Follow up to "Fomenting Fear and Division in Montgomery County" (May 2020)

The power of the press combined with the power of the truth is still potent, at least in our community.

Follow up to https://davidfishback.blogspot.com/2020/05/fomenting-fear-and-division-in.html, which contained the May 1 Maryland Matters guest commentary I coauthored with Karen Chenowith:

In the weeks after the publication, a number of elected office holders in Montgomery County took the unprecedented step of specifically urging their constituents to NOT vote for a particular candidate (Stephen Austin).  See https://www.marylandmatters.org/2020/05/25/montgomery-co-elected-officials-warn-voters-about-school-board-candidate/

Stephen Austin only received 13% of the vote in the primary, coming in a distant third, so he was not on the general election ballot.  My preferred candidate, Sunil Dasgupta, came in second -- and again came in second to the eventual winner, Lynne Harris (who I likely would have voted for in the primary had Sunil not been running.)

In January 2021, Maryland Matters listed our May 1 piece as its sixth-most read article of 2021, and the follow-up piece from the MoCo electeds as the eighth-most read.  https://www.marylandmatters.org/2021/01/04/one-last-look-back-our-most-read-stories-of-2020/

MLK Shabbat Service at Temple Emanuel

Annual MLK Shabbat Service

Temple Emanuel of Kensington, Maryland
January 15, 2021, 6:30pm on Zoom and Facebook Live

Temple Emanuel of Kensington MD will hold its annual Martin Luther King, Jr., Shabbat Service on Friday evening, January 15, 2021, at 6:30pm (virtually, of course). We are pleased and proud to announce that our guest speaker will be Yolanda Savage-Narva, the new Director of Racial Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion (REDI) programs for the Union of Reform Judaism. Her topic will be: Striving to Create Dr. King's Beloved Community: Reform Judaism's Quest for Racial Equality, Diversity and Inclusion. 

In her role as REDI Director, Ms. Savage-Narva is leading the URJ's efforts to address racial justice and equity in all its forms, as well as other kinds of oppression -- looking not only to do what we can in the wider world, but also to what we need to do in our own congregations, as we seek to fulfill Dr. King's vision of building a Beloved Community and to follow the ancient admonition of Tikkun Olam, "Repairing the World." She also serves as Vice-Chair of the URJ's Commission on Social Action, and as Co-Chair of the Religious Action Center's Racial Justice Task Force.

Before joining the URJ staff, she was Executive Director of Operation Understanding (oudc.org), a non-profit whose mission is to create a generation of young leaders to promote respect, understanding, and cooperation while fighting to eradicate racism, anti-Semitism, and all other forms of discrimination. Earlier in her career, she worked in public health and education.

A member of Temple Micah in Washington, D.C. and of Delta Sigma Theta (an international Black sorority dedicated to community service and education), Ms. Savage-Narva is a graduate of Tougaloo College and has a masters degree in education from Jackson State University.

Please join us on January 15. For Zoom login information please contact the Temple Office at 301-942-2000 or office@templeemanuelmd.org.  Or it may be viewed on Facebook Live at www.facebook.com/TempleEmanuelMD

Montgomery County County and State Ballot Question: Please Vote FOR A & C and 1 & 2; Vote AGAINST B & D

In the federal elections this year, I am firmly in the Vote Blue No Matter Who Camp.  That will not be news to anyone who knows me.

 

As a nearly live-long resident of Montgomery County, going back to the 1950s, as a 34-year resident of Olney, and as someone who has been deeply involved in local politics for many decades, I am often asked my opinions around election time.  This year I have been following the ballot initiatives very closely, listening closely to the views of those in favor and those against each of them.  For the reasons set forth below, I recommend voting in Favor of Montgomery County Ballot Questions A & C, Against Ballot Questions B & D; and in Favor of State Ballot Questions 1 & 2.  (The Montgomery County Democratic Central Committee has endorsed Questions A & C and 1 & 2, and opposes Questions B & D.)

 

 

The Case for Voting for Montgomery County Ballot Questions A & C and against B & D

 

The four local Montgomery County ballot questions on the November ballot are very important to our future.  The first two, A and B, deal with our ability to have a rational property tax system, which allows us to grow.  The second two, C and D, deal with how our County Council will be structured and present two opposing visions on how we will govern ourselves.

 

A and B: Montgomery County’s ability to finance its governmental services

 

To understand the impact of these proposals, we first must understand how, under our current Charter and current state law, we are able to raise the money will need for our public schools (47% of our budget), policing and fire protection (11%), debt service (7%), and social and general governmental services, including libraries, parks, transportation, (35%).

