Curio Cabinet / Person, Place, or Thing

He's remembered as a vicious and conniving politician... yet he wasn't so politically successful himself.

The end always justifies the means—at least, according to 16th-century politician and author Niccolò Machiavelli, who died on this day in 1527. His infamous treatise on political power, The Prince, was so controversial that it was banned by the pope and inspired Shakespeare to refer to some of his villains as "Machiavels." Yet Machiavelli didn't exactly live up to the ruthless guidelines he laid out in The Prince. In fact, the book itself was an act of political posturing.  

Machiavelli came of age during a time of intense political turmoil in the old Italian city-states. Florence and Naples desired control of all of Italy, as did foreign nations and the Holy Roman Empire. Machiavelli witnessed several violent and non-violent takeovers of his nation, including the French invasion of Charles VIII. Machiavelli concluded that Italy would only be able to stop such invasions if all Italian city-states were unified.  

Machiavelli's first political job was in Florence, where he served as Second Chancery and Secretary to the Council of Ten for War. His duties required him to travel to France, where he became acquainted with Cesare Borgia, the Duke of Romagna. Borgia was a famously cruel politician who was even accused of killing his own brother to further his own power (although this was never confirmed). Machiavelli was fascinated by what he saw as Borgia's success despite his lack of ethics, and later cited him in The Prince as an exemplar of strong leadership. Unfortunately for Machiavelli, Borgia was eventually banished to Spain by Julius II, where he died.  

After the Medici family (a powerful Italian family also known as the House of Medici) regained control of Florence in 1512, Machiavelli's career went downhill fast. He was dismissed from office and even accused of participating in a conspiracy. After a brief stint of imprisonment and torture, Machiavelli decided to become a writer. Yet he ultimately couldn't let go of his political ambitions, and decided to write a book to curry favor with Lorenzo de’ Medici, Florence's governor. Machiavelli pulled out all the stops and wrote The Prince, a book which argued that politics and ethics should be separate (a controversial idea, since political power was seen as divinely given and therefore constituting moral law). Machiavelli even went so far as to (rather shamelessly) dedicate the book to Medici.  

It would be an understatement to say The Prince lacked the impact Machiavelli had hoped. Not only was he snubbed by Florence's government, the book was also seen as immoral and antithetical to Italy's form of governance. The idea that politics should be looked at in terms of practicality, rather than in terms of ideals, was widely criticized. Machiavelli himself was also looked down upon for daring to write a book that essentially told rulers how to do their jobs. Unsurprisingly, readers viewed Machiavelli as an untrustworthy and callous man.  

Machiavelli went on to write several other books and plays, and to hold one more minor political office before his death. However, none of his works are quite as well-known as The Prince. Parodies and interpretations of the work have appeared in popular culture ever since its publication, such as when scholar Garrett Mattingly called it "a political black mass" in 1958. 20th-century mobsters, like John Gotti and Roy DeMeo, considered The Prince to be a "mafia bible." However one feels about The Prince, it can't be denied that it has retained its infamy through the centuries!
 

Freedom during wartime.

Juneteenth celebrations are coming up this week. To honor the holiday, we're taking a look back at the Emancipation Proclamation of 1863. The proclamation signaled the beginning of the end for slavery in the U.S. by targeting Confederate states. The bill wasn't exactly enforceable when President Abraham Lincoln signed it, though it ensured that former slaves, having fled North, could join the Union army and liberate the South.
 

In 1849, Congressman Abraham Lincoln co-signed a bill to end slavery in Washington D.C. that would compensate slave owners for their loss of "property." Lincoln's initial efforts failed, and in 1857, the Supreme Court ruled in the case Dred Scott v. Sandford that American citizenship excluded black people. Enslaved black bodies remained private property, and any federal attempts to free them were treated as Constitutional violations by slave states. Lincoln, as inaugural president, later claimed he had no intention of interfering with slave ownership during his first inaugural address on March 4, 1861. Nevertheless, the "Cotton Seven" secessionist states believed his presidency would be predicated on abolitionism that threatened their economies. They attacked Fort Sumter on April 12, 1861, effectively beginning the American Civil War.
 

When the Emancipation Proclamation went into effect on January 1, 1863, it served several wartime benefits for the Union. Firstly, Lincoln used it to appeal to France and England after driving the Confederacy out of Maryland in the Battle of Antietam in September of 1862. A palpable victory showed international forces that intervention on behalf of the secessionists would be a lost cause. Secondly, Lincoln was careful to ensure the language of the Emancipation Proclamation only applied to states in open rebellion, meaning his wartime powers would not be legally challenged. Thus slavery wasn't actually completely abolished in slave-owning Union states and non-mutinous Southern states. Thirdly, about 3.5 million slaves were freed, crippling the economic power of Southern plantations (in some estimates, black slaves accounted for 23 percent of all white wealth in Confederate states, totaling about $3.5 billion in profits). This also allowed some 180,000 black men to fill the ranks of the Union army.
 

