Midterm Matters

In less than two weeks, midterm elections will take place in the United States. Thirty three US senators will be elected. All 435 members of the House of Representatives will be elected. Thirty four state Governors will be elected as well, not to mention many other local and state politicians including mayors, city councils, state senators and representatives, sheriffs, judges, school board members, and commissioners. 

Do midterm elections matter?

According to the Washington Post, more than a half billion dollars say they do. That is how much money has been spent so far by groups and corporations acting INDEPENDENTLY of the candidates on this year’s midterms. (“Corporations are people too, my friend”).

Listening to the national media, one would think that the big question is whether or not the Republicans will take the Senate from the Democrats. Since they already own the House of Representatives, this would give the Republicans control of both houses of Congress and the Supreme Court. The only thing missing from the trifecta would be the White House. Theoretically, this would be terrible for the Democrats and President Obama. The Republicans would surely pass all kinds of laws to reverse and minimize everything the President has accomplished over the last six years. The Senate would change the filibuster rules because they are still pissed at Harry Reid for changing the rules so the Republicans had to do a little more than raise their hand to block most of the President’s appointments. The Senate will probably go back to the days of “Mr. Smith Goes to Washington”, when if you wanted to block or filibuster something, you literally had to get up and talk until you collapsed from exhaustion.

Should Democrats be worried? Afraid? Panicked? Nah, relax. Breathe. If the Republicans take the Senate, they probably will pass all kinds of odiferous legislation, and the President will promptly veto it. They will not have the three fourths majority in both houses of Congress to override the vetoes, so the stuff they pass will be dead on arrival at the White House. As for the Senate changing its filibuster rules, that may be a good thing. There will be another election two years from now. Unlike this time, the thirty three seats being contested in the Senate will be in traditionally Democratic leaning states. Democratic voters will be energized by a Presidential ticket that will probably feature the first potential female President. Demographic trends clearly favor the Democrats. Their numbers are growing while the Republican Party is shrinking. The Senate will return to the Democrats.

So, do midterms really matter?

Tip O’Neil got it right when he said “All politics are local”. A half billion dollars isn’t stupid. Those Republicans on the Supreme Court aren’t stupid. When they ruled in the Citizen’s United vs. The Federal Election Commission case in January of 2010 they opened the floodgates for corporate money to buy elections in the United States on a local and national level. President Obama was appalled to the point of chastising the members of the court to their faces during his State of the Union address. 

The primary reason the Republicans have a stranglehold on the US House of Representatives is because of old fashioned gerrymandering and corporate money. Twenty nine states have Republican governors. Twenty seven states have Republican majorities in both houses of their legislatures, including every state of the former Confederate States of America. State legislatures have the power to draw the boundaries of legislative districts. Before the Voting Rights Act of 1965, they could draw them any way they wanted to, and they routinely drew them to minimize the effects of minority voters. Then, the Republicans on the Supreme Court decided the Voting Rights Act wasn’t really necessary anymore, so they gutted it. As a result, many of the Republicans in the US House and state legislatures are now bullet proof. The only thing they have to fear are primary challenges from the tea party right.

Ironically, more than half a million more Americans voted for Democratic candidates vs Republican candidates for the US House of Representatives in 2012, but the Republicans won 55% of the seats.

What’s up with that?

Do midterms matter? Yes they do.

But, maybe not as much as money and the Supreme Court.  

The Servant

“He who is Great among you shall be your Servant, and whosoever shall be the Chief, shall be Servant of All”. 

The first time I heard those words I was listening to a sermon by Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. He was describing a conversation between Jesus Christ and two of his disciples, James and John. Both of them were anticipating the day when Jesus would become King of Israel, and each of them wanted to sit on his right hand when that day came.

Dr. King’s thesis was that each of them wanted to achieve greatness, but they had a mistaken idea of what greatness really is. James and John associated “greatness” with power and glory, but Jesus gave them a new definition of greatness, and by using that definition, everybody could be great, because everybody can serve.

When I was a high school Principal one of my basic beliefs was “the best possible service to the community”. I had signs posted all over the building. I spoke of service to the community in assemblies and graduation ceremonies. I wanted each of my students to believe that they could achieve greatness not by accumulating money or intimidating others, but by serving others.