 

Real estate taxes on both commercial and individual properties cover 45% of our tax revenues.  But under the current Charter (the County’s “constitution”) the total amount of revenue raised by property taxes may not increase from year to year in “real terms” (i.e., the rate of inflation) with the exception of revenue from new construction and rezoned property.  This system is unique to Montgomery County, and makes the budget process unnecessarily complex and restrictive.  Elsewhere, local governments figure out what they need to spend and then set the tax rate accordingly – but do not have a cap on the amount of revenue that can be gotten from the property tax.  If the elected representatives determine that the tax rate is too high, they can cut spending.  The existing arrangement essentially takes that policy making out of the County Executive and Council’s hands.

 

It also means that no matter how much the County grows, both in population and the value of property, the money raised by the property tax must stay pretty much the same in real terms.  At the same time, the County income tax (which covers 41% of our tax revenues) is capped by State Law at 3.2%.  So while the property and income taxes cover 87% of our income for all the services we need – existing laws impose a strait-jacket that can prevent us from dealing with the challenges faced by our community. Indeed, the inability to raise money under the property tax could interfere with our AAA bond rating, which enables us to keep our debt service low.

 

Question A, proposed by the County Council, would eliminate the revenue cap on the amount that may be raised by property taxes. By eliminating the cap, as our County grows our ability to keep pace with that growth would no longer be blocked by this outdated requirement. This would not impact the property tax rate, which currently, under the Charter, may not be increased beyond the rate of inflation unless every member of the County Council agrees.  In other words, removing the cap on actual revenue would allow the County to provide services commensurate with the County’s growth; and it would encourage business in the County, because the County would be better positioned to provide those services.

 

Question B, on the other hand, was proposed by a petition spearheaded by Robin Ficker, a perpetual gadfly candidate for office who has not won an election since 1978.  It only takes 10,000 signatures to place a proposal on the ballot for referendum, and in a County of a million people that is not a significant showing of public support.  And it is not even clear how many signers of the Question B petition were aware of its impact.  Question B would leave the existing Charter provision on real estate taxes in place, except that it would eliminate the power of the Council to ever, even by unanimous vote, raise the tax rate beyond the rate of inflation. The Charter currently requires a unanimous vote of the Council to raise the property tax beyond that level.  In 2016, a fiscal crisis made such an increase essential, and County Executive Leggett and all nine members of the Council were able to make the necessary adjustment in the rate that was needed simply to keep revenues stable.  The combination of a continued cap on the amount of revenue raised by real estate taxes and an absolute bar on raising the tax rate above the level of inflation would make a difficult situation disastrous.

 

It is significant that Question B is vigorously opposed by every present and past Montgomery County elected official to have taken a position and who was elected in the 21^st Century. (Mr. Ficker was elected to a House of Delegates seat in 1978, was defeated for reelection, and has lost every race he has run since then.)  See, for example, the recent op-ed by Democratic former County Executive Ike Leggett, former Republican Member of Congress Connie Morella, and business leaders David Blair and Carmen Ortiz Larsen;  and these statements by Mr. Leggett here and here.

 

If both were approved by the voters, neither would go into effect, because they deal very differently with the same provision of the Charter.

 

A vote FOR Question A would eliminate Montgomery County’s fiscal strait-jacket without significant increases in the tax rates.  A vote AGAINST Question B would prevent a potential fiscal disaster in Montgomery County.

 

C and D:  Structure of the County Council

 

The County Council/County Executive form of local government was established in 1968, when, pursuant to a change in the Charter, the voters replaced the previous County Commission/County Manager system. Initially, the Council was made up of seven members, all of whom were elected at-large, but five of whom were required to live in a particular district. At that time, about a half-million people lived in the County. By 1986, the County’s population had grown to about two-thirds of a million, leading to a decision by the voters to expand the Council to include nine members, only four of whom were elected at-large, with five elected by the voters of particular districts. The County’s population is now over a million. Currently, each district member represents about 212,000 people.

 

Question C, proposed by the County Council, recognizes the growth of the County by increasing the size of the Council to eleven by adding two district seats. Under this proposal, each district member would represent about 151,000 people.

 

Question D, was proposed by a petition, would eliminate the at-large seats and create a Council of nine districts, each representing about 118,000 people.

 

I believe that Question C better than the existing structure, and preferable to Question D. While both ballot questions would make the district seats smaller, Question D would do so by eliminating the advantages of having several members at-large. A nine single member district Council with no at-large members could lead to too much parochialism and, depending on how the lines are drawn, result in decisions not supported by most people in the County.

