Outliving this Day and Coming Safe Home

The Ides of March, March 15, was a day made famous by William Shakespeare’s play Julius Caesar, wherein the Roman leader was assassinated by conspirators fearful of his increasing power. This drama and the story upon which it is based is known, or used to be known, by high school students in English speaking countries. Here in the United States, unfortunately, the study of the classics in many public schools have been eliminated in favor of more so-called “relevant” subjects, much to the detriment of a meaningful education.

Shakespeare obtained the story of Caesar’s assassination from the writings of the Roman historian Plutarch (c.46 – c.120). During his lifetime, Plutarch wrote biographies of many of the prominent Greeks and Romans from the Greco-Roman classical world, including several legendary persons like Theseus and Romulus. While the Bard employed quite a bit of dramatic license, the basic facts of Caesar’s assassination and the aftermath have never been questioned by later historians.

According to Plutarch, and featured in Shakespeare’s play, a soothsayer previously sought to warn him of the impending coup and repeated the warning on the morning of that day. Shakespeare related the soothsayer’s warning as “Beware of the Ides of March” often used, but not taken seriously, by some contemporary politicians and others.

Note: For more on this topic, please see https://bobreagan13.com/2012/03/15/cave-caesar/

Semiquincentennial? Sestercentennial? Quarter-millenial?

How about 250th anniversary instead? Any one is a mouthful, but whatever, it’s worth noting, and even celebrating.

Naturally there has been made a lot of news, and some hype, about our Declaration of Independence that was adopted on July 4, 1776, 250 years ago. Those of us over the age of 50 recall the hoopla of the bicentennial in 1976: fireplugs painted red white and blue, tall ships sailing into New York Harbor, fireworks on the Mall in Washington DC, and many other events.

Declaring American colonies independent states caused a sea change in the world order. But it took an eight-year-long war between the newly declared states and Great Britain, at the time the preeminent military power in the world, to ratify that status.

We refer to the event as the American Revolution. But for the former colonies it was not a revolution in the sense that it upturned their government and body politic, it was not a “regime change” as were the 1989 French Revolution and the 1917 and 1990 Russian Revolutions. The American acts were designed to gain independence from a remote monarchy and to affirm their status of self-governance. Each new state kept its colonial government and body politic, though without a remote parliament and king.

It is significant that in that same year, four months prior to the Declaration’s adoption by the Continental Congress, another, perhaps the second most important document of the century, was published: An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations, by Scottish philosopher and economist Adam Smith. In shorthand, Wealth of Nations.

In his lengthy book, Smith challenged the widespread economic theory termed mercantilism. Mercantilism held that wealth was static and it consisted of the amount of gold and silver in a nation’s treasury; trade was a zero-sum game. The amount of gold and silver could be increased by two long-established principles (1) restraints upon the importation of foreign goods for home consumption that could be produced at home, from whatever country they were imported; and (2) restraints upon the importation of goods almost all kinds from those particular countries with which the balance of trade was supposed to be disadvantageous. These restraints, or regulations, tended to stifle production.

Smith, on the other hand, contended that wealth was potentially unlimited and was measured by production of goods and services. He articulated three basic principles for the production of wealth: individual self-interest, the division of labor, and freedom of trade.

Self interest: the most quoted passage from Wealth of Nations is “it is not from the benevolence of the butcher, the brewer, or the baker that we expect our dinner, but from their regard to their own interest.” The self-interest Smith describes is rational self-interest. “Give me that which I want, and you shall have this which you want” appeals to the self-interests of both sides of a transaction. He further opines that “nobody but a beggar chooses to depend chiefly upon the benevolence of his fellow citizens,” and even a beggar does not depend upon it entirely.

