It’s easy to get irritated by somebody who claims their values are somehow universal and by reference also must be my values if I am to be a good American or a good Christian, or a good something that only they can judge.
This has been going on for a long time in our political system. The most prominent promoters of this presumption today are those labeled White Christian Nationalists. They seem to have superseded so-called Evangelicals in their oppressive assumptions that they are righteously entitled to set a moral tone for me and for my nation. Some folks combine the two into Evangelical White Christian Nationalists.
This issue has come up in recent days with a letter that Rep. Chris Dinkins, the Majority (Republican) Caucus Chair in the Missouri House, sent to Governor Parson that begins “I am writing to bring your attention to a matter of great concern regarding the resettlement of refugees from Gaza in our state. As a dedicated representative of the people of Missouri, I believe it is crucial to take a proactive stance on this issue and safeguard the well-being and safety of our citizens.”
She wants to keep people out “whose beliefs systems are rooted in anti-American and anti-Israel sentiments.”
She continued later, “Our state has a responsibility to protect its citizens and uphold the values that define us as Americans.”
Just what values is she talking about? “We cannot afford to compromise the safety and security of Missourians by allowing the potential entry of individuals who may harbor hostility towards our nation and its allies,” she says.
Potential entry? Individuals who may harbor hostilities? (Actually, the correct word to use in this circumstance is “might.” As used to teach my reporters, might is prospective; may is permissive. You might hit me in the nose but you may not.)
The kind of rhetoric in her letter is abhorrent. We already have a gutful of this kind of conspiracy garbage from a presidential candidate who wants us to think all of those crossing our southern border are fentanyl-carrying killers, thieves, and rapists.
The timing of her letter is atrocious, coming about the same time three Palestinian students were shot while walking down the street near the University of Vermont in Burlington. Police say two of them are United States citizens and the third is a legal resident of the United States. They were speaking Arabic and two of them were wearing keffiyehs, a headdress worn by Palestinians.
We will learn, eventually, if their shooter thought he should take action against “individuals who may harbor hostility toward our nation.”
What are our national values today? Are they such that we should remove the Statue of Liberty and Emma Lazurus’ invitation to send us the tired and the poor, the wretched refuse of other lands, those yearning to breathe free, the homeless and the tempest-tossed?
Many of those we idealistically have said are welcome are now stereotyped by politicians who seek success by fueling distrust and hate toward people who are not that much different from our own ancestors just a few generations ago.
Rep. Dinkins has ambitions for higher political office in 2024. Perhaps she should publish a supplement to the letter she released online that outlines in specific and detailed form what she thinks are my values as an American citizen—and what your values have to be to be a good American citizen.
Governor Parson is on the wrong side of Dinkins’ values on this issue, and so, I hope, are most Missourians and Americans. He wasted no time in throwing her proposal in the ash can, telling reporters, “You don’t have the authority to do that to start off with. I mean, anybody’s been around a little bit, the federal government can place refugees anywhere they want to without asking your permission. First of all, there’s this big difference between Palestinian people, and the people of Hamas. Hamas are terrorist groups that attack our country and hate who we are. We don’t want them here. But I don’t think you want to take everybody that’s from Palestine to make them as bad people. I don’t know that.”
There’s another prominent figure whose recent remarks put people like Dinkins in their places. Bill Bradley, the Crystal City native whose basketball exploits in high school and college led to a ten-year career in the NBA (that was delayed by more two years while he was a Rhodes Scholar and then in the Air Force Reserve) and three-terms as a U. S. Senator from New Jersey.
Our friend, Tony Messenger, wrote in his November 23 Post-Dispatch column about remarks Bradley gave during the Musial Awards event in St. Louis a few days earlier when Bradley received a Lifetime Achievement Award from the organization that promotes humanity and sportsmanship—
“Never look down on people you don’t understand.”
Tony noted the comment came four days after the St. Charles County Council considered a resolution opposing the International Institute’s program to make the St. Louis metro area a destination for certain Hispanic immigrants. The council did not take action.
The St. Louis metro area has been a haven for many immigrants including large numbers of Germans, Italians, and Irish people in the 19th Century whose cultures still thrive in that city—te German culture spreading well into the heart of the state. More recently, St. Louis has opened its arms to those fleeing from Bosnia, Afghanistan, and Ukraine in addition to many coming from Latin America.
Kansas City also has been a magnet for immigrants. In fact, it has the Greater Kansas City Hispanic Chamber of Commerce which works in eight counties on both sides of the state line and bills itself as “the birthplace of the United States Hispanic Chamber of Commerce (in) Washington, D.C.”
The immigration story of the St. Louis area and all of Missouri started even earlier than the 19th century. When Spain controlled Missouri, it welcomed French Canadian immigrants who were central to the defeat of an invading British force that convinced Native Americans it was in their best interests to try to capture St. Louis in 1780. French citizens in Spanish St. Louis defeated that force in what is the westernmost battle of the American Revolution.
The Spanish government in control of what is now Missouri also invited another group to migrate here.
Americans.
George Morgan, a Philadelphia merchant and entrepreneur, was invited by the Spanish Crown in 1788 to create a colony on the west bank of the Mississippi River. A couple of years later he created the town of New Madrid.
Some of the early American immigrants who came here were illegal aliens: Protestants, practicing a faith that was once illegal in Catholic Spanish Missouri. Protestant ministers from the Illinois country used to cross the Mississippi under cover of night and provide services in darkened Missouri homes.
Tony concluded is column, “It is heartbreaking that officials would now look down on such immigrants — the latest chapter in another generation of an American journey. Once a year, the Musial Awards help remind us that it is our shared humanity that makes us great. This year, a big man from a small town in Missouri gave us the words that should echo in our heads, as we move from one political crisis to another. The solution that escapes us is more often than not to treat those with whom we disagree with respect and understanding.”
I want to add this from Vine DeLoria who wrote the best-seller decades ago, Custer Died for Your Sins: an Indian Manifesto:
“The understanding of the racial question does not ultimately involve understanding by either blacks or Indians. It involves the white man himself. He must examine his past. He must face the problems he has created within himself and within others. The white man must no longer project his fears and in securities onto other groups, races, and countries. Before the white man can relate to others he must forego the pleasure of denying them. The white man must learn to stop viewing history as a plot against himself.”
We wonder what Chris Dinkins would say to Bill Bradley.
Bill Bradley was and All-American as a college basketball player. His example as an All-American in deed as well as in word is the value worth having. It is those who follow the Dinkins/MAGA ideal who are the aliens to the American spirit.