As the Confederacy crumbled, President Lincoln became aware he needed to take steps to ensure the permanency of the Emancipation Proclamation's effects after the war ended. A constitutional amendment would need to be passed to entirely abolish slavery in the U.S. After winning a re-election, Lincoln convinced a lame duck Congress to pass the Thirteenth Amendment on April 8, 1865—just seven days before he was assassinated. The Thirteenth Amendment was ratified on December 6th that year, but not before the very last state to get word of the Emancipation Proclamation freed its slaves. On June 19th, the remote slave state of Texas was finally freed. On that same date in the following year, black churchgoers celebrated the end of slavery with feasts and parties—hence the Juneteenth holiday.
 

The end of 400 years of slavery in the U.S. was a pivotal moment in our nation's history, though the recent efforts of Black Lives Matter protests against police brutality show we still have long way to go to achieve equitable treatment under the law for African Americans. Still, reading the personal account of Booker T. Washington shows us the role the Emancipation Proclamation had in ending a specific form of economic, emotional, and physical violence directed at black bodies through slavery, and the powerful effects of liberation on the soul. Washington said, "My mother, who was standing by my side, leaned over and kissed her children, while tears of joy ran down her cheeks. She explained to us what it all meant, that this was the day for which she had been so long praying, but fearing that she would never live to see."

 

The colorful history of Britain's most iconic clock.

It's an international icon, yet most people call it by the wrong name! Big Ben, as it's commonly known, is a clocktower at the Palace of Westminster, in London. When it was completed on this day in 1859, Big Ben was simply called "the clock tower." It was officially renamed "Elizabeth Tower" in 2012. So where does the name "Big Ben" come from? To understand the tower's most common moniker, one must understand the story of its construction.
 

In 1834, most of the Palace of Westminster, which housed the British parliament, was destroyed in a catastrophic fire. The Palace was a symbol of British democracy, as it contained not only the meeting place of the House of Commons, but also the official residences of the Speaker and Clerk of the House of Commons. London officials insisted that the Palace be rebuilt by a skilled architect.

 

In 1836, a design competition was held. The winner was British architect Charles Barry, whose design incorporated the palace's surviving buildings. Barry collaborated with Augustus Pugin, an architect known for his love of the Gothic Revival architecture. This style sought to revive the imposing Gothic architecture of medieval times. Although Barry designed the majority of the new palace, he left the design of the clock tower to Pugin.
 

Construction began in 1843. Because of the clocktower's prominent placement, great care was taken to ensure that its timekeeping would be accurate. Astronomer Royal George Airy specified that the time should be "...correct to within one second per day, and furthermore that it should telegraph its performance twice a day to Greenwich Observatory, where a record would be kept." The clock took three years to complete—from 1851, when it was designed by lawyer and horologist Edmund Beckett Denison, to 1854, when it was finished by clockmaker Frederick Dent. Luckily, since the rest of the tower wasn't completed until 1859, Dent gained an extra five years to perfect it.

 

Of course, in order to chime the hour, the clocktower needed bells. The first hour bell cracked during testing. It was later melted down and recast by the Whitechapel Bell Foundry (the same foundry which cast the Liberty Bell). It was the largest ever cast in the United Kingdom, standing over seven feet tall and weighing over 13 tons. When a team of 16 horses pulled the bell through London to the new clocktower, excited crowds lined the streets. The bell was immediately nicknamed Big Ben, due to its enormous size and in honor of London's First Commissioner of Works, Sir Benjamin Hall, who helped oversee the tower's construction.

 

It took several days to hoist the bell to the top of the 315-foot tower, which was constructed from Yorkshire Anston stone and Cornish granite. On May 31, 1859, Big Ben rang out for the first time. Unfortunately, the enormous hour bell soon cracked, and remained damaged for four years. The hour was struck on the far smaller fourth quarter bell until a new (rigorously-tested) hour bell was installed.

 

The clocktower was immediately praised as an architectural marvel. Each of the tower's four clock faces sits in a 23-foot-diameter iron frame, and is crafted of 324 pieces of opal glass. Even by today's standards, the clock faces are massive, with hour hands measuring 9 feet and minute hands measuring 14 feet.
 

In 2012, the clocktower's official name was changed to Elizabeth Tower, in honor of Queen Elizabeth II's Diamond Jubilee. However, people around the world, as well as the British themselves, continue to call the tower Big Ben. It goes to show that old habits, and catchy names, die hard!
 

A bloodsucker's bite-y origins.

It ain't easy being vampy. On May 26, 1897, Bram Stoker's horror novel Dracula was published, setting off over a century's worth of weirdly romantic and spooky depictions of bloodthirsty revenants. Yet thumbing through the pages of Dracula and Stoker's influences paint a villain who isn't so much a brooding and handsome Bela Lugosi, but a collection of folkloric and personal nightmares.
 

As a brief synopsis, the character of Count Dracula was a strong pivot away from the traditional vampire folklore of Eastern Europe. There, vampires had been traditionally described as ruddy, ugly, and bloated from bloodsucking. Stoker's Dracula, however, was a charming Hungarian nobleman living in Transylvania who was turned into a beguiling, shapeshifting, centuries-old vampire. The reason for the skew in vampire tradition is due to an acquaintance of Stoker.
 

Scholars tend to believe Henry Irving, a 19th-century actor and manager of London's Lyceum Theater, was a primary influence on the Transylvanian bloodsucker's aristocratic manner, tall but thin frame, and strong "aquiline" face. Stoker worked as a personal assistant to Irving. He was entranced by Irving's otherworldly acting transformations. Irving's penchant for cruel behavior and vicious outbursts when he did not get his way also contributed to Dracula's persona. In the same year that Dracula was published, Stoker tried to rally a play production of the horror story, in which Irving refused to play the lead, citing the script as "dreadful."
 

