress "shall have fixed upon some place where it may be proper to continue its residence, and where it may have some kind of jurisdiction without heing exposed to the influence of any particular State."
New York offered to cede the town of Kingston, and Maryland the city of Annapolis, as places for the seat of government, and upon the report of a committee these offers of the two States mentioned were transmitted to the other States, and a day was assigned for their consideration. By these means the subject of a "permanent residence" for Congress was brought to the attention of all the States, and four mouths were allowed for reflection, examination, and offers before any action was proposed to be taken.
But it must be evident, notwithstanding all this, that nothing so clearly presented the necessity of the determination of a place of permanent residence for Congress, and likewise the necessity of an exclusive jurisdiction over the place so selected, as the events which drove the Congress from the city of Philadelphia, and made that city and other cities which could be controlled by mob influence unsafe as a place for such permanent residence as Congress was seeking.
History, it seems, is not without a sense of irony:
Walker described how he had troops ready and waiting to be sent to the Capitol but did not have sign-off from the Pentagon, which in directives ahead of the events had restricted his leeway to respond to contingencies.
Add to the list of things the Founders did not intend: that a branch of the Federal government wouldn't defend another branch.
Posted at 03:37 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)
Following up on my post about the Pilgrim-Wampanoag Peace Treaty, I ought to let Ben Railton say a few words about something I elided:
This treaty, and more exactly the way it reflects the Plymouth colony’s perspective on Massasoit and his people, helps us understand the communal event that took place nearly a year later, in the autumn of 1621, and that was known at the time as the Harvest Festival (and more recently as the First Thanksgiving). Massasoit and his Wampanoag tribe were not just friendly neighbors to the Plymouth settlers, they were political and military allies, and the Harvest Festival was very much the equivalent of a State Dinner, hosting the leader of an allied nation to cement such diplomatic relationships through a formal culinary occasion.
Bradford’s not wrong that that alliance and peace continued for decades (long beyond the 1640s moment in which he wrote this passage), and certainly helped ensure the Plymouth colony’s survival in those early years. But during that same period, the English fought an extensive, brutal war against another neighboring tribe, the 1637 conflict that came to be known as the Pequot War (and on which more in tomorrow’s post). There are all sorts of ways to analyze the almost thoroughgoing absence of that war from our collective memories and narratives of the Plymouth colony and early America, but I would certainly argue that our emphases on the peaceful origins and relationship between the English and the Wampanoag plays into that elision. So while we can and should celebrate this cross-cultural diplomacy, we can no longer let it contribute to the disappearance of the Pequot and the Pequot War from our historical awareness.
In my defense, I did say it "more or less" kept the peace, but that was merely from the perspective of a singular political relationship. Anyway, I'm looking forward to Dr Railton's discussion of the Pequot War.
Posted at 01:47 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)
You can't go on thinking nothing's wrong.
Posted at 08:37 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)
The cry, "to arms," seemed to quiver on every lip, and gleam from every eye!
- William Wirt, Sketches of the life and character of Patrick Henry (1817)
So Patrick Henry gave a famous speech about liberty and death on this date in 1775. In all likelihood, what we know of the speech is not entirely accurate, but rather a reconstruction presented to us third-hand through Judge St George Tucker and William Wirt.
Here's the latter complaining about his project to write about the renowned orator 16 years after the man's death:
The incidents of Mr. Henry's life are extremely monotonous. It is all speaking, speaking, speaking. 'Tis true he could talk:—"Gods! how he could talk!" but there is no acting "the while." From the bar to the legislature, and from the legislature to the bar, his peregrinations resembled, a good deal, those of some one, I forget whom,—perhaps some of our friend Tristram's characters, "from the kitchen to the parlour, and from the parlour to the kitchen."
And then, to make the matter worse, from 1763 to 1789, covering all the bloom and pride of his life, not one of his speeches lives in print, writing or memory. All that is told me is, that, on such and such an occasion he made a distinguished speech. Now to keep saying this over, and over, and over again, without being able to give any account of what the speech was,—why, sir, what is it but a vast, open, sun-burnt field without one spot of shade or verdure?
My soul is weary of it, and the days have come in which I can say that I have no pleasure in them.
It seems the man gave good, fiery speech that made quite an impression, but nobody really remembered much detail. Reportedly Henry's fellow Virginian, Thomas Jefferson, said of him:
His eloquence was peculiar, if indeed it should be called eloquence, for it was impressive and sublime beyond what can be imagined. Although it was difficult, when he had spoken, to tell what he had said, yet, while speaking, it always seemed directly to the point. When he had spoken in opposition to my opinion, had produced a great effect, and I myself had been highly delighted and moved, I have asked myself, when he ceased, 'What the devil has he said?' and could never answer the inquiry...
His pronunciation was vulgar and vicious, but it was forgotten while he was speaking. He was a man of very little knowledge of any sort.
Such a contrast to contemporary politics where we have vapid pols who know nothing, say nothing meaningful or inspiring, and everything is captured on YouTube and elsewhere online for us to parse and argue about.
Regardless, for all his passionate speechifying about liberty during the Revolutionary Era, he lead the anti-federalist opposition to our proposed Constitution and weren't no democrat:
[S]ir, give me leave to demand, What right had they to say, We, the people? My political curiosity, exclusive of my anxious solicitude for the public welfare, leads me to ask, Who authorized them to speak the language of, We, the people, instead of, We, the states?
Henry feared enslavement by government, and claimed to hate slavery, but:
Among ten thousand implied powers which they may assume, they may, if we be engaged in war, liberate every one of your slaves if they please...Have they not power to provide for the general defence and welfare? May they not think that these call for the abolition of slavery? May they not pronounce all slaves free, and will they not be warranted by that power?
This is no ambiguous implication or logical deduction. The paper speaks to the point: they have the power in clear, unequivocal terms, and will clearly and certainly exercise it. As much as I deplore slavery, I see that prudence forbids its abolition. I deny that the general government ought to set them free, because a decided majority of the states have not the ties of sympathy and fellow-feeling for those whose interest would be affected by their emancipation. The majority of Congress is to the north, and the slaves are to the south.
It's a puzzle that this Virginian focused so much on states' and not individual rights. Anyway, he'd probably be best buds today with Ted Cruz, who also is all talk and no action.
In conclusion: Give us liberty AND give us death!
Posted at 03:18 PM in History | Permalink | Comments (0)
[T]he earth belongs to the living, and not to the dead.
- Thomas Jefferson to James Madison, September 6. 1789
Senator Mike Rounds, serving a state that by all rights ought not exist:
The Founding Fathers never intended for Washington D.C. to be a state.
A helpful list of other things the Founding Fathers never intended:
Yet here we are.
Posted at 09:26 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)
The Pilgrims' bigger neighbors to the north, Massachusetts Bay Colony, also did some things on this date:
Can you smell the freedom? At least they hadn't started hanging Quakers yet...
Posted at 05:27 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)
Now we come to the point in our program when, several days after meeting Samoset in 1621, the Pilgrims hosted the big guy, Massasoit. Mourt's describes the scene:
Thursday the 22. of March [Old Style] , was a very fayre warme day. About noone we met againe about our publique businesse, but we had scarce beene an houre together, but Samoset came againe, and Squanto the onely native of Patuxat, where we now inhabite, who was one of the twentie Captives that by Hunt were carried away, and had beene in England...and could speake a little English, with three others, and they brought with them some sew skinnes to trucke, and some red Herrings newly taken and dryed, but not salted, and signified unto us, that their great Sagamore Masasoyt was hard by, with Quadequina his brother, and all their men.
They could not well expresse in English what they would, but after an houre the King came to the top of an hill over against us, and had in his trayne sixtie men, that wee could well behold them, and they us: we were not willing to send our governour to them, and they vnwilling to come to us, so Squanto went againe unto him, who brought word that wee should send one to parley with him, which we did, which was Edward Winsloe, to know his mind, and to signifie the mind and will of our governour, which was to have trading and peace with him.
...
Captaine Standish and master Williamson met the King at the brooke, with halfe a dozen Musketiers, they faluted him and he them, so one going over, the one on the one side, and the other on the other, conducted him to an house then in building, where we placed a greene Rugge, and three or soure Custiions, then instantly came our Governour with Drumme and Trumpet after him, and some sew Musketiers. After salutations, our Governour kissing his hand, the King kissed him, and so they sat downe. The Governour called for some strong water, and drunke to him, and he drunke a great draught that made him sweate all the while after, he called for a little fresh meate, which the King did eate willingly, and did give his followers.Then they treated of Peace...all which the King seemed to like well, and it was applauded of his followers, all the while he sat by the Governour he trembled for scare: In his person he is a very lustie man, in his best yeares, an able body, grave of countenance, and spare of speech: In his Attyre little or nothing differing from the rest of his followers, only in a great Chaine of white bone Beades about his necke, and at it behinde his necke, hangs a little bagg of Tobacco, which he dranke and gaue vs to drinke; his face was paynted with a fad red like murry, and oyled both head and face, that hee looked greasily: All his followers likewise, were in their faces, in part or in whole painted, some blacke, some red.
