Freedom From: The Failure of Majority Thinking

This morning, reading about Rick Perry's comments from yesterday regarding the Texas legislature's so called "Merry Christmas Bill" hit a nerve with me. To be specific, he said "Freedom of religion doesn't mean freedom from religion." Let that sink in for a moment.

The argument at the heart of his comment is that the First Amendment guarantees the right to practice one's own religion, but not the right to not be infringed upon by the practices of others. Quick refresher time:

"Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances."

Swell. Now let's look at how the courts have interpreted that. In 1947, you know, back in the "good old days" that so many people hearken back to as a time when the country allegedly had a more firm grip on it's relationship with Jesus, in Everson v. Board of Education, Justice Black expounded on the Establishment clause of said Amendment, explaining "Neither a state nor the Federal Government can set up a church. Neither can pass laws which aid one religion, aid all religions, or prefer one religion to another ... in the words of Jefferson, the [First Amendment] clause against establishment of religion by law was intended to erect 'a wall of separation between church and State' ... That wall must be kept high and impregnable." No, the Everson v. Board of Education was not the first instance* of the court's quoting Jefferson's "Separation between church and state" doctrine, but it is the germane instance, because it is the instance in which the court extends the First Amendment into state legal issues, and let's face it, Texas is a state.

It is also interesting to note that our fledgling nation also ratified the Treaty of Tripoli which clearly states "As the Government of the United States of America is not, in any sense, founded on the Christian religion." This is pertinent to arguments regarding the government's relation to establishments of religion because there is often the underlying argument that our nation was founded on the basis of religion, but apparently, in 1797, some eight years after the United States Constitution went into effect and only six years after the Bill of Rights was amended to said Constitution, the same founding father's ratified a treaty further establishing that ours was in fact not a nation founded on religious principles.

So, let's think about what Rick Perry said. "Freedom of religion doesn't mean freedom from religion." But how can you have one without the other? Many early settlers in the Americas came here because some group in power was telling them how they had to conform religiously. Every kid in grade school learns how "mean" it was to make people who believed something different than the local Powers that Be, and so the brave little pilgrims set out to find a new land where they wouldn't be forced to do and believe what they were being told to do. As much as they were seeking a freedom to do their own thing, they were seeking a chance to get away from being told to do something else.

"But they weren't trying to avoid schools saying Merry Christmas," you might argue, and you'd be right. They were seeking freedom from being told that they had to believe in points of doctrine like transubstantiation and good works vs. grace. We all know what really happened though. Once here they started telling everyone that they had to believe the same things as all the other members of their villages. I'd like to think the initial drive for individualism was the only thing we, as a nation, inherited from those settlers,** but it appears the longest lasting impact is the drive to assimilate others.

That's what's Rick Perry's comments really mean. They mean "Because I am a member of the privileged majority, I have the right to impose my majority's beliefs on others because I have the power to make my ideas pervasive and silence dissenters." Consequently, the freedom FROM religion is as imperative as the perceived freedom to choose one's own religion. We seem to have come full circle, where state legislatures try to pass laws making it okay to tell kids, from the earliest ages and at the taxpayer's expense, that Christmas and thereby Jesus, and thereby Christianity should be part of his or her life. If you're a Christian, on the surface, it seems like that shouldn't be a big deal. Now let's change the players. Let's say instead a school wanted to start honoring Samhain, or display a large pentacle on the school grounds? Maybe there should be a Menorah in the hallway and the children could be greeted at morning announcements with the Muslim call to prayer.  Zarathustra could maybe use a poster in the hallway.  That would all be kind of awesome, don't you think? I do, in a private school in which parents have chosen to have their kids exposed to the religions of the world (which is also a great elective course in most colleges and universities, I highly recommend taking it).

That said, a lot of people would be upset if their kids were being inundated with non-historical but rather cultural actions indoctrinating them into a religion which was not their own. That sort of promotion by a government entity borrows the ethos of said entity and applies it to what is being taught and modeled. In effect, the "Merry Christmas Bill" means that the state of Texas wants to endorse religious statements, and it must be considered patently wrong to do so.

This isn't just about Atheists who don't want their child coming home from the school their property taxes support with some newfound cultural pressure to convert, but also about members of every religion who shouldn't be pressured into the religions which their teachers decided were the best to espouse. Minority religions and sects within major religions look to the First Amendment (and Fourteenth Amendment, which extends the Bill of Rights to the states) to protect their right not to have the majority's beliefs thrust on them just as much as the dreaded Atheists look to have their right to not cede fealty to anyone's deity.

Freedom from religion is an intrinsic component to freedom or religion, because freedom from precludes the coercive effect when a majority decides to use it's privilege to alienate the minority.

This is the land of the free, and Governor Perry has apparently forgotten that.


*The Supreme Court first used the phrase in 1878
** Interlopers really. There were already people here, you know, the ones converted at bayonet point.

Ballots

Last week I was talking about how to pick the right candidates for the positions that matter, but there's a few other voting guidelines which I have come up with. Sometimes and office doesn't seem wholly important to me, or I don't have strong feelings on the issues. Some years I've forgotten my own rules and walked into the voting booth (well, not really a booth, we don't have booths, we have awkward tables with little privacy screens) only to be surprised by some of the issues and positions up for a vote.  When I follow my own rules, this doesn't happen.

I don't like political surprises.

Rule One:

Find out what the ballot will look like ahead of time.  It really isn't that complicated. Most areas' major newspapers will run the ballots the weekend before the election so that no one is left guessing. This information is also available online. I found mine on the County Clerk's website.
By knowing who and what will be on your ballot,  you have the chance to research the topics that didn't seem germane last week.