But Irving wasn't Stoker's only inspiration for Dracula. One of the iconic scenes from the book involves Dracula's voyage from Transylvania to Whitby, England, aboard the ship Demeter. During the trip, the entire crew mysteriously disappears, and a large, beastly dog emerges from the ship when it runs ashore. All of which comes from a very real wreck. While staying in Whitby during 1890, Stoker learned of the 1885 wreck of the Dmitry, a schooner from Narva, Estonia. Vivid tales were told of the ship's only cargo, a suspicious load of silver sand, and the evil barghest (a monstrous dog from English folklore) who emerged from the accident at Tate Hill Sands.

 

Of course, Stoker also took inspiration from Eastern European culture. Though he never stepped foot in Transylvania, he studied Romani vampire folklore. One source, Emily Gerard's The Land Beyond the Forest, was particularly influential; so much so that the London Library in 2018 found Stoker's hand-written notes and dog-eared pages in an original 1890 copy. Gerard was a novelist and reviewer of foreign literature for The Times, a British daily newspaper. Her marriage in 1869 to a Polish officer led her to travel across Eastern Europe, and subsequently compose the essay "Transylvanian Superstition," which introduced Stoker to the legend of Nosferatu, the East European blood-sucking folkloric monster. The undead villain was allegedly conquered after he was beheaded, his mouth stuffed with garlic, and his heart burned and sprinkled as ashes on his grave—an ending that mirrors and no doubt influenced the way Dracula's protagonists, Jonathan Harker and Quincey Morris, dispose of Dracula.
 

Though Dracula is ultimately defeated, the immense cultural popularity of Stoker's vampire lore can't be overstated. Dublin, Ireland, even hosts a Bram Stoker Festival each year near the Irish author's birthday in early November. It's the perfect time to don a Dracula-like cape—or other items from the many fictitious vampires he has influenced. They include everyone from Anne Rice's Lestat, to Taika Waititi and Jemaine Clement's Colin the Energy Vampire, to Charlaine Harris' Eric Northman: quite an immortal legacy!
 

Below: a portrait of Henry Irving, the original inspiration for Dracula, and cover art for Dracula.

 

Image credit & copyright: Universal Films, Penguin Books USA

It started over Shakespeare and ended in bedlam

Theater lovers got more than they bargained for on May 10, 1849, when a rivalry between two Shakespearean actors, American Edwin Forrest and Englishman William Charles Macready, spilled into the streets of New York. The confrontation turned deadly when a rowdy crowd was confronted by armed soldiers. Although the Astor Place Riot seemingly started over Shakespeare, it had much more to do with tension over the growing class divide in early America.

 

The Astor Riot took place during the Antebellum Period—the time in American history between the War of 1812 and the American Civil War. As industry thrived, a wealth gap formed between business owners and workers. Until the Antebellum period, theaters had been places where rich and poor patrons intermingled. So, when wealthy Americans began building their own theaters in major cities, with tickets and dress codes that the poor could not afford, resentment naturally grew.

 

The feud between Macready, a Brit, and Forrest, an American, started off as a good-natured rivalry. Both men were known for acting in Shakespearian plays, but Macready generally toured wealthier venues. When Macready first toured in America, Forrest set up a rival tour, playing in the same cities but in poorer theaters. Eventually, Forrest toured in Macready's native England. The actors' rivalry became popular with the public. Wealthy Americans identified with Macready, while poor Americans identified with Forrest. Eventually, Forrest began blaming Macready for his poor audience attendance in England, and came to one of Macready's performances just to hiss from the audience. When Macready came back to America for another tour, Forrest booked more rival performances in the same cities, one of which in New York in 1849.

 

Trouble began brewing days before the riot. On May 7, Macready took the stage at the Astor Opera House in New York to perform Macbeth, only to be met with an audience of rowdy Forrest fans. The crowd hurled food at the actor until he was forced to flee the stage. Afterward, Macready was determined to return to England, but was convinced to stay by wealthy New Yorkers.

 

Macready's performance of Macbeth was rescheduled for May 10. This time, the theater's windows would be barricaded, its audience screened, and an armed militia stationed by Washington Square Park. However, none of this stopped a large crowd of poor New Yorkers from making their way toward the theater as the production got underway, to decry Macready for imposing British values on the American public.
 

Eventually, the crowd stormed the theater. Police were quickly overwhelmed. The militia made its way to the scene, some soldiers riding on horseback. Instead of dispersing, the crowd pelted the soldiers with bricks. Finally, the soldiers began firing. Many were wounded and over 20 rioters were killed. In a single evening, the United States lost more civilians to direct military action than at any point since the Revolutionary War. Major-General Charles Sandford later wrote, "During a period of thirty-five years of military service, I have never seen a mob so violent as the one on that evening."
 

Although New York would not see another large-scale riot until the Civil War was underway, the Astor Place Riot forever changed the way that American police dealt with crowds. Riot training became commonplace and shields were added to police arsenals in urban areas, along with heavier batons. Macready, who was lucky to have escaped the United States with his life, never acted in an American theater again. As Shakespeare once wrote, "parting is such sweet sorrow."
 