One little item that I find interesting is that Massasoit is said to tremble out of fear. That might be natural when surrounded by armed strangers, but Nathaniel Philbrick notes in Mayflower:
Instead of Carver and the Pilgrims, it may have been Massasoit’s interpreter who caused the sachem to shake with trepidation. Squanto later claimed that the English kept the plague in barrels buried beneath their storehouse. The barrels actually contained gunpowder, but the Pilgrims undoubtedly guarded the storehouse with a diligence that lent credence to Squanto’s claims. If the interpreter chose to inform Massasoit of the deadly contents of the buried stores during the negotiations on March 22 (and what better way to ensure that the sachem came to a swift and satisfactory agreement with the English?), it is little wonder Massasoit was seen to tremble.
IKR? Anyway, the six-point agreement they made on March 22 helped keep the peace more or less for five decades, until the Pilgrims' kids got greedy (they shoulda stuck with socialism).
Posted at 12:33 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)
All those fuckers after 1/6 wanted Biden to be all Lincolnesque in his Inaugural Address. Well, here's how CSA Vice President Alexander Stephens responded to Honest Abe on March 21, 1861:
The new constitution has put at rest, forever, all the agitating questions relating to our peculiar institution, African slavery as it exists amongst us – the proper status of the negro in our form of civilization. This was the immediate cause of the late rupture and present revolution. Jefferson in his forecast, had anticipated this, as the “rock upon which the old Union would split.” He was right...
The prevailing ideas entertained by him and most of the leading statesmen at the time of the formation of the old constitution, were that the enslavement of the African was in violation of the laws of nature...They rested upon the assumption of the equality of races. This was an error. It was a sandy foundation, and the government built upon it fell when the “storm came and the wind blew.”
Our new government is founded upon exactly the opposite idea; its foundations are laid, its corner-stone rests, upon the great truth that the negro is not equal to the white man; that slavery subordination to the superior race is his natural and normal condition.
Yeah, you don't reconcile with racist, insurrectionist assholes because you can't. Also, too: it was all about fucking slavery.
Posted at 01:15 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)
Speaking of Putin’s disturbing anti-democratic tendencies, I wrote way back in 2003:
George W. Bush supposedly understands and gets along with Vladimir Putin because he “looked the man in the eye” and has “a sense of his soul.” Also according the Mr. Bush, Russia and the US are “allies in the war on terror”.
How comfortable are you having a President who has such a “broad and strong” relationship with an authoritarian leader like Putin? As Bush himself has said, “you can always judge the nature of a man by the company he keeps.”
Putin, Bush, and Trump were always "berries from the same field" in the Russian idiom. All three of them are killers in their own milieu. Now Vlad the Autocrat has challenged Biden to a duel because our president called out the truth, and no whataboutism can obscure the facts.
But what I wonder about the GQP's recent embrace of our Russian nemesis is whether they will acknowledge the kernel of truth in his response? We are a nation founded on genocide, conquest, and slavery. We are the only nation to wage nuclear war.
In their desperation to trigger the libs, will they also begin to support reparations for those we've harmed as a nation? Nah. They're cool with all that killing and other stuff because they, too, are berries from the same field.
Posted at 08:29 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)
Good times on 19 March, 1648/9:
The Commons of England assembled in Parliament, finding by too long experience, that the House of Lords is useless and dangerous to the People of England to be continued, have thought fit to Ordain and Enact, and be it Ordained and Enacted by this present Parliament, and by the Authority of the same, That from henceforth the House of Lords in Parliament, shall be and is hereby wholly abolished and taken away...
I've become radicalized enough that I wish we could do the same with our Senate, but alas, Article V:
[N]o State, without its Consent, shall be deprived of its equal Suffrage in the Senate.
Of course, the English Commons acted during their little Interregnum that started with a minor trial and beheading, plus abolition of the Monarchy. Makes modest filibuster reform look pretty good, eh?
Posted at 05:27 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)
The greatest filibuster in my lifetime (yes, I watched much of it live, including this part).