 

Ballot Question C is, in my opinion, the best option because by adding two more district seats it reduces the size of the districts, making each more likely to be responsive; but it keeps the four at-large seats, thus giving people other members to turn to if their district member is not responsive, and assuring that in big picture matters, the Council is in sync with the majority of voters County-wide, taking into account County-wide considerations. Remember that in 2018, each of the at-large winners got 75% of the vote.

 

Arguments in favor of Question D do not withstand scrutiny. 

 

The contention that the existence of four at-large seats inevitably means that too many members of the Council are down-county economic elitists who can afford to run county-wide live down county is without basis.  None of the current at-large members – who emerged victorious in the 30-some candidate 2018 primary --  are wealthy.  Indeed, like so many in Montgomery County, they are life-long public servants.  Gabe Albornoz, now of Kensington, was former County Executive Ike Leggett’s Director of Recreation for eleven years. Will Jawando, of Silver Spring, has spent his entire career in public service, including work as a White House staffer in the Obama Administration.  Evan Glass, also of Silver Spring, is a former CNN producer who spent his years after leaving CNN as a community activist.  Hans Riemer, of Takoma Park, spent his career in the non-profit sector before his election to the Council.  None could be termed wealthy elitists.  It is noteworthy that a wide range of citizens, including Marilyn Balcombe of Gaithersburg  (who came in fifth in the 2018 at-large primary), and many community organizations have organized to support Question C and oppose Question D.  See https://mocoforc.org/

and http://www.theseventhstate.com/?p=13848

  

More to the point, to the extent that funding may have, in the past, been an impediment to seeking public office in Montgomery County, the public financing system has changed the ball-game in this regard: in 2018, all four winners relied on the public financing system. See here (Item 2). Those who emerge from the Democratic primary elections (which will continue to be tantamount to general election victory as long as the Republican Party in MoCo continues to be so far from its older Connie Morella/Gilbert Gude/Howard Dennis roots) win because they make the most positive impressions on those who attend campaign forums and secure support from experienced people who publicly endorse them.  Thus, to the extent that, in the past, funding has been a barrier to county-wide candidacies, the public financing system has leveled the playing field.

 

In my part of the County, I have heard people express concern that they are not being well-represented by our current Council Member (who is term-limited and cannot run in 2022).  But there is no guaranty that that will improve if we go to a Nine-District Council, since Olney and its immediate environs do not have a large enough population to warrant our own district. Whether C, or D, or the present system is in place in 2022, the challenge will be to field a candidate who will be sensitive to local concerns. That is always the challenge of representative politics. By keeping At-Large seats, if we do not succeed in getting a sympathetic ear from our district, there is always the opportunity to get the ear of one of the At-Large members elected in 2022 -- and that, too, is the normal challenge of representative politics. In local politics, it is often as much about the relationships we develop as it is about geography (at least that has been my experience in issues in which I have been involved).

 

Nor does the expense of having two additional members on the Council counsel against Question C.  Council members are paid $140,370 (less than senior federal civil servants) and have a staff of four.  This would be a low price to pay for better representation, which creates a sound balance between parochial and County-wide interests.

 

As with Questions A and B, if both Questions C and D were approved by the voters, neither would go into effect, because they are inconsistent with each other. 

 

A vote FOR Question C and AGAINST Question D would result in more district-based Council members while at the same time keeping the advantages of having at-large members.

 

State Questions:  Vote for both 1 and 2

 

Council Member Evan Glass has provided cogent reasons for voting for State Question 1 (about the budget process in Annapolis) and State Question 2 (which would permit state-regulation sports betting).  I agree with him (although I do so reluctantly on Question 2; I think that funding public needs with gambling revenues is, as a general matter, not good policy.  But that train has long ago left the station.  The argument that those wishing to engage in such gambling have been crossing into neighboring states to place their bets, thus depriving Maryland coffers of significant revenue, persuades me to vote for it.

 

Pasted below are Evan Glass’s analyses of both the County and State ballot questions.

 

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Dear Neighbors:

 

As you receive your mail-in ballots or make your plan for voting in person, I would like to draw your attention to six ballot measures that will have an enormous impact on the future of Montgomery County and Maryland. From tax policy to the Council’s structure, these questions deserve your attention and your vote.

 

I am sharing with you a summary of what each of these questions mean and how their passage will impact us locally. You can also read the Washington Post article on the ballot measures. Also for your consideration is the Montgomery County Democratic party’s official position on all measures.