Below: a video explaining the riot's historical significance.
 

An unlikely wartime hero.

Thanks to Steven Speilberg, most people have at least heard of Oskar Schindler. This German industrialist, born on April 28, 1908, was a member of the Nazi Party. Yet he became a World War II hero by employing around 1,200 Jews in his factories and saving them and others from Nazi concentration camps. To say he had a change of heart would be a massive understatement.

 

As a young man in the Czech Republic, Oskar worked as a sales manager for Moravian Electrotechnic before briefly joining the Czech army. Schindler was known as a partier with a taste for the finer things in life. In the early 1930s, he was arrested several times for public drunkenness. His lifestyle, combined with Moravian Electrotechnic going bankrupt, meant that Schindler was plagued by debt.
 

It was for this reason that Schindler claimed to have joined the Abwehr, the military intelligence branch of Nazi Germany, even though he was a Czech citizen. He was arrested for espionage in 1938, but released as Czech Sudetenland was annexed into Germany. The following year, Schindler became a member of the Nazi Party and moved to Kraków, Poland.  

After the Nazi takeover of Poland, businesses belonging to Jews were seized. Schindler leased a formerly Jewish-owned enamelware factory and renamed it Deutsche Emailwarenfabrik (German Enamelware Factory), which was nicknamed "Emalia." Because of Schindler's Abwehr ties, he obtained contracts to produce enamel cookware for the military with a staff of mostly Jewish people, who were paid less than their non-Jewish counterparts.
 

Schindler's life had not been particularly heroic up to that point. But things changed as the Nazis' plan to exterminate Jews took shape. Schindler began bribing Nazi officials with money and luxury items (which were obtained via the black market) to convince them not to take his Jewish workers to concentration camps. Soon, he was spending more than he was saving by keeping his workers. Yet he claimed that they and their children were vital to his factory.
 

Schindler even used his drinking abilities to protect his workers. When two Gestapo came to Schindler's factory, demanding that he hand over a Jewish family, Schindler famously got the two men so drunk that they "reeled out of my office without their prisoners and without the incriminating documents they had demanded," according to Schindler's interview with journalist Eric Silver.
 

Schindler was now a double agent, working to make life bearable for his Jewish workers, while playing the part of a regular Nazi. When the Nazis liquidated the nearby Kraków Ghetto, Schindler hid workers in his factory overnight. He built a subcamp at Emalia which housed his workers plus almost 500 more from nearby factories. In 1943, Schinder began passing information and money to the Jewish resistance movement.
 

Schindler convinced Nazi officials to move his factory and workers to Brünnlitz, where they would be safer. Officials compiled a list of 1,200 Jews who were sent to Brünnlitz in 1944—though it was far from a smooth journey. Some were sent to other concentration camps along the way, and Schindler had to send even more lavish bribes—including diamonds—to get them out. Using his connections, Schindler had around 3,000 Jewish women in Auschwitz sent to textiles plants.
 

Having spent so much on bribes and supplies for his workers, Schindler was poor by the war's end in 1945. Mainly, he survived on donations from Jewish organizations, who recognized him as a hero. After passing away in 1974, Schindler was buried on Mount Zion, in Jerusalem, as the only member of the Nazi party to receive the honor. The German inscription on his headstone reads "The Unforgettable Lifesaver of 1200 Persecuted Jews." The Hebrew inscription reads "Righteous Among the Nations."
 

Image credit & copyright: picture-alliance/dpa
 

A band of Jewish resistance fighters defy the Nazis against overwhelming odds.

Fighting violent oppression isn't easy, especially when all hope seems lost. But that's just what one group of brave resistance fighters did, from April 19 to May 16, 1943, in the Warsaw Ghetto of German-occupied Poland. Knowing that Nazi troops would deport them to the Majdanek concentration camp or Treblinka killing center, Jews in the Warsaw Ghetto concealed themselves in bunkers and fought back against well-armed Nazi troops for nearly a month.

 

In occupied Poland, Nazis segregated Jews (as well as other racial minorities and handicapped people) into restricted areas called ghettos. The Warsaw Ghetto, in Poland's capital city of Warsaw, was by far the largest in the country. It held nearly 400,000 Jews when it was first established in 1940.
 

Realizing that they would soon be deported, Jews in Warsaw began to form secret organizations for self-defense. The two largest were ZOB (Zydowska Organizacja Bojowa) or the Jewish Combat Organization, and ZZW (Zydowski Zwiazek Wojskowy) or the Jewish Military Union. They successfully contacted the Polish military underground movement, which was fronted by the Polish Home Army, and obtained a small number of weapons with which to launch their first act of resistance.
 

During a deportation on January 18, 1943, ZOB and ZZW members carrying concealed pistols lined up with a column of Jews being marched toward deportation vehicles. When a signal was given, the fighters broke ranks and attacked the Nazi soldiers. Although most of the fighters lost their lives, many of the people being forced to march were able to run and hide. Disoriented, the Nazis left the ghetto with fewer deportees than usual.
 