Division of labor: Specialization increases economic value. It makes a small quantity of labor produce a greater quantity of work. As an example, Smith points out that the making of a pin could be divided in about eighteen distinct operations from the mining of the ore containing the metal, to the sharpening of the point. Even if the raw materials were available at hand, one person could scarcely make more than a few in a day. But when the functions were divided amongst, say 10 individuals, perhaps they could make thousands of pins in the same time. But Smith was not an absolutist in this regard. He was concerned about the ill-effects of excess in the division of labor. “The man whose whole life is spent in performing a few simple operations, of which the effects, too, are perhaps always the same, or very nearly the same, has no occasion to exert his understanding, or to exercise his invention . . . [t]he torpor of his mind renders him not only incapable of relishing or bearing a part in any rational conversation, but of conceiving any generous, noble, or tender sentiment, and consequently of forming any just judgment concerning many even of the ordinary duties of private life.” Polymaths can take comfort.

Free-trade: Smith observed that all trades, freely made, are mutually beneficial. One side obtained what he wanted more than a certain sum of his money, e.g., a widget; the other side got what he wanted more than his widget, that money. In this example, the cost of production of the widget, or distribution thereof, would be impaired by taxation or regulation at some level that artificially reduces its utility or desirability. That restraint of trade inhibits growth and thus the creation of wealth by imposing on comparative advantage. (The notion of “comparative advantage” was articulated by David Ricardo a few years after Smith’s death.) Smith was opposed to most economic constraints by authority such as tariffs, bounties, price controls, monopolies, cartels, et cetera. Freedom of trade, he maintained, enhances individual freedom.

His solution was that Great Britain should voluntarily give up all authority over the colonies and the Americans would become friends and allies rather than factious subjects. That friendly relationship was ultimately formed, and with some exceptions over the two and one-half centuries, endured.

Even more enduring has been the United States as the most successful capitalist nation the world has known. Celebrate what happened 250 years ago on July 4. And commemorate what was published on March 9 of that same year.

NOTES

Wealth of Nations is quite a tome — in some editions over 1000 pages. This author used the one in Volume 39 of the Great Books of the Western World series (University of Chicago Press 1952). P. J. O’Rourke’s On The Wealth of Nations (Atlantic Monthly Press 2007) is an entertaining explication and commentary in 242 pages including notes and index. O’Rourke explains “Why is the Wealth of Nations So Damn Long” in a chapter so titled. Also available is Jesse Norman’s Adam Smith: Father of Economics (2018). Works of other economists such as F. A. Hayek and Milton Friedman are influenced by Wealth of Nations.

I have published a number essays for Christmas on this blog in the past. All are invited to search the key word if interested.

Here are two observations from writers from around four centuries apart that are worth repeating this December 25th.

Some say that ever against that season comes
Wherein our Savior’s birth is celebrated,
This bird of dawning sings all night long;
And then, they say, no spirit dare stir abroad,
The nights are wholesome; then no planets strike,
No fairy takes, nor witch has power to charm,
So hallowed and so gracious is that time.

    — Hamlet: Act 1,Scene 1

There is an angel close to you this day. Merry Christmas, and I wish you well.

    — Paul Crume, “Angels Are among Us.” Dallas Morning News 12/25/1967
        (reprinted every year)

My sentiments exactly. Merry Christmas to all.

The late 1960s saw a lot of political turmoil and some violence (sound familiar?) as a result of a civil rights movement that turned violent and the increasingly unpopular Vietnam War. Racial segregation and discrimination were legally ended with some dispatch, but the social and cultural reality would linger for some time, even to today to some extent.

Accordingly, from the middle of the decade onward there emerged a Black Power movement demanding a concept of equality, to be achieved by violent means if necessary.

H. Rap Brown, one of the most vocal leaders of the Black Power movement, and who often advocated violence, died last week in a prison hospital while serving a life sentence from 2002 for the killing of a Georgia sheriff’s deputy and other charges. He was 82.

In 1967 Brown succeeded Stokely Carmichael as leader of the civil rights organization oxymoronically named Student Non-violent Coordinating Committee (SNCC, pronounced “snick” by some). As SNCC Chairman, Brown developed a reputation as a fiery orator and leader of the militant black power movement. He was a founder of the Black Panther organization and was styled as its minister of defense. He spent the next decades in and out of prison for his conduct in violent protests.