My teachers were required to have a service component built into their curriculums, regardless of what they were teaching. My athletic teams were required to have a community service project each year. I told my teachers they did not work for me, on the contrary, I worked for them. My job was to do everything I could to give them the organization, resources, environment, and motivation they needed to be the best teachers they could be. I also wanted them to believe that their students did not work for them, but that they worked for their students. I wanted to be a great principal, but because of Dr. King’s sermon, I did not pursue that by trying to accumulate power and glory. I tried to achieve it by taking care of my students and teachers better than any other principal.

Last week I attended the annual fund-raising dinner for The Training Source in Prince George’s County, Maryland. For the last 21 years The Training Source has provided community enriching, outcome proven programs, including employment training for the unemployed, employability skills training for individuals with developmental disabilities, self-improvement workshops for homeless citizens, youth leadership and technology programs for at-risk youth, and staff development training for employers. The organization has been praised by government officials on the county, state, and national level, and has established partnerships with local, regional, and national businesses.

The Executive Director of The Training Source is Evelyn “Kim” Rhim. We have been friends for more than twenty-five years. We met while working together at IBM. We had many conversations in those days about what the future might hold and what was really important. We were all very motivated and ambitious as well. I thought about those things as I sat in the audience during last week’s event. As person after person walked up to the podium to talk about the positive impact Kim’s organization had had on the community or on their family or for them individually, I became more proud of my friend. By the evening’s conclusion I realized that Kim had achieved true greatness. Despite all of the politicians and dignitaries, my friend was the greatest person in the room.

   

My grandmother passed away almost thirty years ago. My uncle was making the funeral arrangements, and probably because of the special relationship that everyone knew my grandmother and I had, he asked me to do the eulogy. My grandmother was a member of one of the largest Black churches in Birmingham. She had been a member all of her life and was known and admired by the entire church community. The eulogy that I delivered was based on the definition of greatness expressed by Dr. King. I told the congregation that my grandmother was a great woman. I told them she was not rich. She did not have five hundred people working for her. She did not lead a powerful army. She had not been elected to anything. Yet, she was a great woman. She was great because she had served. She had served every single person in that huge church. She was our family’s Chief, because she had indeed, literally and figuratively, served us all.

Dr. King concluded his sermon with this; “If you want to be great, wonderful! But recognize... that he who is greatest among you, shall be your servant.”

Amen.  

First Black

It’s hard to be the first Black. I know. I’ve been there. I was the first Black to play varsity sports at my high school, first in my family to graduate from high school, first to graduate from college, first to work at a major corporation. There is a responsibility that goes along with the role of being first. You have to represent everybody that may have aspired to do what you’re doing but for whatever reason was unable to. There is tremendous pressure to succeed, since your failure would indicate that those denied in the past weren’t worthy anyway.

Being the first Black is a lonely experience. It is the ultimate minority experience. There is no other like you. No one else to share what you are really thinking, how you really feel. You don’t know who to trust. You don’t know who trusts you. You have no mentor. No one will school you on what to do and what not to do. No one will explain major and subtle expectations.

Failure is not a private affair. Others are watching. Some wish you well, others will rejoice in your failures. The pressure of it all can be debilitating.

No one should have to endure what Jackie Robinson did to make it possible for Blacks to play major league baseball. In my lifetime alone there has been a constant stream of “first Blacks”. They include Cicely Tyson, Sidney Poitier, Bill Cosby, Benjamin O. Davis, Thurgood Marshall, Bill Russell, Edward Brooke, Robert C. Weaver, Emmett Ashford, Carl B. Stokes, Shirley Chisholm, Arthur Ashe, Marlin Briscoe, Gordon Parks, Satchel Paige, Isaac Hayes, Daniel James Jr., Frank Robinson, Bill Lucas, Max Robinson, Guion Bluford Jr., Vanessa L. Williams, John Thompson, Doug Williams, Art Shell, Colin Powell, Douglas Wilder, Dr. Mae Jemison, Carol Moseley Braun, Toni Morrison, Tiger Woods, Franklin Raines, Condoleeza Rice, Robert L. Johnson, Halle Berry, Denzel Washington, Serena Williams, Tony Dungy, Eric Holder, Susan Rice, Ursula Burns, Michelle Obama, Barack Obama……

