HELLO AND GOODBYE TO LOUISIANA SENATOR ELLENDER!

Monday, September 26^th, 2022

Baton Rouge, Louisiana

 

HELLO AND GOODBYE TO LOUISIANA SENATOR ELLENDER!

 

This week marks the birthday of former Louisiana U.S. Senator Allen J. Ellender.  He was born in 1890, and in his heyday, Ellender was the most prominent Senator in Washington and a powerful voice for the Bayou State.

 

I first met Ellender in 1972 shortly after I was elected to the Louisiana state senate. I had given an evening speech up in Caldwell Parish and began the drive home to Ferriday as the sun was setting. The two-hour drive took me across the duty ferry and back through Harrisonburg, the parish seat in Catahoula Parish.

 

Harrisonburg is not all that lively during the day. At nine o'clock in the evening, there was virtually no sign of life. I decided to stop off at the sheriff's office in the courthouse and use the phone to let my wife know that I was on my way home. Generally, there is no one in the courthouse that late at night except the dispatcher in the sheriff's office. Since not much happened in Catahoula Parish, Sheriff J. Y. McGuffee saw fit to hire for the night job a decent but mildly mentally handicapped fellow who was competent enough to handle the sheriff's radio and willing to sit there all night long. 

 

I told him I was going into the back room to use the phone, and I shut the door to check in at home. When I finished my call and headed back into the outer office, I could hear a loud voice carrying on in some detail about world affairs. Phrases like "too much foreign aid," "not enough for national defense," and "support payments for our rice crop" were part of the conversation. A short, elderly gentleman was doing the talking. He had on glasses and was even reading from notes. 

 

So here was this older fellow who was unknown to me at the time, giving a lecture on international issues to the mentally handicapped dispatcher at the sheriff's office. I introduced myself.  "Glad to meet you, son," he said. ''I'm Senator Allan Ellender." The Senator went on to explain that he made an annual tour every year and stopped at each parish in the state. He ended up at the Catahoula Parish Courthouse for his last stop of the day. The Senator was going to be good to his word, but the only person available to talk to was the dispatcher. Now he had me. 

 

Now as I said, Ellender was not just an ordinary U.S. Senator.  He was chairman of the Senate Appropriations Committee, and was president pro tempore of the Senate, which made him third in line to being president.  No senator in the nation had more power.  And here he was, with a captive audience of two, late at night in a deserted community telling us about the woes of the nation.  Many a politician and lobbyist would have given quite a price to have been in that empty courthouse with us.

 

Ellender talked for about an hour, and I fixed a fresh pot of coffee. After quite an earful on national and international affairs, I led the Senator down the road to Jonesville for the night.  Billy Edwards was the town mayor, and also owned the local motel.  He gladly comped a room for the Senator as I left them and headed home to Ferriday.

 

I never laid eyes on Senator Ellender again until I attended his funeral five years later. It certainly was not as quiet as our first meeting. An hour before the funeral, over a thousand people were packed into the street in front of the entrance of St. Francis de Sales Catholic Church in the south Louisiana town of Houma.  Metal barriers had been set up to keep the crowd at bay, and the church was surrounded by state troopers, local police officers, and numerous Secret Service agents.

 

It became obvious why there was so much security. The President and Mrs. Nixon were to join a long list of dignitaries to remember the Senator. When the President entered, he was led by the Secret Service to a seat directly in front of me. It was a real celebratory ending for Senator Ellender.  And quite an experience for me, a young, wet behind the ears, new state senator from rural north Louisiana.

 

Peace and Justice

Jim Brown

Jim Brown’s syndicated column appears each week in numerous newspapers throughout the South and on websites worldwide.  You can read all his past columns and see continuing updates at http://www.jimbrownla.com. You can also look over a list of books he has published at www.thelisburnpress.com.

 

 

 

 

 

CENSORSHIP IS ALIVE AND WELL IN LOUISIANA!

Monday, September 19^th, 2022

Baton Rouge, Louisiana

 

CENSORSHIP IS ALIVE AND WELL IN LOUISIANA!

Efforts to ban books are accelerating in Louisiana as well as all across the nation. According to a new report from the American Library Association, there have been “an unprecedented number of attempts to ban books,” more than any time in recent memory.

I have been a publisher in Louisiana for 20 years and I have never witnessed the number of efforts in the past to ban what both children and adults can read in the Bayou State like we are seeing today.  It’s ironic that this very week, Louisiana should be celebrating the 40th anniversary of Banned Books Week. Instead, catalogers are under assault for the books they are placing on library shelfs across the state.

There is nothing new in local efforts to ban certain books in Louisiana. Some of America’s classic novels have been banned off and on for many years.  “To Kill a Mockingbird,” a timeless novel of the law and race relations in the South, is one of my favorites that I have read and reread, as well as urging family members to read. This wonderful book was banned by the Plaquemine Parish School Board back in 2000. Superintendent Jim Hoyle, said he’d removed the book — and the 1962 movie based on it — from district libraries “because some parents thought it contained ‘some objectionable words.’”  