 

Vote FOR Question A

Question A is a step toward fixing our broken tax system. It’s simple, as tax policy should be. Your property tax rate next year will remain the same as your tax rate this year, unless all nine County Councilmembers vote to increase it. No complicated formulas. No need for a Ph.D. in economic theory to calculate it. A cap on the rate we pay, not on the total revenue the County can receive. Tax revenues would increase exactly how they should, when the tax base grows. The better our local economy does, the more the County will be able to invest in schools, transportation, and everyday services. By simply keeping our tax rates steady, it would generate millions in revenue without even needing to raise taxes to do so. It’s clear. It’s consistent. It’s fair. It’s better for residents, for businesses, and for the county.

 

Vote AGAINST Question B

Question B is bad and it could bankrupt the County. Proposed by Robin Ficker, it doubles down on our broken property tax system, turning a bad policy into a catastrophic one by eliminating any ability to provide basic services or to respond to a crisis. It would directly threaten our AAA Bond rating which is needed to fund schools, libraries, transportation projects, and rec centers. It doesn’t promote a thriving economy, but actually discourages the very economic growth we need to invest in critical infrastructure and address school overcrowding in a fiscally responsible way. That’s the wrong choice at the worst possible time, threatening our ability to adequately address this COVID-19 health emergency and the resulting economic crisis.

 

Question A is about fiscal responsibility. Question B is about fiscal irresponsibility.

 

Vote FOR Question C

C is for more Council representation. The County Council is currently made up of nine members: five elected in a district and four elected at-large (by the entire County). Question C would create two new seats on the Council by adding two new district Councilmembers, while maintaining the four at-large seats. Most importantly, Question C would maintain your ability to vote for five members of the Council, who you can contact for constituent service needs and advocate for/against public policy.

 

C is for more Council diversity. Montgomery County's population has grown by 50% since the current Council structure was enacted 30 years ago. Question C will expand democracy, provide for more representation, and add more diverse voices by adding two districts.

 

Vote AGAINST Question D

 

D will dilute your voice. Currently, every voter in Montgomery County can vote for five Councilmembers: one in their district and four at-large. This means that every resident has five Councilmembers to represent their interests and provide constituent services. If Question D passes, you’ll be limited to voting for only one Councilmember instead of five.

 

D is not Democratic. Question D is opposed by former County Executive Ike Leggett and former GOP Congresswoman Connie Morella. This measure will only shuffle the chairs and create more parochialism on the Council. This same structure was used in Prince George’s County for decades and in 2018 they changed the system to include at-large members. The at-large members of the Council are important because they maintain a Countywide perspective on major issues such as schools, the environment and transportation, and allow you the ability to contact more than one Councilmember for assistance.

 

For more representation and more diversity, vote FOR Question C and AGAINST Question D.

 

Vote FOR Question 1

 

Question 1 is a statewide ballot question that would grant the Maryland General Assembly the same power 49 other states have –– a power most Marylanders assume we have –– to move money around the budget submitted by the Governor. This would not impact Maryland's requirement for a balanced budget and would require the General Assembly to fund the budget within an overall amount set by the Governor. It would also create a line item veto for the Governor on any budget changes the legislature makes. Finally, the legislation does not take effect until the next Governor's first budget. Bottom line: The people's branch of government should have the authority to fund the people's priorities.

 

Vote FOR Question 2

 

Question 2 is a statewide ballot question that would authorize sports betting in the state of Maryland, something every jurisdiction around us has already permitted. The revenue –– possibly $20 - $40 million annually –– would go toward the education lockbox to fund our state's education programs. For many of us, the state's incremental expansion of gaming from lottery to slots to table games to sports gaming has not been our first choice, but given the actions by other states in our region, the fact is much of this gambling will occur whether in Maryland or not. If we can help fund education programs with these dollars, we should.

“A Republic, if you can keep it.” Benjamin Franklin -- The crisis in the venerable institution created by the senior Founding Father

 

Ben Franklin's statue in front of the Old Post Office Building on Pennsylvania Avenue in Washington DC.  The building currently is under lease -- illegally, in my view (see https://davidfishback.blogspot.com/2017/03/this-day-in-collaboration-defiling-of.html) -- as the Trump International Hotel. 

This morning, we sent the following letter to the Members of the United States Postal Service Board of Governors.  (Thank you to Gary Kreps, from whom we appropriated some of the language.)

August 17, 2020

Robert M. Duncan, Chair

John M. Barger, Member

Ron A. Bloom, Member

Roman Martinez IV. Member

Donald L. Moak, Member

William D. Zollars, Member

United States Postal Service Board of Governors

Re:  “A Republic, if you can keep it.”  Benjamin Franklin

Gentlemen:

Thank you for your service on the USPS Board of Governors. We are writing to you as patriotic American citizens to request your help in addressing serious problems that are happening at the USPS.  