Knowing the Nazis would return, the remaining Jews built underground bunkers and hidden shelters, readying themselves for a full-scale battle. Nazi troops waited until April 19, the eve of the Jewish Passover holiday, to conduct another deportation. However, when the troops marched into the ghetto, they found the streets empty. ZOB commander Mordecai Anielwicz led Jewish fighters to rush from the bunkers in a surprise attack, using pistols, a few automatic weapons, and homemade grenades to drive the Nazi's out of the ghetto. At least 12 Nazi soldiers were killed or badly wounded that day, though many more Jewish fighters lost their lives.
 

Within two days, Nazi troops began to burn and bulldoze the ghetto to the ground, to drive remaining fighters out of hiding. Yet the resistance stubbornly fought on for weeks amongst the fiery rubble. Anielewicz was killed in an attack on the ZOB command bunker on May 8, but organized fighting continued until May 18. Around 7,000 Jews were killed in the uprising, but even after the uprising's official end, individual Jewish fighters continued to battle from hiding places or with help from the Polish resistance. A year later, the Poles would launch their own Warsaw Uprising. All told, the Nazis would retaliate by systematically razing 60 percent of Warsaw, killing over 150,000 Polish civilians caught in their path.
 

Word of what had happened in Warsaw traveled through the Jewish population, inspiring other uprisings in the Bialystok Ghetto and the Minsk Ghetto. The Warsaw Ghetto Uprising was the largest and most famous Jewish uprising of World War II, a reminder of how much courage impacts history. It sent a clear message to the Nazis that, no matter the hardship, the fighters' wills would not be broken.
 

Below: a video about the history and impact of the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising.
 

Image credit & copyright: National Archives/United States Holocaust Memorial Museum
 

An activist who's spent a lifetime fighting for laborers.

Even the most influential people find their inspiration close to home. For labor activist Dolores Huerta, born April 10, 1930, that inspiration was her mother, Alicia Fernandez, who set an early example of how to help low-wage workers in farming communities. Huerta grew up facing poverty, sexism, and racism, which compelled her to fight for the rights of the marginalized. Eventually, Huerta would become one of the most influential labor activists of the 20th century.

 

Huerta spent her childhood in Stockton, California, in a time of extreme prejudice against Hispanics. Huerta's mother struggled to save money while working as a waitress and cannery worker, eventually saving enough to purchase a 70-room hotel, where low-wage workers could afford to stay. Huerta's mother would waive room fees, if people were unable to pay. Thanks to her mother's dedication to local civic organizations, Huerta began sitting in on meetings at a young age.
 

Racial discrimination was a constant in Huerta's life, and would greatly influence her later activism. In middle school, one of Huerta's teachers accused her of cheating due to her essays being too well-written "for a Hispanic." One of Huerta's brothers was beaten by white men in 1945, simply because he was dressed in a popular Hispanic fashion.
 

By the 1950s, Huerta had married twice, had seven children, and was working as a schoolteacher. However, she was concerned with how many children from farming families came to school hungry. Feeling that she could do something to help, Huerta co-founded the Stockton chapter of the Community Service Organization (CSO) in 1955. It was through the CSO that Huerta met César Chávez, who was also passionate about increasing farmworkers' wages and political involvement. The two quickly became friends, and together founded the National Farm Workers Association (NFWA) in 1962. Three years later, the NFWA became the United Farm Workers' Union (UFW). The UFW was instrumental not just in helping to increase workers' wages, but in winning them benefits that most other workers already enjoyed, such as healthcare, unemployment, and safe working conditions.
 

On September 16, 1965, (Mexican Independence Day), Huerta and Chávez joined Filipino workers in a strike and walkout against Delano-area table and wine grape growers. This walkout was the result of years of low wages and human rights violations. Some felt that, being a woman, Huerta shouldn't participate. Nonetheless, she joined the strike, which was a monumental success, largely because Huerta encouraged Latinos and Filipinos to put aside differences and rally together. Strikers participated in a 300-mile march together, from Delano to Sacramento. Both Huerta and Chávez were dedicated to nonviolent protest, asking strikers to take an oath of nonviolence. This strategy led to grape boycotts spreading across the country, far beyond their intended reach. Contracts were eventually negotiated, with greater protections for wages and workers. In 1973, Huerta spearheaded another grape boycott which led to the California Agricultural Labor Relations Act of 1975. This allowed farmworkers to form unions and bargain for decent wages.
 

Huerta never stopped fighting for the rights of working people, women, and Hispanics. She served as vice-President of the UFW until 1999, while working on campaigns which encouraged Hispanics and women to run for political office. In 1998, she received the Eleanor Roosevelt Human Rights Award. In 2012, President Obama presented her with the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the highest civilian award in the United States. Today, she is still involved in various civic organizations promoting human rights, working around the clock so others can work respected and with fair treatment.
 

Image credit & copyright: Dolores Huerta Foundation
 

Laying the presidential smackdown on bills.

Nope, never, no-can-do. However it's phrased, a presidential veto is a big red disapproval sign from our highest government office. The process is meant to maintain the balance of constitutional powers between the branches of government, although its use sometimes reveals the contentious relationship between the president and Congress.
 

The word "veto" is Latin for "I forbid." The practice comes from the sixth-century Roman Republic, when the highest government officials, known as the consuls, could veto legislation. In the U.S., the power of the executive branch's veto is outlined in Article 1. Section 7 of the Constitution. It allows the president to disprove a bill, leave it unsigned, and return it to Congress within 10 days. This is called a "regular veto." A pocket veto differs in that the bill is simply never returned to Congress. A veto statement often accompanies the action and explains the President's reasons for his decision. Congress may override the presidential veto by a two-thirds vote in the Senate and the House.
 