Other books banned in Louisiana include Mark Twain’s The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn," Brave New World, , “A Lesson Before Dying” by Ernest J. Gaines,  “Beloved” by Toni Morrison, “Invisible Man” by Ralph Ellison, “The Color Purple” by Alice Walker, “I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings” by Maya Angelou, America’s first African-American poet laureate,  "The Great Gatsby," "Fahrenheit 451" and J.D. Salinger’s classic, “Catcher in the Rye.  I’ve read and enjoyed them all.

Particularly enjoyable was “A Lesson Before Dying”, by Ernest J. Gaines, whose writings have been taught in college classrooms and translated into numerous languages.  He spent his life writing in his Louisiana home of New Roads, and we became friends in his later years.

The issue of book banning has become a front and center issue recently in Louisiana.  The Lafayette school board has appointed a committee of three who have met in secret to recommend books that are to be kept off library shelfs.  In Livingston Parish, lawsuits are flying and protesters are being arrested over library books.  So what has brought on this current controversy in a number of Louisiana Parishes?

In the past, protests of inappropriate books have come from local citizens who raised questions at school board meetings and at libraries as parents objected to books they felt were inappropriate.  Today, a number of conservative national groups are protecting nationwide.  Governors in a number of states are instituting new laws and regulations that lead to book banning. Simply put, books on library shelves are becoming enmeshed in politics.

Are there reasons to keep books of certain subjects off library shelves?  Of course.  As a parent and grandparent, I would not want sexually explicit or violent material available to young students. Important books containing raw subject matter could be placed in an older student or adult section. There should be established procedures that are followed before summarily removing books from shelves, to be enforced by librarians, who are subject to local school board or parish library board oversight.

The key is to keep book choices under local control.   We do not need national standards for what we can and cannot read. Books of all subjects offer us a free expression of ideas that have served as a foundation of American democracy.  We should not allow a political and cultural war that allows using our schools and libraries as a battleground.  

There is a good reason why we have a first amendment in America.  Censorship becomes a slippery slope that can undermine our basic freedoms.  We should walk with caution when banning books are involved.

Peace and Justice

Jim Brown

Jim Brown’s syndicated column appears each week in numerous newspapers throughout the South and on websites worldwide.  You can read all his past columns and see continuing updates at http://www.jimbrownla.com. You can also look over a list of books he has published at www.thelisburnpress.com.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

THE SEARING OF A GREAT CITY’S SOUL! (New Orleans a war zone)

Monday, September 12^th, 2022

New Orleans, Louisiana

 

THE SEARING OF A GREAT CITY’S SOUL!

(New Orleans a war zone)

 

The real estate website Home Bay just released its national rankings of the best places in the U.S. to retire.  So where is the number one location?  Are you ready for this? Numero Uno is the murder capital of America.  That’s right.  They list New Orleans as the best place to retire.  Has this group been paying attention to what’s going on in the Crescent City?

 

Here’s what’s happening. The Queen City of the South is under siege.  No, not from hurricanes. This time, the siege is from within.  New Orleans is known as the city that care forgot.  But it’s been hard to let the good times roll in the Big Easy when the dice keep coming up snake eyes.

 

New Orleans is in a battle to stay afloat as it deals with major street crime, inept public officials, and a dysfunctional criminal justice system where even federal officials can no longer be trusted.  Author James Lee Burke writes about this corruption and dysfunction in his novel Last Car to Elysian Fields.  “One of the most beautiful cities in the Western hemisphere was killed three times, and not just by forces of nature.”

 

New Orleans is a city that for years has had the highest per capita murder rate in the nation, where multiple killings often happen on a daily basis, a town that is rated as one of the five most dangerous cities in the world.  But even with such a reputation, it was hard to fathom the recent crime wave that attacked the Crescent City.  Recently, in just two weeks, 39 people were shot, including 4 children.  Over 22 shootings in just a few weeks; a war zone. Such violence goes beyond the street shootings that seem to happen almost daily in New Orleans. When a gunman indiscriminately fires into a crowd, it’s an act of terrorism.

 

Many crimes go unreported out of the sense of frustration that nobody will do anything about it anyway. Drug deals gone bad play a major role in a majority of the killings according to the New Orleans Police Department. The city is a cesspool of illegal drug activity in many neighborhoods, even in broad daylight. Recently, I watched the Tom Cruise movie “Jack Reacher: Never go Back,” that was made in the Crescent City.  A local drug dealer tells Cruise: “More s--t in the streets of New Orleans then they make in Afghanistan.”

 

New Orleans has always pushed the limit of what is acceptable to those running government and to its citizens. The city is often referred to as a corrupt third world country and the most northern of the Caribbean nations. But in recent years, the bottom seems to have fallen out of the criminal justice system itself. 

 

In the movie called Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call New Orleans, Nicolas Cage plays a corrupt New Orleans cop, and tells a fellow cop to “Shoot him again.” “What for?” says his companion. Cage casually observes: “His soul is still dancing.” You can’t kill enough in New Orleans. It is the murder capital of America with one of the worst murder rates in the world. And the killings continue at an ever-growing frequency.

