Jenna Fisher reports in the Newton Patch that a proposal is afoot in the City Council to consider changing “Columbus Day” to “Indigenous People’s Day” in Newton.
The proposal was first floated a year ago by Councilors Emily Norton and Vicki Danberg. An item was introduced this session by Councilor Emily Norton, Jake Auchincloss, Alicia Bowman, Becky Grossman, Bill Humphrey, Josh Krinzman, Brenda Noel and Holly Ryan. According to The Patch the council was set to vote on it at this past Monday’s Council meeting but it’s been put off until after this year’s Oct 12 holiday out of concern that “the hearing could turn ugly”.
Lined up on one side are the folks who think celebrating Columbus, given what we know today, is inappropriate. “With all the increased focus of racial equity and the need for righting historic wrongs, and the continued outreach from residents, including students and young people, it seemed like now was an appropriate time to raise this again,” says Emily Norton.
On the other side are many members of the Italian-American community. “This is very personal for me,” Councilor-at-Large Lenny Gentile, a third generation Italian, said Monday. “As an Italian American, it is an insult to me and it’s an insult to a lot of other residents of the city of Newton. The complete elimination of a holiday that has come to represent a celebration of people’s Italian heritage is insulting.”
Here’s a story from Julie Cohen about it in the Newton Tab
What do you think?
The old time mushes and jivals are going to just about have a heart attack over this.
The % of residents are offended by having Columbus day should drive the decision…. not a handful of social justice warriors living in the comfort of an affluent suburb
.. by the way, what will they target next?
Indigenous People’s Day should be instituted in addition to Columbus Day rather than as a replacement for.
Clearly the “celebration” of Columbus Day as traditionally practiced needs to change. It would not be hard and rather constructive to provide a far more balanced perspective than is currently the case. While SJWs such as Norton and Danburg and their like minded coterie of co-sponsors may think there is nothing to balance, they are wrong. In addition to the issues that concern Italian Americans, the fact remains that America, for all of its imperfections (and there are many), has offered safe haven to a wide breadth of people over the years. Case in point near and dear to my heart: were it not for the country that ultimately came from Columbus, the recent ancestors of many of us in Newton would have perished in the Nazi Holocaust. Just because an issue is complex does not mean it should be stricken from the calendar.
Howard Zinn’s People’s History of the US, is available on-line here: https://mvlindsey.files.wordpress.com/2015/08/peoples-history-zinn-1980.pdf
His first chapter deals with Columbus. No matter which side of this people are on, they should read and have a response to this account. If we accept this history (maybe some don’t?), it calls into serious question what and who we are celebrating on Columbus Day.
Columbus Day is to Italian Americans what St Patrick’s Day is to Irish Americans. Both are celebrating the culture vs the individual they are named after. Just rename it Italian American Day and add Indigenous People’s Day. St Patrick’s Day isn’t a state observed holiday and neither should the other two.
@Jerry: I also posted this in my weekly newsletter that folks can subscribe to: http://www.amysangiolo.com: Indigenous People’s Day resolution: The City Council will once again have an opportunity to send a resolution to the Mayor and the School Committee to replace references to Columbus Day to Indigenous People’s Day. See Programs and Services Report for the Committee’s discussion and ultimate recommendation to the Full Council here. Related documents can be found below.
The elimination of Columbus Day should be celebrated as a huge achievement for our community and nation. The origins of the holiday are in the discrimination against (and lynching of) Italians in the United States. That we have come so far as to have completely forgotten a time where this discrimination was commonplace means something.
Let us now celebrate Indigenous Peoples Day, and look forward to the time when our grandchildren wonder why it is worthy of celebration.
All discrimination is wrong, but may I add that the discrimination towards Native Americans has been 100x worse than compared to any other ethnic group.
I would love to see an Immigrant’s Day to celebrate all over our ancestors and their respective journey’s to the USA.
Don’t @ me.
So much ado about nothing…. Don’t these politicians have something better to do when there are so many major crises intersecting at the same time… Economic collapse, health issues with Covid, education failures, depression spikes, business failures, inability to buy food or pay rent, etc.
Really? The name of a holiday that arose after the lynching of Italians which coincided exactly 400 years after 1492…. Please get a life!