Rule Two:
Research the unopposed candidates. Why even bother, right? Well, I don't know about the specific election rules where *you* are, but here, my votes count even when I skip a section. I have the choice to vote for or skip voting for an unopposed candidate. Unopposed candidates have to get a percentage of the vote to be elected, so it's really a yes or no proposition that is presented somewhat deceptively. So yes, I research the unopposed, at least a little, to know if I want to fill in that oval or leave it blank.

Rule Three:
Don't be afraid to leave blanks. As I said earlier, my votes still count, even if there are blanks on my ballot, so I remind myself that it's okay to leave a blank if I still don't know, still don't care, or just don't like anyone running. There are also always options on my ballot where there will be more than one opening on a board of some sort, and I'll be asked to vote for up to three or up to four people. Those are the magic words: up to. I'm not required to counterweight my vote for the one candidate whom I would like to see fill a position by also building up votes for her opponents just because they're the lesser evils coexisting on a ballot. So yes, one is up to three. Two is up to three. Three is up to three. All of these options, including zero, is perfectly acceptable.

Ultimately, I have to remember,

the ballot is not my boss.

Rule Four:

Bring the kids. What? Yes, I said bring the kids. Don't electioneer and tell them for whom you are voting and why, but by all means, bring them. If you know who you're voting for ahead of time because you researched the issues and the candidates, and you're not going to be surprised because you made sure you knew what the ballot was going to look like, their fidgeting isn't going to stop you from filling it out correctly and they're going to learn that voting is part of what adults do. It is part of what it means to be a member of a community. 

Far too few young people vote. Your children can learn to value it as much as you do if you show them that you value it and help them understand the process. I don't know about you, but I'm raising citizens.

That's it, in a nutshell. Look it up, research anything I didn't expect to find on the ballot, remember that I don't have to vote for everything, and make sure my kids get involved with the political process too. Is there anything I missed?

How to Pick the Candidate that's Right for your Home

There are a lot of local issues on our ballot for next Tuesday, and it's my patriotic duty to get informed and then make my opinion part of the collective decision making process. Who will be the new village president? Who will sit on the county board? Do we want our municipal electric co-op to buy up yet another supply source? Is hydroelectric really doing it for us? Big questions. However, the one in which I'm most interested is, in fact, the local community college board.

No, I don't attend said community college. I graduated from other institutions many years ago. But I have kids, and the options which will be available for them in a few years matter. However, I don't think most of the current board and I see eye to eye on what's important.

We live in an economically depressed area, and enrollment at the local community college is down substantially. They approximated that the 2012-2013 student body is 1k lighter than the preceding academic year. One of the problems cited is that because the local economy is stagnant, parents can't afford to send their teenagers to school, teens can't get jobs to help subsidize their education, and financial aid is no longer as easy to come by as it once was. Even the inexpensive two-year institution of my youth has now become as cost prohibitive as the overpriced private university three miles west of it.

Recently, arguably to combat this deficiency, the current board voted to take the funds earmarked for building an Arts center on campus for the homeless arts department, and instead, spend it on other building improvements and the Science/Technology department's space needs. The thinking that led to this decision is that business, technology, science, and vocational programs are going to supply their students with the experience and skills necessary to get a job, and that needs to be their focus.

Okay, I can see that a lot of people enroll in a community college in order to be job ready in two years. Considering the economic climate here, that makes a certain amount of sense. However, I think it was a decision poorly made.

The Arts are an integral part of how we experience life, and the quality of that experience. One of the reasons that high school gym classes offer quarters of bowling and horseback riding is so that students can have exposure to activities which they can enjoy long into their adult years. In the same way, Arts education opens up the door for life-long hobbies that can improve the quality of life, even for the unemployed. Of course, Arts education is the first thing on the proverbial chopping block when public school districts have to make budgetary cuts, and as a result, many turn to alternative programs, such as the community college, even before college age, in order to maintain a well rounded education for their children. Others simply look forward to college as a time to broaden horizons and get involved in the Arts that move them, but now our community college has made it clear that the Arts are not a priority.

Lovely.

This leaves me scrambling to read the platforms of the ten, yes- ten candidates who are running for the three available positions on the Board of Trustees. Interestingly, many of these candidates have not made much of an attempt to let us know anything other than their name, so I have developed a list of considerations.

1. Does the candidate have a website or other internet presence. If yes, read it, if no, cross them off the list. Let's face it, if they don't have a web presence, they haven't done their homework and don't belong on the Board of any educational body.

2. Does the candidate supply any pertinent information on said website. If yes, read it. If no, cross them off the list.

3. Does the candidate say anything with which I agree. If yes, continue to consider their platform. If no, cross them off the list.

4. Does the candidate mention the Arts. If yes, continue to read.  If no, cross them off the list. If they don't mention it, they certainly aren't prioritizing it.

Sadly, I have, to date, only found one candidate who mentions the Arts, so I have not had the chance to employ steps 5 or 6.

5. Does the candidate outline a plan to sustain and improve the Arts program? If yes, move to the shortlist. If no, keep on the list in case no one else does.

6. Does the candidate use language conventions. Yes, at the end of the day, my decision would be swayed by grammar. That may seem silly because my grammar isn't perfect, but I feel that when one runs for political office, they need to take care to present his or herself as professionally as possible, and if a candidate can't be bothered to edit, can I expect them to treat with great care the institution with which he or she'd like to be charged with the keeping thereof? No. Consequently, grammar was going to be my tie breaker.

Now, you might not be worried about the Arts at your local community college, but the model still holds. Take the topic most important to you and put it in the place of the Arts. Maybe it's the local environment, energy resources, roads, or park district programs that matter most to you. Get informed, and get out the vote.