 

The system that is supposed to protect the citizens of New Orleans is rife with corruption and incompetence. In too many instances, those who are charged with safeguarding and serving have betrayed their mission to see that the public is protected, and that justice is done. A report in The New Statesman observes: “Something terrible lies at the heart of New Orleans – a rampant, widespread and apparently uncontrollable brutality on the part of its police force and its prison service. The horrors of its criminal justice system from decades before Katrina and up to now lie somewhere between, with little exaggeration, Candide and Stalin’s Gulags.”

 

New Orleans can be either a unique place to live and work, or it can slowly drift into the cosmos due to a justified fear of crime.  There’s a fight to keep the bright, dynamic young leadership in the city and be an integral force in molding the future of New Orleans.  But it all begins with feeling safe, doesn’t it?  And right now, the Crescent City has a long, long way to go.

 

Peace and Justice

 

Jim Brown

 

Jim Brown’s syndicated column appears each week in numerous newspapers throughout the South and on websites worldwide.  You can read all his past columns and see continuing updates at http://www.jimbrownla.com. You can also look over a list of books he has published at www.thelisburnpress.com.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

LOUISIANA DEMOCRATS BETRAY JEFFERSON AND JACKSON!

Monday, September 5^th, 2022

Baton Rouge, Louisiana

LOUISIANA DEMOCRATS BETRAY JEFFERSON AND JACKSON!

I don’t know about you, but I have always loved to read and study Louisiana History. I’ve had the pleasure of teaching the history of the Bayou State at both Tulane University and LSU. And when it comes to examining the giant political figures that had a direct bearing on the stature and even the survival of Louisiana as an American state, two individuals stand head and shoulders above all others

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They each are former presidents. And without their vision and dramatic leadership, Louisiana might well not be an American state today. No one else could fill this role more than Thomas Jefferson and Andrew Jackson.

Jefferson was the nation’s third president, and could well be the brightest intellect that ever graced our countries’ political scene. He was the author of America’s founding document, the Declaration of Independence, and he became the voice for the hopes and aspirations of a new America. Jefferson founded the University of Virginia, and he designed and built Monticello, one of the most stunning anti-bellum homes in the country. And he was the driving force in negotiating the Louisiana Purchase from Napoleon in 1803. Simply put, without Jefferson’s vision and tenacity in seeking the vast territory west of the Mississippi River, Louisiana would not be a state today.

Andrew Jackson was our countries’ seventh president, and was the only president to have been a prisoner of war, having been captured by the British at 17 while serving in the Revolutionary War. He later was Nicknamed “Old Hickory” for his legendary toughness on the battlefield. During his presidential campaign in 1828, his opponents called him a jackass. Jackson was amused and used the image to win the presidency. He founded the Democratic Party and used the jackass as its symbol.

But what Andrew Jackson did for Louisiana was incredible. In the war of 1812, New Orleans was under siege by the British. Major General Andrew Jackson rushed to New Orleans and gathered a rag tag army made up of a motley group of local citizens, frontiersmen, slaves, Indians and even pirates.  And he was eager to fight the British, telling his wife: “I owe to Britain a debt of retaliatory vengeance, and should our forces meet I trust I shall pay the debt.”

Louisiana should regularly thank its lucky stars for Jackson’s tenacity to get his revenge. He soundly beat the British at the Battle for New Orleans, became an American hero, and saved Louisiana from becoming a permanent British protectorate.

If ever there were any two individuals who should be regularly honored and commemorated in Louisiana history, there should be doubt the two should be Thomas Jefferson and Andrew Jackson. And for many years, the Louisiana Democratic Party did honor both American heroes by hosting an annual Jefferson-Jackson dinner as a yearly fundraiser. Democrats held similar events across the country.

But no more in Louisiana. Party officials decided it is no longer “politically correct” to honor these two American icons. You see, they were slave owners. It made no difference that the first seven American presidents also owned slaves, as did most of the nation’s founding fathers. The democratic leadership apparently wants to judge these past heroes based on present-day values, and continue a warped effort to re write Louisiana and American history.

The new dinner name is the “True Blue Gala.” I suppose we will see a resolution at the dinner calling for the re-naming of Jefferson and Jackson parishes, Thomas Jefferson High School in Gretna, the town of Jackson, La., Jefferson Island in Iberia Parish; the list goes on and on.

The Louisiana Democratic Party is becoming more and more irrelevant in the Bayou State. And Jackson’s symbol for the Democrat Party would seem to have a different connotation today. The real ingrates are those who try to rewrite history and belittle past leaders who served and saved our nation, and particularly Louisiana. The party of Jefferson and Jackson deserve a lot better.

Peace and Justice

Jim Brown

Jim Brown’s syndicated column appears each week in numerous newspapers throughout the nation and on websites worldwide.  You can read all his past columns and see continuing updates at http://www.jimbrownusa.com. You can also look over a list of books he has published at www.thelisburnpress.com.