Perhaps we should just retire the holiday under 2 wrongs don’t make a right. Robert M. is historically correct, Columbus Day was motivated by a lynching of 11 Italian Americans in New Orleans in 1891.
“As part of a wider effort to ease tensions with Italy and placate Italian Americans, president Benjamin Harrison declared the first nationwide celebration of Columbus Day in 1892, commemorating the 400th anniversary of the Italian explorer’s landing in the New World.”
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/March_14,_1891_New_Orleans_lynchings#:~:text=The%20March%2014%2C%201891%2C%20New,had%20been%20acquitted%20at%20trial.
My committee remarks as co-docketer and additional thoughts are included in my newsletter to Ward 5 constituents posted last week: https://www.billhumphrey.org/newsletter/2020/9/17/newsletter-vol-1-week-38-remarks-on-indigenous-peoples-day-resolution-and-an-update-on-leaf-blower-reform
My main takeaways are 1) that people continuing to defend Columbus tend to be using very out of date historical (mis)information that has been proven wrong by scholars with more recently discovered/translated/analyzed sources from his own time period; 2) that continuing to focus on Columbus as an avatar for Italian-American heritage obscures a lot of (or sometimes any!) other Italian-American figures, which I focused on in my newsletter. Many of them have Massachusetts connections, too, unlike Columbus.
But I’m tentatively optimistic that we will come out of this process and discussion at City Council with both an Indigenous Peoples’ Day Monday holiday for the city/schools in October and a separate city designated day honoring Italian Heritage at a different time of year. In particular it’s worth noting that there are not currently significant Columbus Day celebrations in Newton anyway among Italian-Americans or anyone else, and so any city-promoted Italian Heritage or pride events/dates might as well be at a time of year when residents (especially in Nonantum) are celebrating those things already.
@Bill Humphrey-
I never got a chance to chat with you when you campaigned. I read you walked most, if not all of Ward 5 when you ran. Possibly twice. That’s a heck of an accomplishment that would take an awful lot of time. Even one lap around all of Ward 5 would be a haul.
As a constituent and
resident of ward 5 I’d like to know what you do for a living.
Your website says “media”. Are you self employed? Independently wealthy? What is your job and who do you work for? Do you have a job other than councilor? Your campaign website lists your address as the same one as your family. Please don’t tell me that the councilor representing and voting on legislation for all of Ward 5 is underemployed and living at home with mom and dad.
Do you, or have you had any work experience outside of political organizing, strategizing and campaigning for the Democratic Party?
@robert manning – that fact you think this is just about the name of the holiday speaks volumes about the progress we need to make. I think it’s funny out of all the issues we are currently facing right now that you listed off, race relations wasn’t one of them. Oh that’s right, it probably doesn’t impact you so therefore not important.
Call it Heritage Day, make it into a national holiday and celebrate everyone’s heritage…much better.
Robert M, thank you for saying what so many of us are thinking. I was beginning to think I was living in the twilight zone here in Newton. What happened to the two key things my (non-white, immigrant!) parents taught me – use common sense and work/study hard? Many of us see much of the local discussion these days, including renaming efforts, as utter nonsense – luxurious time-wasting by the uber-privileged and over-educated (but lacking common sense). Get a life indeed, or at the very least, some self-awareness.
One would think the City Council has more important issues to focus upon.
They continue to ignore the will of the people to cut the size of the Council.
Quite honestly, all government business in Newton should stop, and especially performative nonsense like renaming holidays, until the kids are back in school.
Every single person involved in city government should wake up each day solely tasked with solving this problem.
I’m first generation Italian on my mom’s side and nobody from my family or from her village that immigranted here gives a cr@p about Columbus Day. Maybe it’s different for Italian-Americans who have been here for generations, but I didn’t even know that Italians cared about it until very recently. Frankly I’m baffled by the outrage.
Councilor Humphrey is a super-smart guy who has taken great care to learn the facts and craft thoughtful policy ideas. He’s a great resource – go Bill!
Perhaps it’s my age, but I get frustrated when so many things are turned into a win lose situation when a win win situation is staring them right in the face. Here’s the rub and what I think is a reasonable solution.