The C-SPAN description for context:
Senator Reid held the floor for over eight hours to speak about judicial nominations, an intended thirty-hour debate scheduled by the Republican majority, the business of the Senate, and other issues. No substantive business was conducted and Senator Reid often read from his book Searchlight: The Camp that Didn’t Fail.
In particular, the Democratic minority was not so pleased with Bush's nomination of Miguel Estrada to the DC Circuit, and ultimately quashed it. Granted, it's no Green Eggs and Ham against healthcare, but still...
Posted at 02:58 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)
My last post got me thinking about how Americans fetishize unanimity/unity, so consider this a little sidebar.
We have a few historical examples of Big Things being done unanimously: the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution, and Washington's election. Yet all of those hide some significant disunity.
The Declaration was approved 12-0, rather than 13-0, because New York had to abstain. But also, PA and SC voted against it on July 1, and DE was split so cast no vote initially.
Caesar Rodney had to ride hard to make it in time for the final decision on July 2 to break DE's tie. Anti-independence delegates John Dickinson and Charles Humphreys absented themselves so PA's vote changed. Edward Rutledge didn't support the break, but ended up pushing SC's delegation toward an affirmative for the appearance of being unanimous.
The Constitution was approved 11-0, not 13-0. Why? RI refused to even attend the Convention. Most of NY's delegation bolted in the summer due to objections against centralizing power, leaving Alexander Hamilton all alone with no state quorum.
Thus, George Washington quipped the Constitution was approved by "11 states and Colonel Hamilton." Also, too: only 39 of the 55 delegates endorsed the final document.
Even Washington, despite being the natural and obvious choice for president, didn't enjoy a neat and tidy election his first time out. Yeah, he scored 69 votes by 69 Electors from 10 states (RI and NC wouldn't ratify for quite some time), but NY was so divided that it couldn't appoint any Electors at all (and LOL, VA and MD didn't even cast 2 of their allotted votes).
In conclusion: unity is great and all, but it ain't all that.
Posted at 07:57 PM in History | Permalink | Comments (0)
You can't do anything without unanimous consent that matters.
- Sen Lindsey Graham to Sean Hannity, March 17, 2021
First off, it would truly be funny to see Graham filibuster until he fell over. Can I get some unanimous consent for some of that shit?
Now, it's true UCAs are "fundamental to the operation of the Senate" as it currently governed by its rules. Unanimous consent is important to the House as well, at least until MTQ came along.
But this is one small part of a typical UCA: "the vote on each amendment and the vote on passage of the bill be subject to a 60 affirmative vote threshold." So what Graham's saying is that he is desperate to preserve the Magical Sixty Vote Threshold for anything he doesn't want to pass, like protecting minority voting rights, thus maintaining the Senate's anti-democratic status quo (but without the hard work).
This would be generally consistent with the sexy beast who held his seat before, Dixiecrat-turned-Republican Strom Thurmond. Before getting into some racist tidbits from his record-setting filibuster against civil rights (August 28 to August 29, 1957), I thought I'd point a couple older, kinda funny examples of unanimous consent.1
I chuckled at this exchange:
Mr. KNOWLAND. My question is, Would the Senator speak up? I do not want him to strain his voice, but I should like him to speak a little louder so I shall be sure no motions are being made or anything of that sort. I do have some responsibility here.
Mr. THURMOND. I suggest that the Senator move closer to me.
Mr. KNOWLAND. Under the rules of the Senate, which are now being strictly enforced, both Senators being in their respective seats, and this happening to be my seat as the minority leader, I urge my request of the Senator.
Mr. THURMOND. We might get unanimous consent to allow the Senator to come closer to me if he wishes. I do not think my colleagues will raise any point. There is an excellent seat here, I may say to the Senator.
Mr. KNOWLAND. I am very well satisfied with the seat to which I am assigned.
It is well known that the Senate hates musical chairs. Then here's LBJ being very, very precise as to what he was asking for:
Mr. JOHNSON of Texas. Mr. President, would the Senator from South Carolina be willing to yield to me for the purpose of submitting a unanimous consent request to the Senate to the effect that when the Senator-elect from Wisconsin appears the telegram of the Governor of the State of Wisconsin may be read and the oath be administered by unanimous consent of the Senate, without my friend from South Carolina losing the floor thereby, and that his remarks thereafter shall not count as a second speech against him, and that this interruption be placed in another portion of the Record?