We are very concerned about the dangerous activities that Postmaster General Louis DeJoy has taken that have significantly harmed operations of the USPS, such as slowing mail delivery, removing postal collection boxes, removing/dismantling mail sorting machines, eliminating overtime pay for postal workers, and removing and reassigning many long-term members of the USPS administration. 

These disruptive actions have reduced the effectiveness of mail delivery, with very serious consequences for the American public who depend on the mail, especially for the many elderly, disabled, ill, rural, military, and hospitalized people who depend on the mail to request and receive needed information, medication, and supplies. This is particularly problematic for the public during the COVID-19 pandemic when many people are not able to get out and travel around safely.  

It is even more alarming that this is happening in the middle of a Presidential election in a pandemic in which the Postal Service is more important than ever for the successful functioning of American Democracy. When the founder of the Postal Service, Benjamin Franklin, told a fellow citizen on the steps of Independence Hall in 1787 that the Constitutional  Convention had produced “a republic, if you can keep it,” he could easily have been speaking to you today. 

We urge you to use your authority, including the removal of the current Postmaster General, to reverse the actions which will interfere with the ability of the Postal Service employees to “complete their appointed rounds” in a timely manner. 

Sincerely,

Barbara and David Fishback

Olney MD

*********************

Here is the contact information for the Members:  

Tom Cotton, John Lewis, and Historical Truth

In all the flap over Senator Tom Cotton’s assertion that  American slavery was “a necessary evil,” I think it useful to revisit conservative columnist Michael Gerson’s discussion from September 2019.  But first, a few additional comments, which are particularly pertinent today, as so much of the nation honors the life of Congressman John Lewis.

The principles set forth in the Declaration of Independence were, in fact, revolutionary – a giant leap in a world in which the norm was that government was imposed on the people and that the people generally had no rights that governments were bound to respect. 

Cotton’s fall-back argument – that the Founders consciously set up a system that would allow for eventual dismantling of slavery -- is simply wrong, historically.  In fact, the Constitution is rife with provisions intended to enhance the power of slave-holding states so that they could hang on to slavery. The history of the first 84 years of the American republic was a struggle over slavery, filled with compromises to keep the Union from splitting apart, but which ultimately (and perhaps inevitably) resulted in the Civil War.  So much for Cotton’s assertion that the Founders set up a glide-path to abolition.

In 1863, in his Gettysburg Address, Abraham Lincoln refined the argument as to how our founding principles should be understood, declaring that the Civil War would determine whether “government of the people, by the people, and for the people” would “perish from the Earth.”  And struggle of the century that followed centered on the question of whether the outcome of the Civil War meant that “the people” meant all people, not just White people.  More often than not, the answer was “not so much.”  The forces of White supremacy lost the War, but won most of the “peace.”  Tom Cotton cannot assert the contrary unless he willfully ignores the historical record.

John Lewis’s passing reminds us that it was not until exactly a century after the close of the Civil War did Congress finally act to assure that the 15^th Amendment to the Constitution which was the post-Civil War effort to guarantee the right to vote regardless of race.  And then only because, in part, John Lewis was nearly beaten to death.

Now, 55 years later, not only has progress been stymied, but the President of the United States and his minions in the Congress (including Senator Cotton) have taken the lead in rolling things back – including efforts to obstruct Black people from voting. 

Politicians who, today, pay lip service to the greatness of John Lewis but oppose the enactment of the John Lewis Voting Rights Act, which would repair the damage to the original Voting Rights Act done by the Supreme Court's decision in Shelby County v. Holder are hypocrites.

Here is Michael Gerson’s September 2019 column:

Conservatives’ reaction to the ‘1619 Project’ is disappointing — and instructive

Opinion by 

Michael Gerson

Columnist

September 9, 2019 at 5:20 p.m. EDT

Conservative reaction to the New York Times’ “1619 Project” — an attempt to tell the story of slavery and its lasting effect on American political, economic and social structures — has been both disappointing and instructive.

I am not referring here to thinkers (the term is employed loosely) who consciously embrace a philosophy of white supremacy. Though resurgent and repellent, they do not constitute the mainstream of conservative thinking on race.

I am thinking instead of conservative writers who argue that the 1619 Project is a prime example of leftist ideological overreach — that its (mainly African American) authors see the country entirely through the prism of its sins and intend to “delegitimize” the American experiment. In making this case, some conservatives have offered excuses — or at least mitigations — for the moral failures of the Founders on matters of race. The institution of slavery, we are assured, was historically ubiquitous. The global slave trade, we are reminded, involved not just Americans but Arabs and black Africans. Other countries, we are told, took more slaves than America, treated them worse and liberated them later.