I’ve been to several Columbus Day celebrations here and in Washington D.C. All of them have as much of an Italian flavor to them as Saint Patrick’s day has for the Irish, but I’ve never seen a Columbus Day celebration where Columbus himself was the center of attraction. In most, he’s gets only passing notice. It’s far more a celebration of Italian life and accomplishments. Far far more about Nonantum than anything about Columbus discovering this continent. Let’s keep it that way for the October holiday. Another problem is that Columbus had absolutely nothing to do with Italian American life or Italian American accomplishments, but there are many, many Italian Americans who do. My personal choice would be to rename the holiday for Fiorello LaGuardia, the former Fusion Party mayor of New York City. LaGuardia is mainly remembered for the airport named after him, but he was so much more in areas of honest, open, courageous and creative government and as one of the nation’s pioneer civil rights advocates. He was famous and wildly popular throughout America. He represented and personified a real breakthrough by Italian immigrants toward the mainstream of political and social life.
As a corollary to this suggestion, I hope we can establish a separate national holiday for indigenous Americans and I suspect support for this would be expedited by keeping the October holiday Italian focused sans Columbus. I also believe that such a holiday is long overdue. A much needed chance to focus on the rich culture and heritage of our indigenous populations, the sordid history of exploitation they have endured, continued violations of their social and civil rights, and the wretched conditions that still prevail on many if not most reservations. I think these are things most of the American people would be eager to hear and act on with a clear focus unimpeded by continuing disputes about Columbus and the whole sordid business of early colonization. We have no national holidays in March, April or August.
@Shawn-
If renaming holidays is the best way our all Democrat city council can think of addressing
racial issues, we are all in trouble no matter how thoughtfully crafted the policies are. It’s called virtue sharing. Window dressing will not solve these issues.
Care to answer any of the questions that I have asked here of super smart Bill? As the spokesman of the Newton
Democratic City Committee I think you have already answered me. Thank you:
No, Councilor Humphrey is not employed outside of Democratic politics, activism, and community organizing.
Yes, Councilor Humphrey is living at home with mom and dad.
@Kathy Winters –
Please run again!
Ward 5 needs you.
Julie Cohen wrote this about that in the Newton Tab
@paulgreen- Does it really matter where a city councilor lives as long is it in the appropriate ward? I find your insinuation to be insulting. Bill does not need to explain his living situation. and frankly, I could care less about his living situation just as I don’t care about your living situation.
The voters elected Bill, fairly. Your preferred candidate was not elected. You have the right to vote for your preferred candidate. Disagree with his policies all you want, but please don’t throw shade at an elected official’s personal life because you disagree or don’t like him.
Perhaps it’s useful to pull the lens out from just Newton on this one. This is part of a much larger trend and discussions about coming to terms with a very different view of our nation’s history. I know that I was taught history in a very traditional way in that certain people were heroes and others were not. Columbus, in that view, was seen as one of those heroic figures. In that same historic view, slavery was seen as something that happened and was corrected, not as something that has ongoing influence today. It was also seen, by those of us in the northern states, as something that happened somewhere else.
We’re at a very different point in our national conversation in which we need to listen to other voices within this historical context. There’s a very interesting piece on NPR’s Throughline that talks about this idea that different groups that had been at the bottom were eventually accepted into America’s majority (Irish, Italians, Jews, etc.). The main outliers being Black and Indigenous Americans, who have never been accepted within the broader caste.
Here in Newton we do need to think about our own history. Even our own city seal takes a western-centric view of history and keeps it front and center. People lived here before our homes existed (and they didn’t have zoning codes) but our own city history centers tend to focus on “settlers” and the last 250 years. The Jackson Homestead’s big selling point, and the thing most elementary schools take away from a visit there, is its role in the Underground Railroad.
Our city councilors have limited ability to take actions that will affect people nationwide, but they can take certain actions within the city. In this context and with their limited ability, I think an action like this makes sense. It sends a signal and points to an attitude. It’s not a perfect action and it’s not a final action, but it’s a good step.