Some would think, and many would hope that the election of Barack Obama as President of the United States was the summit, the pinnacle of a mountain that our country had been struggling to climb since 1776. On the night he was elected I sat in my living room and allowed the tears to flow unimpeded down my face. The first time I heard him say “Yes We Can” I did not believe it. I wanted to, but I had seen too much growing up in Alabama to believe that America would ever cast enough votes to make a Black man the most powerful man in the world. The pride I felt on that night cannot be quantified. I had tremendous hope that his election would give our children the pride and self-esteem that is so necessary for success in our world. Perhaps now we could stop focusing on the “first Black” to do this or that. Perhaps that incredible, unjust pressure of being “first” would be alleviated.

But then, almost simultaneously, I thought to myself, “my God, I hope nothing happens to this man”. As I watched him and his beautiful family on that stage in Chicago, I thought about John Kennedy, Robert Kennedy, Martin Luther King Jr., and Medgar Evers. I thought about the venomous hatred he would have to face each day. I thought about the unrealistic expectations that would be placed on him. I thought about the collective pressure from all of those that needed him to prove that a Black man was indeed possessive of the intellectual, managerial, and organizational skills required of a President.

The last time an incoming President faced the kind of issues President Obama would face was 1932. Franklin Roosevelt was the new President, and the country was experiencing the Great Depression.

 In 2009 President Obama faced one war in Iraq and another war in Afghanistan, not to mention a terrible recession that threatened economic disaster. The financial system was near collapse. The housing market was just as bad. The auto industry was near bankruptcy. Consumer confidence was non-existent, and unemployment exceeded 10%. Meanwhile, the Republican Party became the party of “NO”. Refusing to cooperate with the new President on anything. Their stated purpose was to make sure that he would be a one term president.

Today, American combat troops are no longer dying in Iraq and Afghanistan. The financial system is sound and the stock market is at record levels. The housing market is soaring, and the automobile industry is booming. Consumer confidence is soaring as well, and unemployment is below 6%. President Obama was re-elected despite the best efforts of Republican opposition.

 I believe that history will be kind to President Obama for all of these things, but his crowning achievement will always be the Affordable Care Act. Several Presidents in our history saw the wisdom and necessity for universal health care and made efforts to implement it. They include Harry Truman, Richard Nixon, Bill Clinton, Lyndon Johnson, John Kennedy, Gerald Ford, Jimmy Carter, Theodore Roosevelt, Franklin Roosevelt, Dwight Eisenhower, Ronald Reagan, and George H.W. Bush. Six were Democrats, six were Republicans. They all failed. Only President Obama got it done.

I still pray that he will finish his term unharmed. I know that many Americans hate him. I know that many others don’t appreciate him. Ironically, the same thing could have been said about Abraham Lincoln.

Only a man bestowed with greatness could be born Black in the United States of America and accomplish the things that President Obama has accomplished. He is a great man, and he will be remembered as a great President. To be the First Black President of the United States is beyond comprehension. God Bless Michelle Obama. He never would have made it without her. God Bless their children, she never would have made it without them.

It’s hard to be the “First Black”. Ask anybody that has ever experienced it, like Jackie Robinson, or Barack Obama, or me.

  

Cancelling The Season

The Sayerville War Memorial High School football program is in trouble. Seven members of the football team have been accused of sexual assault of their freshman teammates in what is being described as a “hazing ritual”. The Superintendent has cancelled the remainder of their season and is considering the abolition of the program. Some of the parents are vehemently opposed to the Superintendent’s actions, others support him. The local and national media are weighing in on the decision as well, as local prosecutors decide whether to charge the students as juveniles or adults.

Déjà vu.