The attempt here is to defend the honor of the American experiment by denying the uniqueness of its hypocrisy on slavery. In one way or another, all these arguments ask us to consider the inadequacies of the Founders within the context of their times.

But to deny the uniqueness of American guilt on slavery is also to deny the uniqueness of its aspirations. Americans are required to have ambiguous feelings about many of the country’s Founders precisely because of the moral ideals the Founders engraved in American life. The height of their ambitions is also the measure of their hypocrisy. It should unsettle us that the author of the Declaration of Independence built a way of life entirely dependent on human bondage.

This leads to an unavoidably complex form of patriotism. We properly venerate not the Founders, but the standards they raised and often failed to meet. This is their primary achievement: They put into place an ideological structure that harshly judged their own practice and drove American democracy to achievements beyond the limits of their vision.

One thing we cannot do is excuse the Founders according to the standards of their time. In the mid to late 18th century, there was plenty of compelling moral thinking on the issue of slavery.

In 1759, Quaker Anthony Benezet wrote “Observations on the Enslaving, Importing and Purchasing of Negroes,” which presented eyewitness accounts of the cruelties of the slave trade. Benezet called slavery “inconsistent with the gospel of Christ, contrary to natural justice and the common feelings of humanity, and productive of infinite calamities to many thousand families, nay to many nations, and consequently offensive to God the father of all mankind.”

In 1776, the year independence was declared, Presbyterian pastor Samuel Hopkins wrote “A Dialogue Concerning the Slavery of the Africans,” which he dedicated to the Continental Congress. Hopkins was alert to the incongruity of the American cause, urging his readers to “behold the sons of liberty oppressing and tyrannizing over many thousands of poor blacks who have as good a claim to liberty as themselves.”

In 1778, another minister, Jacob Green, preached a fast-day sermon referring to slavery as a “most cruel, inhuman, unnatural sin.” He also pointed out the discrediting inconsistency of a country that was dedicated to liberty and yet tolerant of slavery: “What foreign nation can believe that we who so loudly complain of Britain’s attempts to oppress and enslave us, are, at the same time, voluntarily holding multitudes of fellow creatures in abject slavery . . . ?”

America’s Founders stand accused by the best, most humane standards of their own time. When Jefferson wrote about natural rights on his mountaintop prison for black people, many of his contemporaries knew he was, on this issue, a total hypocrite.

America’s story is not one of initial purity and eventual decay. It is the story of a radical principle — the principle of human equality — introduced into a deeply unjust society. That principle was carried forward by oppressed people who understood it better than many of the nation’s Founders. Denied the blessings of liberty, African Americans became the instruments by which the promise of liberty was broadly achieved. The victims of America’s moral blindness became carriers of the American ideal.

This story is not simple to tell. But it is miraculous in its own way. And it is good reason to be proud of America.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/conservatives-reaction-to-the-1619-project-is-disappointing--and-instructive/2019/09/09/2acfad58-d33c-11e9-9610-fb56c5522e1c_story.html

The Danger of Moving to a Nine-District Member Montgomery County Council

        Last winter, I testified before the Montgomery County Charter Review Commission in opposition to a proposal to alter the structure of the County Council, changing it from a five-district, four at-large arrangement to a nine-district arrangement.  The text of my presentation is below.
         My main point might appear to be a very "inside baseball" argument, but it is one that I think makes expanding to nine district seats extremely unwise and potentially dangerous.  
         Background:  The Ficker Amendment was a referendum-established amendment to the County Charter in 2008, which bans an increase in the property tax rate over the rate of inflation, unless the Council unanimously agrees to the increase.  An emergency faced the County in 2016, and County Executive Leggett proposed a budget which required a greater-than-inflation-rate tax increase.  It was a heavy lift, but eventually all nine members of the Council, including the five district members, agreed with the increase, with good results for the County.  The debate centered entirely around the merits, and was not mired in parochial or partisan politics.  
          But with a nearly 100% increase in the number of districts, the likelihood that one member on the Council would be unconvinceable, thus thwarting the judgment of the representatives of an overwhelming majority of County voters, would increase significantly.  
          So moving to a nine district member Council, while attractive in some respects, could be fundamentally undemocratic in a fiscal emergency.  Whatever the merits of a nine-district Council, I believe they are outweighed as long as the Ficker Amendment -- which allows a single Council member to block needed action -- is still on the books.