Thomas Sowell is an American economist and social theorist and senior fellow at Stanford. He also happens to be African American. He has many excellent quotes that are particularly apt right now. Here’s one: “Activism is a way for useless people to feel important, even if the consequences of their activism are counterproductive for those they claim to be helping and damaging to the fabric of society as a whole.” And here’s another good one: “Envy plus rhetoric equals ‘social justice’.” Check him if you need a dose of common sense and some support for the old-fashioned ideas of hard work, self-sufficiency and gratitude during these trying times where many loud voices seems to be saying all you need is your sense of outrage and entitlement.
@Bob B-
As usual thank you for being the adult in the room. The goal with this type of legislation is not to deal substantively or even thoughtfully with race. It doesn’t even pretend to involve meaningful, legitimate activism. Certainly not the type of activism that these times demand from our white leaders. That would be too hard and would involve sacrifices like sharing power with people of color by electing more of them to our city council and school committee. Never going to happen here in Newton. All the “progressive” Democrats will line up for Bryan Barash if he runs against Tarak Lucas. Bill Humphrey and Sean Roche have already said so and Shawn Fitzgibbons will do so in lock step as will the rest of the Newton Democrat City Committee. The window dressing of renaming holidays, schools etc.. distracts voters from noticing the abysmal level of people of color in power in Newton.
The rest is just a bunch of makarkey
@“Bruce C”, or whoever you are-
What exactly am I “insinuating”?
What do you find insulting about my post?
How am I “throwing shade”
C’mon man!!
I meant to say Malarkey..
@”Paul Green”, I applaud your efforts to learn more about our elected politicians, and that’s no makarkey! Since you have a talent for fishing out information about city councilors’ employment and living arrangements, could you provide some insight into Lenny Gentile’s?
The address listed under his name on the ballot (8 bedrooms, 5k+ square feet of living space, five-sixths of an acre of land) is assessed at almost $3 million, and he bought it for more than $1.9 million over 16 years ago – not an insignificant sum of money at the time. A quick check of the Middlesex Deeds website implies that he was able to come up with with close to a million dollars in cash for the down payment (in 2004!).
Aside from those who were born into wealth, that would probably make Gentile one of the wealthiest city councilors in Newton, if not the state. Yet when I google his name he comes up as some sort of a loan originator for a mortgage company based in Florida???
I honestly don’t know anything about the man aside from the infamous “summahville” incident, so I’m just curious as to what I’m missing – does he have development interests, wealthy family members, lottery winnings, etc.? TIA
Newton Resident,
Sowell is a Milton Friedman sycophant. Sowell’s views on slavery are bogus and trigger hives. If MS had his druthers, then everything in our society would be privatized. All he thought about was how to make a profit. He is the main character in an Ayn Rand book. TS is, and Milton was a clown. Both stand for what is so wrong with the greatest nation on earth that is busy figuring out ways to control the world.
Well Paul, I know you’re not my biggest fan, but I suppose I can answer some of your questions about my personal life instead of about the substance of my work as a city councilor for Ward 5.
1) I worked as a magazine editor for 5 years and I worked for a global consulting firm’s Newton office on state/municipal strategies to attract jobs. I’ve never worked for the Democratic Party and I haven’t had an “organizing” job in 7 years. (Perhaps you’re thinking of my volunteer efforts on my own time.) This is all readily available information online and things that people who spoke to me during the campaign on my four passes to knock doors were aware of. There’s nothing hidden here.
2) Similarly, everybody who watched any of the campaign candidate forums also knows that I am the fifth-generation in my family home where I grew up with my great-aunt et al (and my cousin in the same generation lives around the corner in my late grandmother’s house). In my family, it would be more odd for me to leave permanently, although I have lived other places. Taking care of older family members is an important commitment in my family. And like many other people have realized, Newton does not have tons of affordable places to live. I was elected on the basis of my deep roots in Ward 5 and how many residents I have known for my entire life. This is my community.
3) Like millions of Americans right now, yes, it has been difficult to find full-time employment. Ward 5 has been the biggest beneficiary of this — as many residents can attest from my presence at city meetings or community events and from coming by their house as soon as they have a problem — since it has meant that I am effectively a full-time Councilor until such time as I find a second job.