In July 1967 Brown spoke in Cambridge, Maryland saying, “It’s time for Cambridge to explode, baby. Black folks built America, and if America don’t come around, we’re going to burn America down.” Gunfire reportedly broke out and both Brown and a police officer were wounded. A fire started that night and by the next day, seventeen buildings were destroyed. Brown was charged with inciting a riot.

Brown’s trial was originally to take place in Cambridge, but a change of venue moved the trial to Bel Air, Harford County, Maryland, to start in March 1970. On March 9, two SNCC officials, Ralph Featherstone and William “Che” Payne, were driving on U.S. Route 1 just south of Bel Air when a bomb they were carrying exploded, killing them both.

At that time I was in my last tour of military duty at the nearby Aberdeen Proving Ground as an officer in the Ordnance Corps. I recalled hearing about the blast but did not pay much attention to it at the time. Several years later when I was a detective in the Dallas Police Department I met Dr. Vincent DeMaio, then Assistant Medical Examiner for Dallas County and consultant to the Southwestern Institute of Forensic Sciences. At the time of the Bel Air bombing. Dr. DiMaio was employed in the Harford County medical examiner’s office, where what was left of the bombers was taken for autopsy.

Dr. DiMaio recalled that the county sheriff’s office was on high alert for anticipated violent protests surrounding Brown’s trial. One afternoon a deputy noticed a car making several slow trips around the courthouse in downtown Bel Air, apparently casing the location. The occupants appeared to have spotted the deputy and turned onto the highway leading out of town. The deputy followed them and looked for a reason to stop and investigate. While driving behind the suspect car, he decided to contact the dispatcher by radio. A second or two after keying his microphone, the suspect car exploded, severely damaging it and killing Featherstone and Payne. Dr. DiMaio said the investigators determined the RF from the police radio set off an electric blasting cap, detonating the dynamite. The passenger had the bomb in his lap and the explosion literally blew his body in two.

One lesson from that incident: there is always a way to blow up explosives; the trick is not to be around when they go off.

This lesson has oft gone unheeded. There have been numerous wannabe bombers in militant groups from the Provisional IRA to the Weather Underground to Al-Shabaab who have succeeded in blowing themselves up, not having learned that trick.

Note: Dr. Vincent DiMaio left Dallas County to become the Chief Medical Examiner for Bexar County (San Antonio) Texas until 2006. He was appointed to the Texas Forensic Science Commission in 2011. Dr. DiMaio authored many publications about forensic pathology and testified in a number of high profile trials, including for the defense of George Zimmerman in the Trevon Martin shooting in Florida. He died in 2022.