When I was a high school Principal I would meet with my varsity football and basketball players (male and female) a few days before the start of their individual seasons. I would look each one of them in the eye and make my expectations clear. I wanted them to realize that playing varsity sports is not a “right”, but a “privilege”. They had earned that privilege by the hard work and dedication they had displayed to make the roster. They needed to understand that when they put on our school’s colors and went out on that stage they were ambassadors, representing all of us. They would be representing all of the students, teachers, parents, and administrators, past and present that had any connection to our school. They had a responsibility to represent us well. I wanted them to understand that their visibility could be a blessing or a curse. The fact that our school was literally a twenty minute drive from the nation’s Capitol potentially gave us a national stage. We were in a major media market. The Washington Post was our local newspaper. If they represented us well, it could go a long way in improving the perception of our school. If they represented us poorly, it could very quickly destroy all of the progress we had made in changing the culture of our school, and the perception of our graduates. They needed to understand the power of the press, and the consequences of their actions when the press is present. 

I would also tell them I expected them to be role models for the other students. I expected them to be the best students. I expected to see them get to class on time. I wanted them to be the best examples of our basic beliefs of “respect, service, and excellence”. Finally, I made sure that each of them clearly understood that any suspension would result in an equal number of lost games. Consequently, a three day suspension would be three games not played. A five day suspension would cost them five. 

I expected my coaches to give our athletes the same message, but it was important for them to hear it from me as well. Culture is driven by expectations, and expectations are driven by the leaders of the group.

In October of 2009, my football players got into a fight on the field that got so bad the game had to be stopped. The fight continued as the visiting team tried to get on their bus. Fans got involved. One of my players threw his helmet at the bus. The police had to use pepper spray to subdue some of my players. There were arrests. Someone could have been killed.

As soon as we sorted out the facts, I suspended four players and requested an expulsion for one. I fired all of the assistant coaches and accepted the resignation of the head coach. I then met with the players and told them that what had happened was unacceptable, and the rest of the season was cancelled.

Some of the parents were vociferous in their opposition to my actions, as well as some in the media. Some of the parents and teachers supported me, but not nearly as loudly as those that did not. I actually got a phone call at home from the Superintendent who asked me to reconsider, but did not order me to. He did tell me that if I decided to stand by my decision, he would support me, and he did. The Washington Post and the broadcast media were all over it, and one columnist in particular was very critical, especially after I refused his request for an interview.

We resumed our football program the following year. I continued my preseason speeches. Never again did we have any character issues with any of our athletes again.  They made us proud, in all sports, and I was proud of them.

Cancelling the season in Sayreville was the right thing to do. Character can be built by playing football, but the games should never be more important than the life lessons that the players need to learn.

There are some things that should never be tolerated, including violence and sexual assault. If cancelling some high school football games can ensure that students are not subjected to those things, cancel the games.

Martin Luther King Jr. once said, “The Time is Always Right To Do Right”... even if it is in the middle of a football season.   

I Know What Love Is

I have read a lot of books and watched a lot of movies. I read all kinds of books and watch all kinds of movies too, but I don’t like science fiction. I didn’t even like the Twilight Zone and the Outer Limits when I was a kid, and when I grew older, I wasn’t into Star Trek or Star Wars either. However, when I was in the Marine Corps one of my friends convinced me to read a science fiction novel called “Stranger in a Strange Land" by Robert A. Heinlein. I didn’t like it, but I never forgot it. The reason I never forgot it is because that book explained to me what love is. 

Now, that’s a STRONG statement. You can ask a hundred people to explain what love is and I promise you will get a hundred different answers. We want to love and be loved. We write books, poetry, songs,and plays about it. We use it as a prerequisite for marriage. We use it as a synonym for sex and jealousy and passion and lust. But we can’t define it, and struggle to describe it. But, not me. I can tell you exactly what love is, because I read a science fiction book that I didn’t really want to read.

The book is about a Martian named Valentine Smith. Yes, that’s what I said! I can see some of you smiling. The more cynical of you are saying “WTF!!!” But it’s a novel ok? Valentine is actually a human. He was born on a spaceship that was on its way to Mars. When the expedition got there they lost contact with the earth. Valentine was the only survivor and was raised by the Martians. About twenty years later another expedition from earth arrived on Mars, and when they left to return to Earth, the Martians sent Valentine back with them.

Valentine had to learn everything about the Earth and the culture of its peoples. He was incredibly inquisitive and asked endless questions about everything. Eventually he asked the question, “What is love?” The answer was one I would never forget.

“Love is that condition, when the happiness of another is essential to your own.”

