Newly Discovered Version of Declaration of Independence Raises Questions

A second parchment copy of the Declaration of Independence was recently discovered in a records office in Southern England.  The only other parchment copy is in the National Archives in Washington D.C. There are several differences between the two documents; the most obvious is that the newly discovered version is printed horizontally rather than the vertical version in the National Archives. However the most important difference is that the signatures at the bottom are seemingly in random order rather than being grouped by state. In fact there is no mention of which state each of the signers belonged to at all. This raises the question about whether America was founded as a single sovereign republic or as a collection of thirteen separate colonies.   

After analyzing the newly discovered Declaration it was dated to the 1780s. This was a period of much debate over how to govern our young nation between the Federalists and Anti-Federalists as the inherent problems in the Articles of Confederation were increasingly becoming apparent.  The lack of signatures grouped by states suggests a Federalist leaning towards a strong central government of the US Constitution rather than the Anti-Federalist Articles of Confederation.

Another question raised by this newly discovered document is how it came to be in England. It is believed to have been commissioned by founding father James Wilson who later went on to be one of the six original Supreme Court justices appointed by George Washington. It may have been given to Charles Lennox, the Third Duke of Richmond, often called “Radical Duke” due to his support of the American Revolution. However it got there it remained tucked away in a records office in Sussex for over two centuries. Surprisingly, it is in better condition than the one in the National Archives which has faded over time to the extent that portions are no longer legible. No word on whether this copy will remain in England or if it will ever find its way back to the United States.

Reply to a Colleague's Blog

In her blog post titled "The Defunding of Planned Parenthood", Reanne Becerra made some valid points about a recent Senate vote to allow states to block Federal funding from going to Planned Parenthood. Mike Pence broke the tie in favor of defunding Planned Parenthood. 

If only Mike Pence could have known about the unintended consequences of stripping funding from Planned Parenthood… Oh yeah, when Mike Pence was Governor of Indiana he defunded Planned Parenthood. In many rural counties Planned Parenthood was the only clinic that did STD testing.  In the following years many of these counties had an epidemic rise in HIV and syphilis. The HIV outbreak was escalated by Governor Pence’s moral objection to needle exchange programs for intravenous drug users. Pence incorrectly believed that if drug addicts didn’t have clean needles they would simply choose not to inject drugs. The result was the biggest HIV outbreak in Indiana’s history. Not only were the drug users sharing dirty needles but with Planned Parenthood shut down many of them no longer had access to HIV testing. 

Trump Shouldn't Get to Appoint a Supreme Court Justice in His Last Year in Office

When James Comey announced that the FBI was reopening the investigation into Hillary Clinton’s emails a week before the 2016 election Donald Trump famously said “It would be  ‘virtually impossible’ for a President of the United States to ‘govern or lead’ if they were under an FBI investigation.”  For once I agree with Trump. Last Monday James Comey confirmed the rumors that there has been an ongoing investigation since last summer into ties between the Trump Campaign and the Russian government to influence the election. This is a far more serious charge than using a private email server and calls into question every policy Trump attempts to put in place as possibly trying to return the favor to Russia for getting him elected.

            There has been a vacancy on the Supreme Court for over a year since Justice Antonin Scalia died in February of 2016. Republicans refused to even meet with Obama’s appointee, Merrick Garland. Now that they control both houses of Congress as well as the White House they seem to want to rush Trump’s pick through conformation as soon as possible. Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer is having none of it.  He has proposed delaying a vote on Neil Gorsuch as long as Trump remains under investigation by the FBI. As the FBI investigation picks up speed along with separate Hose and Senate intelligence committee investigations as well as daily revelations from the media, it’s becoming increasingly apparent that Trump is unlikely to remain in office through the summer. This begs the question; if Obama wasn’t allowed to fill a seat on the Supreme Court in his final year, why should Trump? 

Trump is Living the High Life on Taxpayers' Dime

In a recent blog post in Think Progress, author Aaron Rupar noted that Trump will spend his 7th consecutiveweekend at a Trump-branded property while taxpayers foot the bill. This weekend was Trump’s fifth trip to his Mar-a-Lago club since taking office despite promises on the campaign trail that he would not take any vacations because there is so much work to be done. It’s bad enough that each trip costs taxpayers $3 million, but because it is a Trump owned property much of that money goes right into his pocket. Days before Trump’s first visit to Mar-a-Lago as president, the Trump organization announced that the initiation fees were doubling to $200,000. While Trump was very outspoken in criticizing President Obama for taking time off to play golf, in his first month in office Trump golfed six times at a cost to taxpayers of $10 million. During his eight years in office Obama averaged $12 million a year on vacations.

This frivolous waste of taxpayer’s money is especially troubling given Trump’s recent budget proposal where he seeks to do away with programs like Meals on Wheels, NPR, PBS, and the National Endowment for the Arts. As the author points out so far Trump has spent $16.5 million on trips to Mar-a-Lago alone. For that money Meals on Wheels could feed almost 6,000 seniors for a year and after school programs could feed 114,583 children for a year. This doesn’t even account for the millions we are spending on security so Melania can remain in Trump Tower where the secret service pays rent directly to the Trump Corporation or the millions we are spending flying his adult children around the world on vacations and business trips. One has to wonder how long it will take the working class Trump supporters that he promised to help to figure out they have been scammed.

Trump’s dangerous strategy to undermine reality

A recent op-ed in the Washington Post titled “Trump’s dangerous strategy to undermine reality” written by John Podesta makes some valid points. However it’s impossible to consider the source an unbiased observer as Podesta was Hillary Clinton’s campaign chairman. He writes about Trump “First he benefited from fake news stories during the campaign; then as president-elect and now president, he has constantly used the epithet against mainstream media outlets that dare criticize him.” It seems that Donald Trump benefited most from the very real news of the contents of Podesta’s emails in the month before the election that may have cost Clinton the presidency. Podesta, himself, pushed the narrative of Russian hacking to take media attention off of the contents of the emails.

Podesta argues that what Trump is trying to do goes beyond the spin that all politicians do, Trump is trying to undermine the public’s faith that any news is true. “Trump is attempting to build a hall of mirrors where even our most basic sensory perceptions are shrouded in confusion. He is emulating the successful strategy of Vladimir Putin.”  The Kremlin combines reality TV and authoritarianism to blur the line between fact and fiction. When Russians see something on TV they assume it is a lie. Trump’s constant cries of “fake news” every time a poll or a news story shows him in a bad light are having a similar effect on Americans. He is undermining faith in journalism which has traditionally been the fourth estate to keep politicians in check. This is especially dangerous when you have an administration that needs to be fact checked.   

GOP Votes to Repeal Rule Banning mentally Ill From Owning Guns

Last week while most Americans were focused on Trump’s Muslim ban, House Republicans voted to repeal an Obama-era rule barring gun ownership from people deemed mentally incapable of managing their own affairs. This rule affected about 75,000 recipients of disability insurance and supplemental insurance income because of a disabling mental disorder ranging from anxiety to schizophrenia.  While the number of attacks committed by immigrants from the seven predominately Muslim countries named in Trump’s travel ban stands at a hard zero it is estimated that 10% of all homicides in the US are committed by the mentally ill. The rule issued in December of last year as a response to the 2012 Sandy Hook shootings required the Social Security Administration to send records of people on disability insurance because of mental illness to the federal background check system. Although 93% of Americans support background checks to keep guns out of dangerous hands, Republicans lobbied by the National Rifle Association feel that this rule was infringing on the Second Amendment rights of the mentally disabled.   

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