The Dallas Morning News obituaries this week announced that Suzie Humphreys has died at age 87. May she rest in peace. For those of us who were around during the late 60s through 70s and later, Suzie was a television and radio personality. She was probably best remembered as Ron Chapman’s remote sidekick on his popular morning program on radio station KVIL. Chapman and his crew catered to an audience primarily of the young urban professionals, then known as “yuppies,” many of whom were reformed hippies. In addition to playing contemporary pop music, Chapman fielded phone calls and exchanged banter with listeners. Those calls rarely involved politics, except when some politician did or said something ridiculous or otherwise humorous. Such comments were not hostile or venomous like today’s social media, but many were followed by a “what’s this world coming to” jingle. This, of course, was an age in which there were only line-land telephones. 
	Suzie’s role was making traffic reports, first from the KVIL helicopter and later from the “Yellowvan” that roamed the streets. She and Chapman engaged in a lot of humorous and interesting banter interspersed with reports of jams on the freeways and the occasional wreck. Suzie’s transition from the sky occurred only after her escape from death. One morning in the late spring, while pregnant, Suzie, intrepid as ever, flew and made her reports and conversation with Chapman. That day’s weather was turbulent, some gusts over 25 MPH. Suffering from nausea brought about by her morning sickness and the rough air, Suzie asked the pilot to land and let her out. He did and took off again. After several minutes, the KVIL helicopter crashed, killing the pilot and destroying the aircraft. After that harrowing brush with death, Suzie, Chapman, and KVIL management decided that it was prudent that she continue her career on the ground — she did and continued until Chapman’s show ended and he went to another station.
	I had a somewhat minor connection with that event.  The day of the KVIL helicopter crash I was a detective with the Dallas Police Department’s special investigations unit, a group of officers that investigated organized property crimes and anything else the chief assigned. At the time there was a rash of burglaries of wealthy homes in North Dallas. One of the burglars had been arrested, and probably in hopes of some leniency, told us that he and his partner in crime had stolen a safe from a victim’s house. They could not open the safe and it was too heavy and bulky to carry very far. They left it on the side of one of the numerous creeks that ran through the neighborhoods in North Dallas. We caught one of the burglars and when interrogated he told us about the safe and roughly where they left it. Rather than search on the ground that day, I volunteered to ride in a police helicopter to look for the safe along the creeks. It did not take long to spot and we called officers on the ground to retrieve it. On the way back to the airport in southwest Dallas, we ran into the same weather Suzie and their pilot were experiencing. Susceptible to motion sickness myself, I thought about asking the pilot to put down, but valor rather than discretion took over and I toughed it out. Later, after hearing about the helicopter Suzie had been in crashing, I thought about what could have happened to me. It has taken the grim reaper another forty-eight years to claim Suzie. Hope it takes him longer to harvest me.

Eighteenth Century composer George Frederic Handel who is probably best known for his oratorio Messiah, wrote and performed many more of the same genre. One, Judas Maccabaeus, was reportedly composed to celebrate the victory of the Duke of Cumberland over Charles Edward Stuart (known as “Bonnie Prince Charlie”) at the Battle of Culloden during the 1746 Jacobite rebellion. The libretto, with considerable dramatic license, comes from the Bible’s Old Testament Book of 2 Maccabees that chronicles the period 170–160 BC when Judea was ruled by the Seleucid Greek Empire.¹ The then ruler Antiochus IV had undertaken to defile the Second Temple in Jerusalem and destroy the Jewish religion.

Judas Maccabeus, son of a priest who defied Antiochus, became the leader of the resistance and inspired the people with thoughts of liberty and victory through the power of Jehovah. When victory was finally achieved for the Jewish people, Maccabeus was celebrated as their hero (the chorus “See the Conquering Hero Comes!” in Act III). News arrives that Rome is willing to form an alliance with Judas against the Seleucid empire. The people rejoice that peace has at last come to their country (“O Lovely Peace”).² The Jewish feast of Hanukkah commemorates the victory and the cleansing of the Temple.

Mark Twain is reputed to have observed history does not repeat itself but it rhymes.³ So go recent events in the war of Israel against its Hamas enemies in Gaza. That war, or at least that phase is over. The result has to be regarded as an Israeli victory, the return of the hostages eliminated Israel’s internal opposition to continuing to fight. If Hamas reneges on the rest of the deal, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netaynahu will have free hand to deal with it as he chooses, and President Donald Trump has said the U. S. will back him.

The Israeli success was multi-factored. The competence of the Mossad and the competence and courage of the Israel Defense Force were two of them. Netanyahu’s resolve in the face of a internal dissent and international disapproval (and condemnation) was another. But Donald Trump, deal maker extraordinary, orchestrated the process. After giving Netanyahu a green light to eliminate Hamas leaders in Iran and control Iranian airspace, Trump delivered the coup de grace and destroyed Iran’s incipient nuclear capability. The combined Israeli – U.S. forces thus neutered Hamas patron. Iran’s proxies Hezbollah and the Houthis in Yeman were also neutralized; Hezbollah leaders decimated by the exploding pagers, dubbed “grim beepers.” Trump publicly urged Netanyahu to seek a peace deal, but appeared to privately support whatever Israel did. When Netanyahu bombed the Hamas leaders in Doha, Trump publicly expressed disdain, but this act appears to have had the President’s tacit acquiescence to the deed. In any event it seems to have motivated the Qatari rulers to force Hamas to the table.

After the combatants agreed to the cease fire, Donald Trump went to Jerusalem to address the Knesset.⁴ He was greeted with a standing ovation and a trumpet fanfare. Benjamin Netanyahu was similarly, if not as ostentatiously, honored. There is no report that the fanfare was based on Handel’s Judas Maccabaeus choral anthem. How apropos would that have been!

Postscript

While the Second Century B.C. Maccabees ultimately prevailed against the Seleucids, It was slightly less than a century when their erstwhile Roman patrons under General Pompey, during the conquest of the rest of the Levant, entered Jerusalem and established Rome’s rule over Judea and the rest of what is now the State of Israel. The downstream effect of the Trump-Netanyahu cease-fire, whether soon or distant, is anybody’s guess.

For now we can enjoy Handel’s oratorio, like the rest of his music is, in a word, glorious.

Footnotes

1. Alexander the Great’s empire was partitioned among several factions after his death.
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2. Maccabeus, the spelling varies, was actually killed in the final battle. But the Maccabees fought on.
   ↩︎
3. Mark Twain, The Gilded Age: A Tale of To-Day (1873) Ch. 47. What was actually stated was in a quote“History never repeats itself, but the Kaleidoscopic combinations of the pictured present often seem to be constructed out of the broken fragments of antique legends.” Later writers interpreted it to the shorthand version.
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4. The Israeli parliament. ↩︎

Federal Communications Commission Chairman Brendan Carr gave Jimmy Kimmel’s late night television show a boost to his anemic ratings. The Chairman made a not so veiled threat to use the Commission’s licensing power to discipline media for speech that it determined “not to be in the public interest.” Carr’s statement was eventually to no avail, but Kimmel’s return after a week’s hiatus was bound to increase the number of viewers curious to see what the fuss was all about. Without Carr’s foolish faux pas it would have been a non-story and Kimmel would have remained canceled.

This situation and similar ones have illuminated free speech issues already raging in public discourse. This right, ensconced and protected by the U. S. Constitution, is widely misunderstood. What it means is, with extremely narrow exceptions, that if a person expresses an opinion or interpretation of facts, the government or any state actor may not do something unpleasant to that person. It does not apply to private persons unless they are state actors.¹ There is no permitted legal sanction for so-called “hate” speech nor criticism of government, public officials, or other private persons or groups. An exception is speech “directed at inciting or producing imminent lawless action and it is likely to incite or produce such action.”² There is also an exception for civil actions for defamation, i.e. slander and libel where a person utters or publishes false facts — not opinions — that are defamatory.

Governments may also enact reasonable time, place, and manner restrictions for expression, so long as they are not based on content. An example is requiring a permit for use of a public street. Certain acts, such as vandalism of public or private property or assault, might also be legally punished.³

The above is a brief overview of the Constitutional and legal aspects of free speech and expression. There are many yards of law library shelves (or today terabytes of electronic storage) that contain law and commentary on the subject.

Of note is the current issue of private “self censorship” enforced by social disapproval of an individual’s peer group, or by economic boycotts, formal or otherwise, of business activities. That might be worth another post.

Of interest is Tunku Varadarajan’s summary of his interview with Harvey Silverglate, a lawyer who describes himself as a “liberal libertarian” in today’s Wall Street Journal (9/27/2025). Silverglate, along with Alan Charles Kors, a University of Pennsylvania history professor, described as a “conservative libertarian” founded in 1999 the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression (FIRE).⁴ This organization is in the forefront of promoting freedom of speech. Varadarajan’s interview summary is at https://www.wsj.com/opinion/the-right-needs-to-conserve-free-speech-14291c81?st=HCcded&reflink=desktopwebshare_permalink and is well worth a read.