That is what happens when I have truly loved. It is impossible to be happy when you know that someone else that you love is unhappy. You want to do whatever you can to assist them. You worry until their unhappiness is remedied.  You feel their pain. That is how a parent feels about a child. That is how people having sex that love each other feel, one is not happy if the other is not. That is the empathy between siblings. That is how we feel when we love our pets. If they are not happy, neither are we.

One of the most beautiful love stories I have ever seen is “Forrest Gump”. Forrest loved Jenny. When Jenny was happy, Forrest was happy. He thought she was beautiful and kind, but he knew she wasn’t perfect. If letting her go her own way made her happy, he was willing to do that. If being with another man made her happy, he would accept that. If someone else made her unhappy, he was there to protect her. If forgiving her, accepting her, and taking care of her was what she needed, he would do that as well. 

Sometimes, we are not fortunate enough to have the person that we love feel the same way toward us. Jenny did not love Forrest the way he loved her. But to love another person is its own reward. Jenny was not the only person Forrest loved in that movie. He seemed to love everyone, and in the end, he enjoyed a happier and more fulfilling life than everybody else.

As Forrest said;

“I’m not…a smart man…but I know….what love…is”

Me too.   

I Don't Know

I don’t know what to do about domestic violence. I am confident that since the beginning of time some of the strong has abused some of the weak. That doesn’t make it any less abhorrent.

For some reason, a large segment of the American public has come to the conclusion that the National Football League is the epicenter of this problem. Fingers have been pointed at its players, owners, and commissioner. The consensus opinion seems to be that if the league had a coherent policy to address domestic violence, including indefinite suspensions for players involved in domestic violence, the problem might be fixed. Oh, don’t forget to fire the commissioner.

Well… I don’t know.

I have always had this thing about fairness and equality. You can be hard, as long as you are fair. A parent, principal, employer, teacher, judge, coach, etc. has to make sure that whatever punishment or consequence is given to one, can and will be given to others committing the same offense.

With that in mind, should everybody   accused (not necessarily convicted) of domestic violence be indefinitely suspended from their jobs?

I suspect that if that became the standard consequence for the strong abusing the weak, there would be a quick and drastic decrease in the number of victims. I also suspect that there would be a quick and drastic increase in the number of people falsely accused.

If you check the statutes for domestic violence for all 50 States you will find different definitions and different consequences for each of them. The reality is if you assault your wife or girlfriend in the United States, the thing that determines if you are subject to a $500 fine or 99 years in prison is what State you did it in. That is, unless you are a player in the National Football League, then it might cost you your job.

Unless the same penalty applies to teachers, engineers, CEO’s, politicians, actors, musicians, writers, news anchors, lawyers, plumbers, electricians, farmers, fishermen, and everybody else with a job, I don’t think that’s fair.

There is no good reason to abuse anyone. Abuse comes in many forms, including psychological, physical, and sexual. The victims often suffer long after the event occurs. Some of the victims suffer in silence. Some cry out for help and are ignored by friends, family and authorities. Some live in constant fear of the next assault. Some die.

It is good that some attention is being paid to this very serious problem in our society.

But, I don’t know what to do about it.

Perhaps it is good that the NFL has people talking about this. Maybe it can establish internal policies that will reduce the number of its players that abuse others. Perhaps that will motivate the National Basketball Association, Major League Baseball, and other professional sport leagues to do the same thing. Perhaps that will raise many people’s awareness of the issue. That is all good, but that is not a solution. The fact is 99.999999…….. (Forever)% of the perpetrators and victims of this vicious crime will be unaffected, and continue to do what they do.

Federal laws supersedes state laws. Perhaps the US Congress will be moved to pass a domestic violence law that will bring some sanity and certainty to the consequences for domestic abuse. Even if today they can’t agree that the sun is shining.

Bertrand Russell once said, “The idiots are cock-sure, the intelligent are full of doubt”.

I doubt that this will be fixed very soon.  

9 and 1

One of the defining moments of my life occurred on a football field.