******************************************************************

February 22, 2020

To:              County Charter Review Commission

From:          David S. Fishback, Olney MD

Re:              Proposal to alter the structure of the County                                   Council

I have lived nearly my entire adult life in Montgomery County, and have lived in Olney since 1986.

I believe it would be a big mistake to move to a nine District Council, eliminating the At-Large seats.

The advantage of the current five District/four At-Large system is that it is more likely to reflect majority sentiment in the County.  The four at-large members are responsible to the entire electorate; the five district members are responsible only to the people in their districts.  The more districts and the fewer at-large districts, the more likely we could get a Council that would not reflect majority views on significant policy matters.  I recognize that smaller districts might lead to more responsiveness with respect to constituent service and might yield a greater diversity of ideas in the course of Council deliberations.  But for the reason explained below, I think that that argument is far outweighed by the impact of the current requirement of the “Ficker Amendment."

Under the  "Ficker Amendment" to the Charter, property tax rates may not be increased beyond inflation unless the Council unanimously approves such an increase.  Several years ago, County Executive Leggett correctly concluded that such an increase was absolutely necessary for the County to continue to be the kind of place we want to live in. After considerable discussion, the Council unanimously voted to approve the necessary tax package.

But if the Council had been splintered into nine districts, it would have been much more difficult, if not impossible, to secure that unanimity.  With more, and smaller, districts, it would have been more likely that a single Council member would have vetoed the overwhelming majority of sentiment in the County. 

A better case could be made for more, smaller district seats if the "Ficker Amendment" had not been passed. Indeed, one could make an argument that the Amendment it might not have passed if the Council structure had then consisted of nine smaller districts.  But unless and until the "Ficker Amendment" is repealed, splintering the Council into smaller districts would be a ticking, fundamentally undemocratic time-bomb, which could result in tragic consequences for our community.

Thoughts on Peter Beinart's new assessment of the way forward in Israel/Palestine.

Peter Beinart has made quite a splash with his recent Op-Ed in the New York Times and longer essay in Jewish Currents, arguing that it is time to think in terms of a single, bi-national state in Israel/Palestine.    

My friend Rabbi Michael Feshbach (who accuses me of not knowing how to spell my own last name) posted on Facebook Yehuda Kurtzer's Tablet Magazine critique of Beinart's essay.  My comments were too long for a FB response, so I have place them here.  I think Kurtzer may make too much of the Yavne metaphor, a reference to the rabbinic surrender to the Roman destruction of the Second Temple and Jewish sovereignty in return for a safe place to study and develop principles for what became the Jewish Diaspora.  Beinart does not even mention Yavne in his New York Times Op-Ed and only discusses it in the eighth paragraph and at the very end of the Jewish Currents essay, where he suggests that the metaphor is apt in the sense that it was an "acknowledgement that a phase of Jewish history had run its course."  Beinart poses the question of whether a sovereign Jewish state is the ultimate goal, or whether the ultimate goal is a safe place for the Jewish people in our ancestral home, regardless of purely Jewish sovereignty. Kurtzer asserts that it must be the former.  Beinart concludes that it will have to be the latter, in large part because he sadly has determined, with much justification, that the former is no longer possible without our becoming the very sort of people we do not want to be. 

I tend to agree with the late analysis of the late writer Amos Oz, set forth in Rob Eshman's Forward article about Beinart essays:

 "In a 2015 speech to the Institute for National Security Studies, . . . Oz sounded the alarm [about the dangers of annexation], but with far more pessimism than Beinart. 'I think the idea of a bi-national state is a sad joke,' he said. 'You can’t expect Israelis and Palestinians after 100 years of blood, tears and calamity to jump into a double bed and begin the honeymoon.'” 

That is why Oz so strongly supported a two-state solution, as did Beinart until now. 

But events of recent years seem to have made such a solution impossible. While I understand and appreciate Beinart's view and wish it was a viable solution, I am extremely skeptical. But I am also aware that of the various scenarios, Beinart's newly-arrive-at-approach -- while a long shot -- may well be the most likely way that the Jewish people can survive in Israel and still keep their souls. 

Suggestion on how to think about Winston Churchill & Richard Montgomery -- and so many others who we currently commemorate.

A report on a petition to rename Winston Churchill High School in Potomac, Maryland, brings into further focus the considerable public discussion of the last few years of how we should deal with the memorialization of historical figures whose views and actions regarding slavery and race, and the related issues of European colonialism, clash with our current (and, I hope, more permanent) sensibilities on these issues. See, e.g., here and a related blog post here.