1. Private employers are generally not state actors, and may restrict speech or expression as a condition or employment.
   ↩︎
2. Brandenburg v. Ohio, 395 U.S. 444 (1969).
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3. It’s arguable that burning a flag in a public place could be banned on safety grounds. ↩︎
4. The FIRE was originally “Foundation for Individual Rights in Education.” Its original purpose was to promote free speech on campuses that were restricted by “speech code” by many colleges and universities. It recently expanded its focus. ↩︎

August 2025 marks the 80th anniversary of the first and only wartime use of nuclear weapons. A de facto moratorium on such use has existed since then.

Recently Vladimir Putin has made veiled threats that he could use nuclear weapons to keep the USA and NATO from helping Ukraine further defend against Russia’s invasion. Further south, Iran has attempted for years to obtain nuclear weapons to achieve its stated goal of annihilating Israel. These and other events have stimulated interest and speculation among journalists, politicians, and those of us who are interested in international current events, that this moratorium could soon come to an end.

So far, public alarm has not risen to the level of that of the 1950s, where schoolchildren practiced diving under their desks as a first response to nuclear attack by the Soviet Union. Nor of the early 1980s, when President Ronald Reagan’s Strategic Defense Initiative provoked the Soviets’ saber, er, bomb rattling.

Some observers regard the Cuban missile crisis in 1962 as the closest the world has come to a nuclear war. Thankfully, it was averted. But ever since the Soviets got the bomb, there has been an undercurrent of worry that “somewhere, somehow, a damn foolish thing in a remote place would precipitate a nuclear confrontation that would escalate to involve the whole world” (to paraphrase Otto von Bismarck’s prediction about the inevitable coming of World War I).

Russia, China, and to some degree North Korea, use nuclear threats more as a shield than a sword. North Korea is also too close to South Korea to use a weapon against its neighbor, for fear of backfire on their side. The same applies to India versus Pakistan. Even so, a series of missteps in these venues could precipitate a war between the major powers.

Currently there are nine states that have deployable atomic weapons: the USA, Russia, Great Britain, France, China, Pakistan, India, North Korea, and Israel. Would any of these nations use these weapons?

The concept of Mutual Assured Destruction (MAD) has doubtless been a major factor in the prevention of a USA-Russia conflict. It surely has crossed the collective mind of other powers.

But what about Russia’s currently unsuccessful war with Ukraine? It can be argued that those two countries are too geographically close and Russia’s nuclear use there would affect Russian territory. At any rate, Putin wants to take over Ukraine more or less intact, not as a radioactive wasteland.

Britain and France have no interest in starting a war with the Russians, or anyone else, but they are members of NATO and bound to come to another member’s aid if that member were attacked.

China? That nation’s goal, beyond obtaining trade dominance, is taking over Taiwan. That can be done with conventional weaponry. If the US were to aid Taiwan militarily, a conventional conflict would be more likely and would not necessarily threaten either power’s homeland.

North Korea is also constrained by geography as to its rival on the southern part of the peninsula. Kim Jong Un’s plan appears to be obtaining a delivery capability to threaten the USA if it uses its military to support the South.

While not yet a member of the nuclear club, Iran under the rule of Islamist mullahs has spent the last decade or so and billions attempting to obtain an atomic bomb and a ballistic missile delivery system. The stated goal of obtaining these weapons is to provide the means to eliminate what the ayatollah and other Islamists consider the Great Satan and Little Satan, that is, the USA and Israel.

Iran is different from other potentially hostile nuclear powers. It is run by religious fanatics who are undeterred that using these weapons would end in their own destruction. Becoming martyrs guarantees entry to heaven to be serviced by many virgins; this a fantasy many take seriously. There is little doubt that Iran would use nuclear weapons if they obtain them.

