There Passes a Hero Tonight.

It is my sad duty to call to your attention the death of a national hero. Congressman John Lewis (D-GA5) has died of pancreatic cancer. He was 80.  He was a real hero, who put his life on the line for his beliefs more than once. John Robert Lewis was battered and nearly killed by police for the crime of trying to cross the Edmund Pettus bridge outside Selma Alabama. He led sit-ins at lunch counters, student marches, desegregation attempts at schools. Later he would get elected to the Congress of the United States, where he would serve 17 terms. But he never gave up the struggle for civil rights. This spring, he spoke with Black Lives Matter protestors, and told them "don't quit. " In a way, he passed the baton to the new generation. He was one of the original Freedom Riders in 1961.

Representative John Lewis. taken from us this 17th instant, July 2020.
Gentlemen, remove your hats for a moment of silence.

cuatro de julio, veinte y veinte.

July Fourth, Twenty-Twenty.
On this day, some 244 years ago, a group of American Colonists, acting on behalf of electors, caused there to be published a document called the Declaration of Independence.  This document was a compromise. Yes, I realize that today, compromise is a dirty word. I realize that no one wants to compromise, ever. That they believe that compromise means death. or worse, because all too many have declared that they will kill and die before compromising. Well, this document, like many others after it, was a compromise. Some wanted to open with an offering of peace with the English King. Some were afraid that any such declaration would leave them open to a charge of treason against a lawful ruler. In the end, the members of the continental congress realized that the open rebellion that had been going on for a full year must be the course to take, and that the forces of the King must be driven forth from the newly-named United States. So it was. Each colony voted to form a new Union. The English King was to be told to piss up a rope. But this year, more so than many others, people have been demanding to know why they compromised then, and more so and worse in 1789 when they sat down to write the Constitution of the United States (replacing the grossly inadequate Articles of Confederation.) They wanted to know why a compromise, most especially with 3/5 of slaves or of "Indians not taxed." The Federalist papers, and other historians offer a fairly good idea why some of the compromises regarding taxes and representation, and even of slavery. but I want to talk about the "Great Compromise" from a different viewpoint. So here goes: