Thomas Jefferson

In the year 1791 an unusual correspondence took place. Benjamin Banneker, a free African American and an astronomer, mathematician, surveyor, almanac writer and farmer, wrote a letter to then Secretary of State Thomas Jefferson. Banneker’s letter was a plea for justice for African American slaves and a statement of racial equality and it challenged Jefferson’s suppositions of the inferiority of blacks. At a time when most Americans shared Jefferson’s racial views, men like Benjamin Banneker were around to show the wrongness of such views.

Benjamin Banneker was born on November 9, 1731 to Mary and Robert Banneker. Mary’s parents were Molly Welsh, a European, and Banneka, a member of the Dogon tribe in Africa that had knowledge of astronomy. Banneka was originally a slave of Molly, but Molly freed and married him and they lived in a small farm to the west of Baltimore, Maryland. This place was out of the way from the more mainstream South, so attitudes towards African Americans were more tolerant. Mary received her learning from her parents, and she taught Benjamin how to read, farm, and interpret the sky. This information is from wikipedia .

One could say that my life has been a series of debates. This is not to say that I’m argumentative. I’ve just been lucky in my life to have had friends with whom I could talk about issues and debate politics and religion. Although I’m fairly liberal in my politics, I’ve had in my life a fair amount of conservative Republican friends with whom I used to be able to debate on points of disagreement and while still maintaining a sense of respect for each other. Somehow, though, those type of talks have become less frequent in the past couple of years. I’m not sure if people in the past few years have just become more polarized along certain positions and are no longer tolerant of differing opinions. It’s become rare to meet that kind of friend, that friendship of opposites, and I miss those type of conversations.

 With the birthday's of Washington and Lincoln and the coming of President's Day, I wrote this post:

Right now I'm reading Howard Zinn's book A People's History of the United States and it's a wonderful book of the contributions and struggles that women, African Americans, Native Americans, workers' groups and various other marginalized people have made to build up America.  It's a history that needs to be told, as these stories talk of the struggles of marginalized people to be included in America's democratic experiment, and Zinn sees a struggle based on an oppressive economic system.  One of the few things where I disagree with Zinn is in his take on the Founding Fathers and their relationship with slavery.  Slavery was a subject that the Founding Fathers struggled with mightily, and their inability to resolve the issue was something that they themselves realized was one of their greatest failures. 

Two quotes that I've always liked and may apply to the different clashes of opinion in our posts. I think the clashes are good and healthy.

“The future does not belong to those who are content with today, apathetic toward common problems and their fellow man alike, timid and fearful in the face of new ideas and bold projects. Rather it will belong to those who can blend passion, reason, and courage in a personal commitment to the ideals and great enterprises of American society. It will belong to those who see that wisdom can only emerge from the clash of contending views, the passionate expression of deep and hostile beliefs. Plato said: A life without criticism is not worth living.”

Robert F. Kennedy, Oct. 22, 1966

"While Governments can make a difference, in the final analysis it is the individual – that is each one of us – that will bring the dream of a nonviolent world to reality. We, the people must think and act nonviolently. We must not get stuck in the past as to do so will destroy the imagination...To change our world we need a spiritual and a political evolution."-Irish Nobel Peace Prize Laureate, Maried Maguire.