This threat was abated, at least for now, by Israel (together with USA help) in the so-called Twelve Day War this past June. The threat may recur, especially if the current Iranian regime survives. If it does, Israel, the United States, and the rest of the world will be sorry.

There are numerous books, monographs, and documentary films about the making of the atomic bombs code named “Little Boy” (dropped on Hiroshima August 6) and “Fat Man” (that devastated Nagasaki August 9, 1945). The Manhattan Project, led by General Leslie Groves, with scientific head J. Robert Oppenheimer, was a three-year effort, conducted in secret, to develop an atomic bomb. Unfortunately, it was not secret enough. Stalin’s spies were embedded at Los Alamos and managed to obtain the plans, and the Soviets soon caught up with nuclear technology.

Two books recently reviewed on the Wall Street Journal are Garrett M. Graff’s The Devil Reached Toward the Sky: An Oral History of the Making and Unleashing of the Atomic Bomb and Iain MacGregor’s The Hiroshima Men: The Quest to Build the Atomic Bomb, and the Fateful Decision to Use It. Not sure if this writer will have time to read either, but the reviews were complimentary. The most comprehensive books on the science and engineering, as well as the politics, on development are Richard Rhodes’ The Making of the Atomic Bomb (1986) and, Dark Sun: The Making of the Hydrogen Bomb (1995).

Iran’s potential nuclear adventure, coupled with the United States’ porous borders of recent times, has suggested that a terrorist could bring a nuclear bomb into the US, secrete it in a large city, and detonate it. It would be 9/11 on a monumental scale. A 1980 novel The Fifth Horseman, by Larry Collins and Dominique LaPierre, was about terrorists secreting a hydrogen bomb in New York City to blackmail the USA into forcing Israel to remove its settlers from the West Bank. This book is a rattling good yarn.

For those interested, a visit to the American Museum of Science and Energy at Oak Ridge Tennessee, a suburb of Knoxville, is worthwhile. The exhibits there include the development of the atomic bomb during World War II.

This past June, the Department of Defense restored the original names to a number of military bases that were changed during the last Administration. Forts Hood, Polk, Lee, and Bragg were a few of those installations whose names were surnames of Civil War Confederate Army officers from 160 years ago. This produced some hand-wringing by certain factions over such re-re-naming.

This consternation is misplaced. Few service members who served at those bases associate their names with the Confederacy, and fewer persons in living memory, whether they served in the military or not, even know or care who those installations were named for. Anyone who paid any attention in history class would know who Robert E. Lee was; how many know who Leonidas Polk, Braxton Bragg, and John Bell Hood were?

Outside of the so-called woke movement, there are few of us who do know and care. Here in Texas, Fort Hood — whose former name is now restored — was renamed for General Richard Cavazos. Cavazos and the others doubtless deserve to be honored for their service. But those honors can be given without cancelling the names of bases, especially prominent ones like Bragg or Hood.

Many present and former service members have memories — fond and otherwise — of their service to the nation at those installations. I served, albeit briefly, at Forts Lee and Polk. Fort Lee, near Petersburg in Virginia, was a day trip from many famous and interesting historical sites, including Williamsburg and Monticello. Fort Polk was not exactly Alligator Alcatraz, but it is in the boondocks not close to much of interest.

Regardless of who or what these or other public places were named for, after a while they become recognizable, not for their namesakes, but for geographical locations or what subsequently occurred at the location. Those names should not be disturbed, particularly to make a political point. That would also go for renaming international waters like the Gulf of Mexico, a bit petulant but perhaps a boon to map publishers.

Biographical Note: Leonidas Polk was a West Point Graduate who subsequently attended the Virginia Theological Seminary. He was ordained as a priest in the Protestant Episcopal Church and later a bishop in that church. Polk, who was a cousin of President James K. Polk, was appointed as a general in the Confederate army and was in battles at Shiloh, Chickamauga, and others. He was killed in the Battle of Atlanta in 1864. If interested, see Parks, Joseph H. General Leonidas Polk, C.S.A.: The Fighting Bishop (Southern Biography Series). Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 1992; Mitchell, Joseph B. Decisive Battles of the Civil War. New York: Ballantine Books, 1955.