The simple response has often been this: Confederate memorials Out/Founding Fathers memorials In.  But there are other example of the dilemma, as well.  I wrote this five years ago, when the status of Woodrow Wilson was at issue (as it is, again), and I think this basic formulation of how we should approach each situation still makes sense.

It was one thing to be a bystander to the evil of governmental race discrimination, or even to being a willing beneficiary of the slave system (e.g., Washington, Jefferson, Madison). Such people's positive societal contributions may keep them out of permanent historical hell. But those, like Calhoun, who seized the opportunity to be enthusiastic apologists for and defenders of the slave system and made that the centerpiece of their public careers are beyond the pale. By affirmatively acting to role back what little progress had been made once slavery was abolished, Wilson probably put himself beyond the pale in the 20th Century. Racism was not THE centerpiece of Wilson's Administration, but it was not merely an incidental part, either. Woodrow Wilson lived simultaneously in two worlds at the time of his election to the Presidency in 1912: The polite Progressive Movement which focused on reining in the excesses of concentrated wealth centered in Wall Street; but also the only semi-reconstructed aristocratic South which was resentful of Yankee (Wall Street) control over the American economy. These worlds joined forces over their resentment of the J.P. Morgan's of America. Some good did come out of it, but the cost was a full reimplementation by the federal government of Southern Jim Crow policies. Wilson's 1912 election as the first post-Civil War Southern President was seen in the South as a triumph over the hated Yankees -- and Wilson governed accordingly, and not at all reluctantly. (A. Scott Berg's admiring 2013 biography of Wilson lays out the facts underlying this analysis, even though Berg himself seems to view Wilson's racist policies as a relatively minor flaw as compared to his Progressive achievements. After reading the book, I drew a different conclusion.)

How to apply this formulation is not always easy -- but debates over such applications can be useful.  Take the question of Richard Montgomery High School -- and, indeed, the name of our own county, which was also named after the aforementioned Revolutionary War general, who was killed during an incursion into Canada in 1775.  General Montgomery had been a career British officer who fell into disfavor in the British Establishment for being sympathetic to the colonists and them emigrated to New York; he rose to prominence in the early days of the Revolution when he was chosen to succeed Philip Schuyler (Alexander Hamilton's future father-in-law) in command of a large Continental Army force when Schuyler fell ill.  General Montgomery never set foot in what is now Montgomery County; some now wish to remove his name from the high school because because, two years before his death, he married a woman whose family owned enslaved people.  Specifically, his wife was the daughter of prominent New Yorker Robert Livingston, who owned owned enslaved people, and he then came into possession of such "property."  Indeed, General Montgomery's wife's uncle Philip was deeply involved in the international slave trade, although her father had a mixed record on slavery, not dissimilar to (but a bit more enlightened, in a relative sense, than) Jeffersons'. See
 here.  

Ulysses S. Grant also married into a slave owning family, and while he eventually freed the slave he eventually owned, his father-in-law was an unabashed supporter of slavery.

The point about Generals Montgomery and Grant is that their historical significance is pretty much unrelated to slavery.  And that, arguably, their contributions far outweighed the taint of slavery, which was a common part of our sinful past.  We could say the same about Washington and Jefferson, who were far more implicated in, and benefitted from, slavery.  We certainly cannot say the same about John C. Calhoun, Chief Justice Roger Taney (the Marylander who authored the Dred Scott decision), and all the Confederate generals who are commemorated. (There are virtually no public memorials to Confederate General James Longstreet, and there is a reason why:  After the Civil War, Longstreet affirmatively fought against White Supremacists who sought to suppress the formerly enslaved. See  So when, in order to send a signal that, as a practical matter, the South had not entirely lost the Civil War, White Supremacists began erecting statues lauded the general's "virtues", Longstreet was left out.)

While Woodrow Wilson presents what many would see as a tougher case (for the reasons set forth above, I believe he falls on the Confederate side of the ledger), Winston Churchill presents what may be an even tougher case.  Churchill embodied European colonialism, with all the exploitation and racist rationalizations that grew out of it.  One of his most significant quotes came in 1942, in the midst of the struggle against Hitler, when he said, "I have not become the King's First Minister to preside over the liquidation of the British Empire."  Churchill was a politician of his time, and but for his leadership of the United Kingdom during World War II, no one in the United States would even think of commemorating him.  But that is a huge BUT FOR. See   As much as any other individual in history, he legitimately symbolizes the destruction of the 20th Century Voldemort.

I hope that discussion in the Winston Churchill High School community (and in the County generally) will be an opportunity to work through and develop a deeper understanding of the flaws and virtues of members of the human race, and how they are dealt with in the public square.