The first presidential veto occurred on April 5, 1792, when George Washington objected to an early version of the Apportionment Act of 1792. The bill was an attempt to set the number of members each state would have in the House of Representatives—with a catch that the eight states with the largest populations would each gain a Congressional seat (a move that would benefit the Federalists' agenda to create a strong national government). Washington, working with the advice of Thomas Jefferson, argued the bill was unconstitutional. An attempt to override his veto soon failed, and a revised bill was signed by Washington on April 14th.
 

In one of the most contentious battles between the president and Congress, Andrew Johnson saw his executive powers reduced by the Tenure of Office Act in 1867. Johnson was a southern Democrat Vice President who took over the presidency when Lincoln was assassinated in 1865, much to the chagrin of the two-thirds majority Republicans in both houses. As Johnson attempted to thwart the Reconstruction era and the expansion of civil rights laws, he fired the man in charge of enforcing the new corresponding provisions, Secretary of War Edwin Stanton. Congress acted swiftly to pass the Tenure of Office Act, which restricted suspensions of Cabinet members and officeholders. Johnson vetoed the bill, but the Republican-controlled House overrode his veto and the law was passed on March 2, 1867: Johnson was later impeached for his actions against Stanton, and barely acquitted in May 1868. In 1928, the Supreme Court finally struck down the Tenure of Office Act as unconstitutional.

 

The President with the most vetoes was Franklin D. Roosevelt, with a whopping total of 635. Roosevelt's most famous veto was for the tax-related Revenue Act of 1943. During World War II, Roosevelt asked Congress for $10.5 billion in federal excise taxes to slow inflation and help the war effort. Various luxury goods, including jewelry, alcohol, and telephone services, would be taxed more heavily. The House Ways and Means Committee didn't see eye-to-eye with FDR and watered down his demands, presenting him with a $2.1 billion bill instead. In his veto statement, FDR said it provided "...relief not for the needy but for the greedy." However, both Houses overrode his veto in February 1944.

 

Recent presidents have usually stuck to less than 12 vetoes each, with our incumbent president, Donald Trump, tallying six thus far. It's highly unlikely another president will break FDR's record of 635 any time soon. His successor, President Harry S. Truman, followed up with 250 vetoes, and the number has sunk precipitously since then. Several causes for the decline include the trend of larger bills, the lack of legislation coming from Congress relative to the past, and the rise of signing statements, which allow the president to subtly frame bills through their point of view, rather than cancel a bill outright due to a single unwanted provision. Needless to say, the government is always evolving. Time will tell if the poor veto remains relevant!
 

Image credit & copyright: Steve Sack / Star Tribune
 

A look at one of the most controversial criminal cases in U.S. history.

It's not every day a crime is declared "worse than murder." Yet that's precisely what Judge Irving R. Kaufman said in regard to the crimes of Julius and Ethel Rosenberg, who were convicted of espionage on March 29, 1951, and put to death two years later. It made them the first American civilians executed for the crime. Today, the Rosenbergs' case is an ongoing source of controversy, bringing up ethical questions about the death penalty and trials during the U.S.'s "Red Scare."

 

The Rosenbergs were born in New York, and married in 1939. They were members of the Communist Party of the United States of America, and in 1940, Julius began working as a civilian engineer with the U.S. Army Signal Corps. During this time, he engaged in espionage. Ethel's involvement would remain unclear, but her brother, David Greenglass, was also a spy. He was a U.S. Army Sergeant who worked as a machinist on the top-secret Manhattan Project, and passed secrets about atomic weapons to Julius. Julius then turned this information over to a courier named Harry Gold, who gave it to Soviet Vice-Consul Anatoly A. Yakovlev.
 

Julius became a suspect in 1945, when the army discovered he was part of the Communist Party. When Harry Gold was arrested in May of 1950, he implicated Julius Rosenberg and David Greenglass, who were both quickly arrested. Ethel's arrest came in August. The trial that followed was highly public and extremely short, lasting from March 6th to April 5th. The Rosenbergs were charged with conspiracy to commit espionage, which, under the Espionage Act of 1917, carried the death penalty.
 

Ethel's own brother was the chief witness for the prosecution, and spoke in detail about the crimes committed by the Rosenbergs. Greenglass was not required to provide physical proof, and his story regarding Ethel's involvement was inconsistent. His original testimony before a grand jury stated that only Julius was involved. However, only Greenglass's second testimony was shown during trial, in which he stated that Ethel was present during all of the spy ring's meetings. Greenglass gave this second testimony in exchange for charges against his wife, Ruth, being dropped.
 

The Rosenbergs maintained their innocence throughout the trial, but pleaded the Fifth Amendment when asked specific questions. This may have done them more harm than good, as their silence made them appear suspicious, to many. Although public opinion was not on the Rosenbergs' side, many people were shocked at their death sentence. A surge of international sympathy for the Rosenbergs cropped up. Many who thought they were guilty still protested the death penalty. Even F.B.I Director J. Edgar Hoover said that the execution of a young mother would reflect poorly on the government.
 

The Rosenbergs' sentence was appealed and denied seven times before the Supreme Court. Two presidents, Harry Truman and Dwight D. Eisenhower, dismissed the Rosenbergs pleas for clemency, with Eisenhower stating that, "The execution of two human beings is a grave matter. But even graver is the thought of the millions of dead whose deaths may be directly attributable to what these spies have done."
 

In 1953, the Rosenbergs were executed at Sing Sing Prison, making Ethel the first woman executed in the U.S. since 1865. After the collapse of the Soviet Union, in the early 1990s, Soviet intelligence confirmed Julius' involvement in espionage. However, much debate remains about Ethel's involvement, the fairness of their trial, and especially the fairness of their sentence. One thing's for sure: the Rosenbergs' case will remain one of the most unique criminal cases in U.S. history.
 

The notorious prison closes its doors.

Nicknamed "the Rock" and "Uncle Sam's Devil's Island," Alcatraz prison remains an unforgettable American institution. Its cold waters and cells housed many of the 20th century's most infamous gangsters, including Al Capone, George "Machine-Gun" Kelly, and Alvin "Creepy" Karpis. Yet what made it one of the most inescapable federal prisons led to its inevitable closure in 1963.

 

The history of Alcatraz is less sordid than its inhabitants were. In 1775, Spanish explorer Juan Manuel de Ayala discovered the island and named it "La Isla de los Alcatraces," or "The Island of the Pelicans." Decades later, in 1846, California's Military Governor John C. Frémont purchased the island for the U.S. Government. In 1850, President Millard Fillmore ordered Alcatraz to function as a military base with the Citadel barracks, lighthouse, and other main fortifications completed by 1858. During the Civil War, Fort Alcatraz housed over 85 mounted cannons and the San Francisco Arsenal, along with Confederate sympathizers and POWs as prisoners.

 

Over the next 80 years, Alcatraz's expanded as a military prison. In 1867, inmates moved from the guardhouse basement to a new jailhouse. When the Spanish-American War broke out in 1898, the prison population boomed from 26 to 450. During the 1906 San Francisco Earthquake, civilian prisoners took refuge on the Rock. Shortly after, the main cell block was completed and the barracks torn down in place of a dry moat in 1912. And by 1933, operations on the island were transferred to the Department of Justice and Federal Bureau of Prisons for use as a maximum-security civilian prison.
 

A transfer to Alcatraz typically lasted five years—if inmates could tolerate it. Extreme isolation, minimal privileges, and unforgivingly cold tides wore down even the hardest criminals. Al Capone, sick with neurosyphilis, could hardly back up his threats and was stabbed by James C. Lucas in 1936—two years before Capone became too disoriented to leave Alcatraz's hospital ward. The infamous Arthur "Doc" Barker made an escape attempt in 1939, but was caught on the western shoreline and killed while resisting arrest. John Giles executed a particularly clever escape attempt in 1945: while unloading laundry on the docks, he managed to steal an entire uniform piecemeal. Wearing the outfit, he boarded an Army motorboat thinking it was headed for San Francisco. To his surprise, he landed at the military post on Angel Island, and was apprehended and returned to Alcatraz.

 

Alcatraz's unforgiving landscape took a toll on itself. In the early 1960s, cost assessments to repair the saltwater damage to facilities was estimated at about $5 million dollars. In addition, the isolated location made it costly to operate. A million gallons of water had to be barged in each week, along with food and other supplies. The estimated daily cost of operations was about $10 per prisoner, as compared to $3 at the federal penitentiary in Atlanta, Georgia. On March 21, 1963, the last inmate transferred out of Alcatraz was Frank C. Weatherman, a 29-year-old gun smuggler who remarked, "Alcatraz never was no good."
 

In later years, plans to make Alcatraz a United Nations monument and a West Coast equivalent of the Statue of Liberty fell through. A 19-month occupation of the island in 1969 by a group called the United Indians of All Tribes caused President Nixon to end the discriminatory federal laws aimed at assimilating Native Americans deemed the "Indian termination policy." Several of the prison buildings were burned and destroyed during the protest.

 

In 1986, Alcatraz was designated a National Historical Landmark. Since then the National Park Service has taken over management of the land and turned it into a San Francisco tourist destination. Though the location is no longer a fearsome prison, the history of the Rock will certainly capture imaginations for years to come—and never let them escape!
 

Image credit & copyright: AdstockRF
 

An activist who would not be held back, even by the President.

She famously said she was "sick and tired of being sick and tired," but civil rights activist Fannie Lou Hamer, who passed away on March 14, 1977, always fought on, regardless. While battling for the voting rights of black Americans, she fearlessly defied white segregationists, racist police, and even President Lyndon B. Johnson.

 

To say that Hamer had a difficult upbringing is an understatement. She was the youngest of 20 children, born to a sharecropping family in Mississippi, in 1917. Sharecropping, in which black families rented plots of land from white landowners in exchange for crop shares, was designed to keep black families in debt. Starting at just six years old, Hamer toiled in the fields with her family.
 

Throughout her young life, Hamer suffered numerous human rights violations. One of the worst occurred shortly after she got married at age 27. During what was supposed to be a small surgery to remove a tumor, a white doctor sterilized Hamer without permission. Forced sterilization of African American women was so common at the time, they were called "Mississippi appendectomies."
 

