A brief history of the origins and battles of the Martin Luther King federal holiday, and of the MLK monument at the Washington Mall, with full text and video of Martin Luther King’s “I Have a Dream Speech.”
us history
Voices From the Grave
Maj. Sullivan Ballou’s Last Letter to His Wife
Maj. Sullivan Ballou’s letter to his wife, written a week before he was killed at Bull Run in 1861, is one of the great eulogies of sorrow and divided duty to nation and family. As a memorial to the victims of war, who include survivors, especially civilians, the letter has few equals.
How One City Took Down Its Confederate Monuments: A Stealth History Lesson
After Charlottesville, Baltimore’s removal of Confederate statues in the dead of night was the city’s latest attempt to make peace with the ghosts of the Civil War. Other cities may be taking note.
Shirley Chisholm, “Part of the Heritage of Palm Coast,” Receives Presidential Medal of Freedom
Shirley Chisholm, the first black woman to run for president, retired to Palm Coast in 1991. She received the posthumous medal from President Obama today as an awareness campaign about her life and impact on Palm Coast grows locally.
The Confederate Flag:
A Swastika Cross-Dressing as Heritage
Removing the Confederate flag from public places isn’t a denial of first amendment rights. It corrects an offensive version of false history and opposes black honor to white supremacy.
Lyndon B. Johnson, Terrorist
In 1926, Lyndon Johnson and his friends bombed the town square in Johnson City, Texas, taking out all the windows of a bank. He was never punished, let alone arrested. Times have changed.
In Memory of D-Day:
Walking Omaha Beach
Let me tell you about a very lucky trip I had a chance to take with my wife and child about a year ago, to Omaha Beach in Normandy. I’d been wanting to go there for 30 years. I consider it part of my transformation, as an immigrant, into an American, like traveling the 50 states and being a Yankee fan.
Flagler Kills Together:
Bill O’Reilly’s Re-Assassination of JFK
Bill O’Reilly’s “Killing Kennedy,” this year’s choice for the annual Flagler Reads Together event, is not the usual O’Reilly polemic and provides in parts a fair summary of Kennedy’s presidency and the assassination, but it also has many flaws, writes Pierre Tristam.
Phil Robertson’s Edited America
Phil Robertson’s comments about gays, cloaked in religious dogma, touched off an immediate firestorm, but his observations about blacks in the Jim Crow South prompted an oddly muted response, though those comments reveal a man still living in a fantasy only white prejudice can construct.
Franklin D. Roosevelt’s Thanksgiving Day Proclamation, 1939
President Franklin D. Roosevelt changed the date of Thanksgiving in 1939, moving it up a week, to accommodate merchants and business still reeling from the Depression. The full text of FDR’s proclamation issued on October 31, 1939.
The Trouble With Veterans Day
It’s hard to see how, if a war is unjust, it can be heroic to wage it. So it’s flat-out preposterous to claim that everyone who has ever been in the U.S. military is a hero, argues Arnold Oliver, a Vietnam veteran who finds it troubling that Veterans Day has devolved into a hyper-nationalistic worship service of militarism.
Walmart at 50: Gutting the Middle Class 1 Small Business and Manufacturing Job at a Time
Walmart’s 50th anniversary caps a 150year stretch when the number of independent retailers fell by over 60,000, and when, between 2001 and 2007, some 40,000 U.S. factories closed, eliminating millions of jobs.
The Live Profile:
Who The Hell Is Saul Alinsky?
Saul Alinsky: a profile of the author of “Rules for Radicals,” dead since 1972, whom Newt Gingrich names as the reason to oppose Barack Obama. But the Saul Alinsky Gingrich creates never existed. The invention is more revealing of Gingrich than it is of Alinsky. A corrective to both.
In Praise of Tom Wicker, Antidote to the Age of Reagan
Tom Wicker, the Times columnist for 25 years, wrote as if he’d seen the country’s best days. He probably had even then, having witnessed the eight years of Reagan taking out a second, third and fourth mortgage on the nation’s prosperity while making Americans feel like a million bucks.
Sisco Deen on the Meaning of Veterans Day, Frank W. Buckles and Mackenzie’s Card
In a moving tribute to veterans and Frank Buckles, the late, last World War I veteran, Sisco Deen, Flagler County’s archivist, reminds us why we must “always remember and honor those who have served and dedicated their lives to our country.”
The Boys of Pointe du Hoc: Ronald Reagan in Normandy
Reagan’s speech at Normandy’s Pointe du Hoc on June 6, 1984, commemorating the 40th anniversary of D-Day, is one of his noblest, especially in retrospect, for what he said about the cold war, the Soviet Union and nuclear weapons.
Andrew Young, a Civil Rights Star, Glitters Over African American Cultural Society’s 20th
Andrew Young headlined Palm Coast’s African American Cultural Society’s 20th anniversary celebration Sunday with humor, a little Martin Luther King memorabilia, and a lot of pragmatic hope about American culture.
Malaise from Jimmy Carter to Barack Obama: Recalling the “Crisis of Confidence” Speech
Jimmy Carter’s malaise speech is revisited in the more positive context in which it was initially received, when the nation faced an energy and self-confidence crisis. Barack Obama is not in Carter territory yet.
When Income Was Taxed at 94%: How FDR Tackled Debt and Reckless Republicans
The last time the nation faced war debts Franklin Roosevelt didn’t hesitate to raise taxes and show up Republicans who stood in the way of fiscal responsibility, argues Sam Pizzigati.
Federal Individual Income Tax Rates By Year: 1913-2013
Federal income tax rates by year: the full history of marginal tax rates in the United States going back to 1913 in an easy-to-read format.
John F. Kennedy’s Speech on the Arts and Robert Frost, Amherst College (1963)
Full text and audio of John F. Kennedy’s Amherst College speech on the arts in 1963, one of the most eloquent defenses of the artist and art’s role in American civilization by an American president.
U.S. Citizenship Test: When Even the Federal Government Doesn’t Know the Right Answers
The writer, a Canadian who just became a citizen, realized she would not pass the U.S. Citizenship test unless she kept the correct answers to herself. She investigates the big differences between the citizenship test’s presumed answers and the real answers.
My Favorite Republican: A Look Back at Eisenhower’s Otherworldly Farewell Address
On the 50th anniversary of Eisenhower’s farewell address, what’s striking about the speech today, Donald Kaul argues, is its tone of balance and moderation. It sounds like a speech not merely from another era but from another planet.
Graduations from God to America
Graduation speeches are part of the American habit of reinvention. They should be provocative and revealing, even if we don’t all agree with the message.
Thomas Jefferson’s “Separation Between Church and State” Letter
Original text of Thomas Jefferson’s separation of church and state letter from Thomas Jefferson to the Danbury Baptist association, 1802.
“Pacific” a Sequel To Exalt War Passions
The Pacific war was not a sequel. It is here, with all the hand-me-down fatigues of war sequels.
Prohibition’s Binge of Sanctimony
On the history and stupidity of Prohibition, the 13-year binge of sanctimony that a minority of eugenics fans and anti-German racists imposed on the majority.
Gerrymandering
Gerrymandering’s origins had plenty to do with the wily efforts of Elbridge Gerry, governor of Massachusetts in 1812, whose redistricting scheme ensured that Democrats would clobber Federalists in elections.