 In 1965 Alexander City, Alabama had two school systems, separate but unequal. There was a high school, junior high school, and elementary school for the white kids. There was one school for the Black kids. The Black school was for grades 1 thru 12. The city decided to integrate the high school in 1967 using a system they called “freedom of choice”. For various reasons, few of the Black students ventured across town to the white high school. As for me, although I was only 14 years old, I was well aware of what was happening in the civil rights movement. I read the Birmingham News every day, and watched the national news every night. I could not understand how so many people could be protesting, marching, and dying for civil rights and integration, and when the time came to integrate, nobody integrated! It did not take very long for me to decide to go. My parents did not have any influence on my decision. In fact, they would have talked me out of it if they could have, but I was determined to go.

To tell the truth, there was another reason I wanted to go to the big high school across town. Benjamin Russell High School had a big time sports program. The football team was the heartbeat of the city. Every game was broadcast on the city’s only radio station, and featured each week in the city’s weekly newspaper. The really big games were often reported in the Birmingham News. Their home games were played to full houses in the stadium downtown. I wanted to be a part of that. I wanted to play football, and basketball, and be on the radio and in the newspaper. So, my two best friends and I integrated the high school.

All freshmen played on the school’s junior varsity, and all three of us became starters on what would be the first undefeated freshman team the school had ever had. Our integrated team was a hot topic of conversation on both sides of town, and for the first time, black people and white people were attending the same social event, (that’s what a football game in Alabama is) sitting side by side with a common cause.

Integration in our city was never contentious, controversial, or violent. I think that our freshman football team had a lot to do with bringing both sides of our city together and convincing everyone that maybe we could be one city.

During my junior year in high school the city announced that full integration would take place the following year. The Black high school would be converted to an elementary school. All high school students would attend Benjamin Russell High. This would take place in the aftermath of 1968, one of the most traumatic years in the history of our country. Martin Luther King had been killed. Robert Kennedy had been killed. The inner cities had exploded with riots in the aftermath of Dr. King’s death, The Democratic convention in Chicago tore the city apart. John Carlos and Tommie Smith had galvanized the Black community with black gloved salutes on the Olympic medal stand in Mexico City, and the war in Viet Nam suddenly went sideways with the Tet Offensive, forcing LBJ to decline to run again for the Presidency.

No one knew what would happen when our schools were totally integrated in the aftermath of all of this domestic turmoil. I did know that many of the Black students that were coming to the school that I had attended for three years feared the unknown. I knew that most of them were not academically prepared for what would be expected of them. I knew that many of them would fail.

For our school, the football season started before the first day of class. Our team was now fully integrated, and the influx of athletes from Laurel turned a really good team into a great one. We won our first game easily, electrifying the town. We won again, and again, and again, and again. We defeated the defending state champions, shocking the entire state. Everyone was convinced that we would go undefeated and untied, and go on to win the state championship. The football team was the talk of the town. With all of this going on, the fact that we were fully integrated for the first time was an afterthought.

The last team on our schedule with any chance to beat us was Valley High School, a school located just east of Auburn on the Alabama/Georgia border. It turned out to be a really good game. Each team had opportunities to score but neither did until the fourth quarter when Valley scored. They missed the extra point so the score was 6 – 0. Our team responded immediately and drove the entire field until we found ourselves with a fourth down on the Valley two yard line. We had a play that we ran that no one had stopped all year. We had used the same play to score against the defending state champions earlier in the year, and none of us were surprised when our coach told us to run it again. I had a very important role on that play. My responsibility was to block the defensive end, allowing our quarterback to run around the left side of the line. This time, for the first time all year, I missed the block.

We lost the game, 6 – 0. Valley went on to win the state championship. At the time, it seemed everything else in life that was important had been lost. We had a goal of perfection, immortality. We had worked so hard, so long, laughing together, praying together, eating together, and even showering together. We had endured pain and exhaustion, practice after practice. We had let the whole city down, our parents, friends, and girlfriends. We cried. All of us. Our band members and our cheerleaders cried.

I felt responsible. If I had only made that block….

 I never forgot that play. I never will.

I have a plaque that has hung on the wall of my office for more than thirty years. It is a quote from the great Green Bay Packers coach Vince Lombardi. It says;

“Winning is not a SOMETIME thing,

It’s an ALL THE TIME thing.
You don’t WIN some of the time.
You don’t do things right SOME OF THE TIME.
You do them right ALL THE TIME.
There is no room for second place.
There is only one place, and that’s first place.