Okay, enough about that. Skipping to the end for a moment:
Mr. President, I urge every Member of this body to consider this bill most carefully. I hope the Senate will see fit to kill it. I expect to vote against the bill. [Laughter.]
Narrator: he did, and lost big anyway.2 Haha.
Anyway, Thurmond got a number of breaks thanks to interruptions for a variety of questions in addition to some Senate business, and he droned on without once reading the phonebook or recipes. Instead, he got his newspaper reading in, such as when he cited a July 4th editorial from Charleston's News and Courier:
Throughout June 1957 the American people were being pushed into a corner, precisely as the people of the province of South Carolina and 12 other colonies were being pushed in the broiling summer of 1776. No one attacked Sullivan's Island last month, except possibly mosquitoes. But liberties of South Carolinians and their fellow citizens in 47 States were under attack.
Who knows it? Who cares? Today Fort Moultrie, which should be a national shrine, is padlocked and the grounds overgrown with grass. Today, grass is growing over Ameri- can liberties.
Americans cared in 1776. Of George III, the signers said: "The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute tyranny over these States. To prove this, let facts be submitted to a candid world."
And so they submitted the facts. They said that King George "has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our Constitution and unacknowledged by our laws; giving his assent to their acts of pretended legislation; for depriving us in many cases of the benefits of trial by jury; for taking away our charters, abolishing our most valuable laws and altering fundamentally the forms of our governments; for suspending our legislatures and declaring themselves invested with power to legislate for us in all cases whatsoever."
Does this have a familiar ring?
Is not the Congress, on recommendation of the President, preparing a civil-rights bill that would deny trial by jury to some Americans? Isn't the Supreme Court striking down State laws, abolishing important laws of Congress and altering fundamental forms of our State and Federal governments? Isn't the Supreme Court legislating school laws for the South?
LOL, these guys always love to compare tyrannical apples with representative oranges. And notice the scaremongering about eliminating jury trials for people who violate civil rights (which the CRA57 did not do, but was amended to explicitly say so anyway).
So what else came up?
10 references to outside agitators who ruined the friendly relations "between the Negroes and whites." Call outs to "old Negro[es]" begging to keep schools and churches segregated. And stuff like this:
I simply say that in my State the Negroes are voting in large numbers. They claimed the credit for carrying the election for Stevenson in 1952, and at that time there was a very close election. They claimed they cast more than 80,000 votes, which was about 25 percent of the total. Their own newspaper contained that information. I have a clipping from that newspaper, the Lighthouse and Informer. So they are certainly voting in my State, and I am sure they are voting in the Senator's State. Is it not better to let the local people work out these problems, rather than to rush things on them, and try to change their customs overnight?
...
They are voting in the South in larger numbers than ever before. No persons in my State are deprived of the right to vote. If they are qualified to vote, they are allowed to vote. Of course, no man who is not qualified ought to be allowed to vote.
See? Some of them vote, so can't possibly be suppressing them! However:
[W]hite southern politicians fought against stronger voter protection mechanisms by arguing that Black people were either unqualified or undesiring of voting... They could also always point to a very small number of registered Black voters in any county as proof that some Black people could register to vote, if they so desired.
...
The records of southern registrars revealed starkly different voter registration processes explicitly linked to the race of the applicant. Some registrars did not require white people to take a literacy test at all. Other documentation showed that white and Black applicants were consistently asked different questions in literacy tests. Most provocatively, some records showed that illiterate white citizens passed literacy tests. There were white people listed in the voter registration books who had signed their name by leaving the mark “X.” Further interviews with unsuspecting white voters confirmed evidence found in the voting records. In at least one Mississippi county, the local registrar had never denied a single white voter applicant, proving beyond all shadow of doubt that white and Black voter applicants faced different standards based on race.
Second verse same as the first. Replace "qualified voter" with "legal votes" and "voter signatures" and Lindsey is making discreet phone calls just to make sure "signatures are verified" and nodnodwinkwink and are we sure he's not another one of Strom's secret children?
Regardless, I wonder how long Graham could realistically filibuster, and would he have to read more than Dr Seuss books to fill the time? I say it's time to find out, because there's a lot of legislation that matters we need to pass.
1 - No, I did not read the whole fucking thing. I skimmed, and searched for some keywords to reveal interesting nuggets. Mostly the dude read statutes and such, which were ostensibly germane to the debate at least.
2 - CRA57 passed 60-16 a couple hours after he finished.
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