You might have read on Village 14 from Jerry Reilly about how early on in the pandemic, I personally dropped off information on emergency rental assistance to most of the rental housing units in Ward 5. I also played an active role in the FY21 budget battle where much of the actual work of local government happens as opposed to the symbolic stuff, and as a result we will continue to have library hours on Sundays (which were slated to be eliminated). I’m a very active member of the Finance Committee (which is chronically under-attended despite the current crisis) and the Programs & Services Committee (where we have a much busier agenda of ordinances than these relatively easy symbolic items despite the comparative level of coverage online), I’ve been appointed to the Rules Subcommittee, I’ve been convening meetings on low-income housing needs, and I’ve been co-sponsoring substantive legislative items and exploratory items with many of my colleagues. I will probably have to dial back my hours per week on all these things once I have another job, but it seemed like people could use the help in the meantime during this present emergency.
I’ve had a productive and positive working relationship so far this term with both my predecessor, Councilor John Rice, and with the candidate you supported, and I have tried to serve all my constituents. I’m sorry that you didn’t get a chance to meet me during the campaign and that you do not feel I’ve been serving you or Ward 5. But overall feedback on my work from Ward 5 residents has been positive.
Claire’s post above caught my attention. If Columbus Day has turned into an Italian heritage appreciation day then let’s keep it as a day on the calendar. But like St. Patrick’s Day there is no reason for it to be a holiday.
Let’s move the holiday from October to November and make election day the holiday.
We can add an Indigenous Peoples Day elsewhere on the calendar without overwriting Columbus Day.
I second Craig’s comment from above. I’ve copied it here:
“Quite honestly, all government business in Newton should stop, and especially performative nonsense like renaming holidays, until the kids are back in school.
Every single person involved in city government should wake up each day solely tasked with solving this problem.”
Every Newton elected official, whether Executive, City Council, or School Committee who is up for re-election next year should recognize that their reelection is at risk unless more is done to determine the conditions by which even a partial return to in person learning can happen. What if the Commonwealth mandates a return? This could happen. Will we be ready?
To the politically correct extremists in Newton, why not also insist that Councilor Gentile change his surname so as not to offend….?
(This, by the way, is a reductio ad absurdum to those extremists…)
Michael,
At this point parents should be pushing to skip right past the hybrid and partial learning nonsense and ask what the plan is to get kids back in school as normal. Cases are now as low in Newton and Massachusetts as they are likely to be for the remainder of the school year. Private schools are fully in session and students and teachers there are NOT being tested.
If “surveillance” testing of healthy, asymptomatic kids is a precondition for the teachers returning to school, let’s get that on the table right now and create a plan to implement it and pay for it.
I don’t think people understand how close we are to losing an entire school year.
Equating it to St. Patrick’s Day doesn’t really fly with me. St. Patrick’s Day is not a federal holiday.
If you’re looking to the government to celebrate, or express pride, in your ethnic
heritage, you’re probably looking in the wrong place.
@MMQC Agreed. That is why I proposed that none of them should be national or state holidays
Aha! Thank you Paul Green for exposing Bill Humphrey’s employment status! On a thread about Christopher Columbus no less! I bet he thought he thought he comment on the issue without grown men shaming him about his employment status, but we owe it to our city to make that fact known!!
How dare we have a City Councilor who is unemployed! Our government should be for the people, by the people. And by people, I mean wealthy people who work in profitable industries. Profitable industries that can throw millions of dollars into our local elections, and will in no way expect compensation through future policy decisions. That’s the America I know and love!!
I don’t see any foreseeable problems with that type of government! Private lawyers, and real estate executives are known for their moral compasses and impartial reserve. I love that people in those honorable professions can represent me!!
What does this unemployed Humphrey hack know about policy? Yes, he may be well-educated, eloquent, committed to his constituency, motivated to distribute rental assistance
during COVID, and willing to treat the City Councilor role as a full time job. But damnit, he’s unemployed so he doesn’t represent ME!
@BlueFB…
Now you’re talking!