 We finished that season 9 and 1. I learned a lot more from the one than the nine.

The Fourth of July

Gettysburg. The battlefield is less than an hour’s drive from my home in Maryland. It has become the place I go to when I want to get away from everything else. I have become very familiar with the town and the battlefield. It has a strange, almost metaphysical attraction to me. Although there are many well-known and historical places there, I am always attracted to Little Round Top, the spot where Joshua Chamberlain and the 20^th Maine fought off the Alabamians to save the vulnerable left flank of the Union army on the second day of the battle. I have often sat there on the rocky hill for hours at a time. In my mind’s eye I can see the Confederates charging the hill, over and over again. I can hear the screams of the wounded and the final prayers of the dying. I can smell the gunpowder, I can feel the spirit of the ghosts.  

In three days during the summer of 1863. Robert E. Lee’s Army of Northern Virginia faced off against the Union’s Army of the Potomac and its brand new commanding general George Meade. It was the most important battle in the history of our country. It was also the bloodiest. During those three days there were more than fifty thousand casualties. The Viet Nam War lasted 20 years, and during that time fifty eight thousand Americans died. If Lee had won at Gettysburg, the Civil War would have probably been over. There would have been nothing between him and Washington DC, Philadelphia or Baltimore. The United States would have been broken in two. The Confederate States of America would have continued its “peculiar institution” of slavery, and probably expanded it to Mexico, Central, and South America. The history of the world would have been very different. It all was in the balance on that field in Gettysburg.

When visiting the US Capitol today one of the things that is impossible to ignore are the many statues that are on display. It tells the story of our country thru the perspectives of the American people. Each state is allowed to have two statues of their own choosing. Some of the people that have been placed there may be unfamiliar to the average citizen, but upon further review, you will find that each has made a significant contribution to their particular state. The statues representing the state of Virginia are George Washington, and Robert E. Lee.

The battlefield at Gettysburg has been immaculately preserved. You can take an automobile tour by following clearly visible signs and relive all of the events that occurred there. Every military unit that participated has a monument on the very spot they were engaged. Most of the monuments tell you the State the unit was from, the casualties they suffered, and describes the actions they took. The largest of the monuments along Seminary Ridge, which housed the Confederate lines is Robert E. Lee. It is a beautiful, majestic statue of Lee sitting tall on his famous horse, Traveller. He is in the center of the Confederate line looking across the field toward Cemetery Ridge, which housed the Union lines, about three quarters of a mile away. He seems to be staring at a smaller statue of the Union Commander George Meade, which stands directly across from him, on the higher ground, in the center of the Union lines.

On the third day at Gettysburg Robert E. Lee made a decision that saved the Union. On the first day he had attacked on the Union’s right. On the second day he had attacked the Union left. On the third day he decided to go up the middle. He would send fifteen thousand men across that open field, directing them to converge on the middle of the Union line near a copse of trees. Lee ordered his best General, James Longstreet to organize the attack. Longstreet had his doubts the attack could succeed. I took my daughter to Gettysburg when she was still in elementary school. We stood near the clump of trees on Cemetery Ridge and when I showed her the open field and explained what Lee ordered his men to do, she said, “daddy that was stupid”. The ill-fated attack, forever known as Pickett’s charge, was a disaster. Confederate casualties were almost seven thousand.

There is a short pathway leading from Lee’s statue to the spot where he rode out to meet his troops as they retreated on that day. He is reported to have said, “It is all my fault”. He was right.

On the fourth day, the Confederates began their retreat back to Virginia in a pouring rain. Perhaps the rain was the tears of angels for the innocent young men that had died on the field. Perhaps it was God’s way of washing away the blood that could be found everywhere on what is now hallowed ground. Perhaps Lincoln was right when he said, “all the wealth piled by the bondsman’s two hundred and fifty years of unrequited toil shall be sunk, and … every drop of blood drawn with the lash shall be paid by another drawn with the sword…”.

The Confederates retreated on the fourth day, July fourth, eighteen sixty three. To me that was the day that THIS country was born. This was the day when America experienced a new birth of freedom. This is what I celebrate on the Fourth of July.

