Contemporary Politics

Late last year Pennsylvania’s Governor Josh Shapiro interjected himself forcefully into the uproar over former University of Pennsylvania president Liz Magill’s Congressional testimony (in which she failed to say that calling for “the genocide of Jews” would necessarily violate the school’s code of conduct) and the events on the Penn campus that would soon culminate in her resignation. The governor came out strongly against antisemitism in all its forms – never bad in itself. But Shapiro’s widely reported speech on Sunday, December 10, 2023, at Philadelphia’s Rodeph Shalom synagogue, in which he proclaimed, “Hate has no place here,” misnamed the chief problem that had plagued Penn and a number of other universities this past fall.

I grant there is no compelling reason for New Jersey’s counties to retain the traditional term “chosen freeholders” as the name for their elected officials. In a bill signed into law by Governor Phil Murphy on August 21, the title of these lawmakers will become “county commissioners” at the beginning of 2021. The new term certainly conveys better than “chosen freeholder” what these elected representatives do. But there is little basis for tying the older term to the history of slavery or racial prejudice, as many of New Jersey’s political leaders have done.

President Trump isn’t the only one citing the Salem witch hunt to shape public opinion these days. Reference to the infamous witch hunt of 1692 has again entered public discourse to explain psychology professor Christine Blasey’s accusation that Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh sexually assaulted her when both were teenagers.

The Occupy Wall Street movement has reached a tactical dead end. This much has been apparent for weeks. Remarkably, its fundamental message of seeking a more equitable distribution of wealth in America has not been lost, despite the extremism and eccentricity of the protests.