Now unable to give birth, Hamer and her husband adopted two daughters. Hamer became determined to fight against the kinds of injustices that she had suffered. In 1962, Hamer and 17 others traveled to the county seat to register to vote, which was extremely dangerous since the Klu Klux Klan menaced black people who attempted so. Hamer was turned away when she couldn't answer questions about the state constitution's "de facto" laws, thus failing the "literacy test" designed to keep black people from registering. Hamer was harassed by police on her way home and fired from her sharecropping job when she returned.
 

Unwavering, Hamer became a community organizer, helping others learn to read, write, and register to vote. She co-founded the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party. Hamer was an exceptional public speaker, and her words inspired many to follow her cause. In 1964, she did the unthinkable and ran for United States Congress, with the support of fellow activists like Martin Luther King Jr.
 

At the 1964 Democratic National Convention, Hamer appealed to the Democratic National Committee. She wanted the Committee to seat delegates from the Mississippi Democratic Freedom party, rather than the usual Mississippi segregationist delegates. President Lyndon B. Johnson, fearing the loss of support from Southern Democrats, tried silencing Hamer. He sent advisors to persuade her not to deliver her planned speech, but she refused. So, Johnson called a news conference during Hamer's speech, to draw away the attention of national news networks.
 

The ploy didn't work, however. Hamer's fiery, 13-minute speech, which included vivid details of a police beating that left her with kidney damage, was widely broadcasted. Although the freedom party delegates were not seated, Hamer's speech drew national attention and is remembered as one of the most important speeches of the American Civil Rights Movement. When asked why she persisted in giving her speech, Hamer answered "All my life I've been sick and tired. Now I'm sick and tired of being sick and tired."  

For the remainder of her life, Hamer focused on forming organizations to help black Southern families. She helped end unjust sharecropping by starting the Freedom Farms Corporation, in 1969, which lent land to black families until they could afford to buy it. In 1971, she helped form the National Women's Political Caucus. In addition to helping black people register to vote, she set up local organizations to provide childcare to working families. Even a 1976 cancer diagnosis couldn't stop her from fighting. When she died in 1977, she was laid to rest in Ruleville. We take solace knowing she is resting in eternal peace.
 

The story of what was once the largest building in the world.

Third time's the charm! The beautiful building known as the Hagia Sophia, in Istanbul, Turkey, is a testament to the phrase. Two versions of it were completed and destroyed before the final version was commissioned on this day in 532 C.E. Originally a basilica, or cathedral of the Greek Orthodox Christian Church, (also used by Romans and Catholics) this architectural marvel has changed functions throughout the centuries. But for the past 1,500 years, it has steadfastly stood as a larger-than-life symbol of its nation, not unlike Paris' Eiffel Tower or New York's Empire State Building.
 

The first version of the Hagia Sophia was commissioned by Byzantine Emperor Constantius around 360 C.E. At the time, the city of Istanbul was called Constantinople, after the first Byzantine Emperor (and Constantius's father), Constantine I. Unfortunately, the city was faced with political discord and riots during the reign of its next ruler, Emperor Arkadios. The Hagia Sophia, which was partially made from wood, was burned down in the chaos. In 415 C.E., it was rebuilt, but part of its structure was once again made from wood, and once again, around a hundred years later, it was burned down during a time of political turmoil.
 

Finally, in 532 C.E., Emperor Justinian I decided to commission a new basilica sure to stand the test of time. Byzantine architects Isidoros Milet and Anthemios Tralles were called upon to build a flame-resistant successor. Using enormous slabs of marble, plus other stone and bricks, the renowned architects created a structure measuring 269 feet long and 240 feet wide, which, upon its completion in 537 C.E., made it the largest building in the world. The newly-minted Hagia Sophia featured marble floors and ceilings, 104 marble columns, and a 180-foot-high pendentive domed roof. It was the first large-scale employment of a pendentive, or vaulting which stabilizes spherical domes to square frames. It wasn't until St. Peter's Basilica was finished in 1506, just under a 1,000 years later, that a larger pendentive dome was erected.
 

The Hagia Sophia is considered a marvel of Byzantine architecture and is by far the most famous structure in Byzantine history. Not only is it where Byzantine Emperors were crowned, but every province in the empire was responsible for its construction, for Emperor Justinian I decreed that all of them must supply architectural materials, in order for the building to truly represent the entire empire. "My Lord, thank you for giving me the chance to create such a worshipping place," he spoke upon its completion.  

The Hagia Sophia was not only a symbol of the Byzantine Empire's might, but also its culture, specifically its central Greek Orthodox faith. This didn't sit well with Emperor Fatih Sultan Mehmed of the Ottoman Empire, who captured Constantinople in 1453. The Ottomans quickly converted the Hagia Sophia into an Islamic Mosque. The majority of the building's structure was left intact, although some of the Hagia Sophia's original Greek Orthodox artwork was covered over with Islamic art and minarets were added to the building so that Muslims in Istanbul could be called to prayer.
 

In 1935, the Hagia Sophia was transformed into a museum. Today, it is a haven for those interested in the Byzantine Empire, the Ottoman Empire, and the history of Turkey, in general. How fitting is it that the name "Hagia Sophia" means "holy wisdom"!?
 

Below: a photograph of the inside of the Hagia Sophia, which is now a museum.