Abandon Ship

One Sunday morning more than 15 years ago I decided not to go to church. Later that morning I found myself watching an old black and white movie called “Abandon Ship”. I never forgot it. When I became a Principal I thought about that movie every single day. I showed it to my teachers. I showed it to my International Baccalaureate students. I recommended it to everybody that asked me about the secrets to our success in transforming our school from the worst in our district to one of the best.

The movie is about leadership, decision-making, crisis management, group dynamics, ethics, favoritism, passion, and so many other things. Starring Tyrone Power, Stephen Boyd, Mai Zetterling, and Lloyd Nolan, the movie begins with a cruise ship striking a mine left over from World War II. The ship is destroyed and eventually Tyrone Power winds up on a life boat filled with other survivors including the ship’s captain, who is mortally wounded. Before he dies, the captain transfers command of the boat to Tyrone Power, who had been the second officer on the cruise ship. His last words to Tyrone Power is “save as many as you can”.

The boat is designed to accommodate nine people. There are twenty seven people either in the boat or holding on to the side of it. The people on the boat include young and old, male and female, strong and weak, black and white, meek and courageous.  Some of the people on the boat are grievously wounded. Some have faith and trust in the new captain, others think they are better qualified for leadership than he.

Mr. Holmes, (Power) initially believes they only need to survive for 24 to 48 hours until help arrives. He is confident that an SOS was sent before the ship sank. He is then informed by the dazed radio operator that both of the ship’s transmitters were destroyed before the distress signals could be sent. With no help on the way and the nearest land 1500 miles away in Africa, Holmes begins to realize the impossible situation he faces.

Another of the cruise ship’s officers, (Lloyd Nolan) is also seriously injured, and whispers the obvious to the beleaguered captain, “there are too many people on the boat, it has provisions and was made for nine, it will stretch to fifteen, but twenty seven has no chance. You have to get some of these people off this boat! Some are already dead! Like me!” He then jumps off the boat. Holmes jumps in the ocean to try to save him, but fails.

Soon it is obvious that a storm is coming, and the vacillating Holmes finally decides that he will have to sacrifice some of the people on the boat to save the rest. He informs everyone what he is about to do and begins to order the injured, weak, and cowardly to abandon the ship. He orders each to be given a life vest and placed over the side. One crew member (Boyd) is so opposed that he will only follow the order at gun point when told to place an unconscious woman over the side. When Holmes obliges he follows the order but insists on going over the side with her, despite the objections of Mr. Holmes.

One of the fifteen allowed to remain on the boat is so angry with Holmes that he wounds him with a knife, and Holmes shoots him dead with a flare gun.

The boat and the people on it survive the storm, and when they awake the next morning they hail Holmes as a hero and are effusive in their praise for him, unanimously thankful that he had saved their lives. However, Holmes’s wound has worsened, and applying the same standard to himself, he transfers command to the radio operator, giving him a ring signifying command that had been given to him by the previous captain, and throws himself overboard. The other passengers go after him and put him back on the boat.

Shortly thereafter, a ship appears on the horizon and everyone is jubilant when the ship acknowledges seeing them. But then, the passengers begin to disassociate themselves from the captain. They begin to express their objections to what the captain had done. The radio operator returned the Captain’s ring to him. The passengers literally turned their back to him in the boat.

The Captain was charged with murder and convicted. He was sentenced to six months in prison.

As a Principal, each day I reminded myself that “I can’t save everybody on the boat”.  Sometimes I would say it out loud. I wanted to save them, but until I accepted the fact that I couldn’t, each time I lost a student I considered myself a failure. To save them all was an unrealistic goal that endangered all of them. I believe that our students that were put over the side needed to be jettisoned. If they had remained we would have been in danger of losing the entire school. The life jackets that we offered included evening school, job corps, and alternative schools.

I remember this movie because of the similarities with my own experiences as a Principal. I remember the passionate discussions I had with my assistant principals, teachers, counselors and students about the moral dilemma faced by Mr. Holmes. Some of them realized that I faced the same dilemma every day.

Should a leader sacrifice the few to save the many?

I did.