Newton is absolutely chockablockloaded with the corporate and private lawyers and real estate executives that you have so thoughtfully mentioned. Let’s throw in the private equity crowd also as a bonus. Some of these individuals have toiled on the newton city council, some on the school committee. As Michael mentioned earlier, there are even some serving now. One trait they all share is that they are all liberal Democrats. Many of them are handsomely compensated, have vacation homes on MVI or the Hamptons and send their children to private colleges. Their kids definitely don’t mix with the riff raff at state colleges. These are the people that promote affordable housing(as long as it is not in their neighborhoods) and promote racial justice and equality, but prefer to keep the legislating in-house. Advocating for affordable housing or promoting racial justice is fine, but they will hold the elected positions and do all the legislating, thank you very much. Sharing power or electing people of color is off the table. ALL of these people know the value of having a seat at the table, having skin in the game, or most importantly having an equity share. Thats how they got there, and that’s how they stay. Thats why they fight like hell to stay there. Liberal icons like Jeff Bezos, Bill Gates, Mark Zuckerburg, and all of the Silicon Valley executives(Google, Twitter etc..) that promote and exploit cheap workers,(most of the exploited are people of color from diverse cultures) are all liberal Democrats, and MOST of them are white. Jim Davis and Jim Koch might be rich, but they are pikers compared to this group.
As far as being unemployed, i am guilty as charged. There’s no shame in that, especially in these “complicated times”, # stronger together. I’ve been self employed for the last 35 years. I am a small business owner and thankfully i don’t have a brick and mortar location that was wiped out during a peaceful protest after a life time of work by a privately educated white child of privilege. Destruction has consequences for others after your parents lawyers have bailed you out. There are no carve outs, lifetime health insurance benefits for a minimum number of hours paid for, or safety nets. None. Like you, i would prefer to have someone smart and motivated with an eye toward detail representing me. Maybe someone like Bill H.
Sadly, our city council, aldermen, etc have a long history of coloring outside the lines and venturing into areas of legislating that they were not elected to no matter how well intended the causes might be. Honestly i could care not one bit about Columbus Day, but the legislation surrounding renaming or canceling it is not where i feel my ward 5 councilors energy should be expended in these “uncertain times”, #celebrate our front line workers”
On another note, Trey Anastasio is an extraordinary guitar player and it was a treat to see him play with the Dead.
I went to the University of Delaware, not an expensive private university. I chose to go there because it was the least expensive, I could finish in 3 years with my AP credits, they gave me a scholarship in my field of interest, and it was the last recession and I wanted there to be some savings left over for my sister to go to college. I don’t have rich parents and I’m not independently wealthy. I’ve never earned even the median national income in a year, let alone the Boston area median. I’m a leftist, not a liberal, so I make similar critiques of billionaire liberals that you’ve made here. I supported low-income housing in my own neighborhood (Engine 6 in 2013) and I spent the morning in Cambridge yesterday with two of my city council colleagues touring low-income housing developments, both already open and under construction, so we could get some ideas for our own community. It really seems like you’ve confused me for someone who is the opposite of me, in virtually all things.
“I’m a leftist, not a liberal.” Pardon me while I roll my eyes. You live with your parents in one of the most expensive zip codes in the state and as far as I can tell, you don’t have a real job. You’re white. Male. You’re a Berniebro who perpetuated the lie that Biden had dementia, playing right into the Republicans hands. I don’t know how the Columbus Day thread went off on such a tangent but I just had to roll my eyes at your comment.
Hey Mary,
Why don’t you share your real name and I’ll happily share my off-the-cuff thoughts on your living situation.
Thx
Newton is the national news poster child for the long-running nationwide trend of housing prices rising faster than income.
IMHO that fundamental of economics appears to be driving:
some commenting here to apparently feel “left out”, as they see others being more able to afford Newton
some of the identity politics scramble where groups (distinct from individuals) are told to vie for their “fair share”, implying, by definition, that a group currently gets less than that
group icon-protective politics and, what some here has been derided as Liberalism, modern versions of noblesse oblige toward other groups (let’s not take-up whether that is a condescension, okay?)
Some comments suggest that there is enough room in America for all groups to thrive without having to put-under those establishing themselves earlier. That seems the most American of the sentiments in flight.
I like making Election Day a holiday.
MMQC your attack on Councilor Humphrey is ugly and Trumpian. And filled with WEIRD (Western, educated, industrialized, rich and democratic) stereotypes: individual over family, work only matters if paid,…. Please explain why you had to remind him he was a white male?