One hundred years ago on July 10 in Dayton, Tennessee, jury selection began in the trial of John T. Scopes. Scopes was a high school teacher accused of violating state law by teaching the theory of evolution in biology class. This trial, dubbed by some as the “Monkey Trial,” was probably a set-up to test the law. Ultimately, Scopes was convicted and fined, though the conviction was overturned on appeal for procedural reasons. The trial was reported contemporaneously by H. L. Mencken, a journalist and commentator for the Baltimore Sun known for his ascerbic wit.

The Darwinian theory, today much enhanced by a century of research and study, was — and is — highly controversial among certain populations. Almost all serious practitioners in the biological sciences accept the theory in its current form. Many who continue to be believers in various religions, maintain that their faith in divine creation is not incompatible with the biological theory. The exceptions, today as in 1925, include fundamentalist Christians who insist that the Bible (in whatever version they use) is the final word of God and its stories and statements are literally true.

When I was a freshman (9th grade) at Jesuit High School (now known by the highfalutin title as Jesuit College Preparatory School) in Dallas many decades ago, our teacher who taught both religion and English, brought up in class the stage play by Lawrence and Lee “Inherit the Wind,” a fictional account of the Scope Trial. We discussed the pros and cons of the Darwinian theory and its relation to faith, and were assigned to each write an essay about the compatibility of biological evolution with Christianity. My belief and understanding was that then, and now remains, the Roman Catholic Church does not teach that Christian faith and evolutionary theory are incompatible. Using exegesis to interpret Bible according to the spirit of its meaning, rather that strict literal language (from whatever version one wishes to read), harmonizes the science with faith. Nothing in Genesis, or elsewhere, precludes the intervention of God to endow an already developed creature with a human soul.

The United States in 1925 was a Protestant Christian society, pretty much fundamentalist in rural areas and small towns. Today, we are more pluralistic. There are numerous versions of Christianity, and many religious ideas and sects. And quite a few individuals here are atheists or agnostics. This pluralism is protected by the U. S. Constitution and state constitutions and law. Those who wish to manifest their beliefs publicly may do so, but those beliefs must not be ensconced into law. To paraphrase a wise observation from the New Testament: render unto the scientific study that with which it concerns, and unto faith what is its concerns.

The three main characters in the play are representations of defense lawyer Clarence Darrow, prosecutor William Jennings Bryan, and journalist H. L. Mencken. David Mamet, in todays Wall Street Journal Essay “Political Theater Makes Bad Drama,” criticizes the play as too one-sided — it tends to portray the Darrow character as heroic and dismissive of benighted populations of the town and Christians in general, Bryan as a buffoon, and Mencken as a cynical agnostic. Manet maintains drama should be more ambiguous and not dogmatic. He has a point. Invective rarely persuades the one at whom it is directed. Manet ends his essay opining that Darrow (and we) have learned nothing from the fictional play. I disagree. At the end, the Darrow character, picks up a Bible and Darwin’s book “The Descent of Man.” He balances them in each hand and puts them together in his briefcase. That says a lot other than mere words.

Note: “Inherit the Wind was staged numerous times. It was a 1960 film by Stanley Kramer; starring Spencer Tracy, Fredric March, and Gene Kelly, and a number of made-for-TV movies, including 1999 with Jack Lemmon, George C. Scott, and Beau Bridges.

Another anniversary worth noting is the launch in 1962 of Telstar, the first communications satellite. This was a feat comparable to the invention of the printing press that led to widespread literacy, the electric telegraph that enabled direct interpersonal communication from a distance, and microchips that allowed the creation of computers, cell-phones, and more. Each event was a blow to the “tyranny of distance” by enhancement of out ability to communicate. These developments have not been without side-effects, but have, on balance, improved the lives of billions.