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Mark R. Stoneman

Historian, editor, and translator for hire (German to English). Longtime resident of Washington, DC, now in Conway, NH, as a caregiver (he/him).

  Citizenship

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    I forgot how many things can be on a NH town and school election ballot. Still more boning up to do, and not a deep enough media scene to lean on endorsements.

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    Turns out some 800 people were at the protest I attended in Conway, NH, on Saturday.

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    Local clergy and faith leaders posted A Call to Justice, Mercy, and Peace (PDF) in our local newspaper yesterday. Its themes have been prominent in the sermons at my mother’s church this year.

    This is the kind of messaging that I, an otherwise nonobservant, unbelieving Christian can get behind. I sometimes think that I should get over my own church issues and seek out community there. We certainly share many of the same values and concerns.

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    Old white guy in need of a hair cut and beard trim, smiling and holding up a protest sign that reads 'WE THE PEOPLE' - '1st, 5th, & 14th Amendments' - 'Appropriations Clause'.

    My sign is hiding a lot of the crowd. I haven't heard an official number, but preliminary counts suggest at least 500 for my small town.

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    I’ve been watching a lot of Cory Booker on the Senate floor since yesterday evening (but getting some sleep myself). Good to see the fire in him. I needed this. 🇺🇸🗽

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    There will be a nation-wide protest on April 5 called Hands Off! Check out the map on handsoff2025.com for a town or city near you. I’m excited because even my town has one. I’ll get to meet locally engaged people. HT Alexander Kern.

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    I’ve heard historian Timothy Snyder a lot in the past several years thanks to his fantastic public speaking, captured in freely available videos and podcasts. Today, I’ve finally begun reading him. First up: On Tyranny: Twenty Lessons from the Twentieth Century (Tim Duggan Books, 2017).

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    Sometimes I hate my state: “NH’s new ID requirements send some would-be voters home to grab passports, birth certificates,” www.nhpr.org….

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    Orange, white, black, brown, and tan poster depicting nine women of various backgrounds engaged in different activities, including arts, activism, and blue-collar work. The accompanying text reads: 'Radical Women Annual Conference – 1976'. 'A New Era for Women Workers, Minority Women and Lesbians': 'Women in the Labor Movement', 'Feminism and the Minority Woman', 'Gays and the Class Struggle.' 'Panels; Workshops; Role Playing; Dinner & Party, Saturday.' Held on Sat. and Sun., October 9–10, University of Washington, Seattle, WA, along with addresses, phone numbers, and a few more details.

    A New Era for Women Workers, Minority Women and Lesbians. 1976 poster by a Seattle organization called Radical Women.

    Via Library of Congress, Yanker Poster Collection, https://www.loc.gov/pictures/item/2016649885/.

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    Two Suffragettes

    Black and white photo: Fay Hubbard full-length, standing, showing publication to young man, bag labeled 'American Suffragette' slung over her shoulder.
    Black and white photograph: full-length portrait of elderly woman, standing, facing slightly right, holding an umbrella and wearing a top hat and tails. She's got chains suggesting a pocket watch and wallet of some kind, but also a rose. She's also wearing a medal of some kind, probably the Congressional Medal of Honor.

    1. “Fay Hubbard, 13-year Old Suffragette” in New York on February 9, 1910.

      “Suffragette! Suffragette!” This is the cry of little Fay Hubbard as she goes through the crowd at the suffragette meetings in New York selling copies of the paper… Miss Hubbard is a niece of Mrs. E. Ida Williams, the recording secretary of the Suffragette…

    2. Mary Edwards Walker (1832–1919). Dr. Walker served as a surgeon in the U.S. Army during the Civil War. She was a Medal of Honor recipient, a suffragette, and a dress reformer.

    Images via Library of Congress, PPOC, https://www.loc.gov/pictures/item/92510578/ and https://www.loc.gov/pictures/item/2005684835/.

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    Poster encouraging purchase of war stamps and bonds to support the war effort, showing faces of Hitler, Mussolini, and Hirohito.

    “Stamp ‘em out! Buy U.S. stamps and bonds.” Poster by Thomas A. Byrne. WPA War Services of La., circa 1941–43.

    Via Library of Congress, https://www.loc.gov/pictures/item/98518290/.

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    If we as U.S. citizens find the resolve to oppose Orange Oaf’s foreign policy, especially with regard to Ukraine and Russia, we will help not only Ukraine against tyrants but ourselves as well. This is a transnational, existential fight for freedom and human rights. 🇺🇦🗽

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    Good piece on the role of Black children and youth in the civil rights movement: “Hidden Herstory: The Leesburg Stockade Girls” by Tulani Salahu-Din, National Museum of African American History and Culture, nmaahc.si.edu….

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    Kamala Harris speaking at the NAACP Image Awards: youtu.be…. This is leadership.

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    📽️ A well reviewed historical drama is streaming on Paramount+ in the United States: “Suffragette,” dir. Sarah Gavron (UK, 2015). The struggle it dramatizes was about getting the vote in order to shape the laws and policies that affected women in uniquely cruel ways.

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    'A Bit of War History' – Three Paintings by Thomas Waterman Wood (1865–66)

    Description from The Met: 'This work, painted at the close of the Civil War, forms a narrative triptych … of African American military service. In 'The Contraband' … the self-emancipated man appears in a U.S. Army Provost Marshall General office, eager to enlist.' He is raising his hat, and the U.S. flag is visible behind him.

    "The Contraband"

    'The Recruit' depicts the same man as a proud new soldier wearing union blue with a rifle slung over his shoulder.

    "The Recruit"

    In 'The Veteran,' the same man appears on crutches because he is missing his lower left leg. His clothes are civilian, but he's got a Union army cap on. He is saluting.

    "The Veteran"

    The word “contraband” referred to an enslaved person who had escaped. Given that the term usually indicated illegally imported or exported goods, its dehumanizing quality in the context of someone who has escaped bondage is palpable. Here, however, it stands in contrast to the painting, which shows a man, not a chattel or a caricature.1

    The other two paintings see the same figure transformed into a soldier and a veteran. Both of these images underlined the figure’s manhood. With time, in fact, military service came to be associated with masculinity and citizenship in an age of people’s wars fought in North America and Europe.2

    From this point of view, the paintings represent a message not only of self-emancipation through military service but of modern masculine citizenship shortly before the nineteenth amendment was ratified. In the West, this image of manhood and military service reached its high point in World Wars One and Two.

    1. Digital images via The Met, objects 84.12a, 84.12b, and 84.12c. ↩︎

    2. Mark Stoneman, “War, Gender, and Nation in 19th-Century Europe: A Preliminary Sketch,” blog, June 23, 2017. ↩︎

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    Black woman with sunglasses, skirt, blouse, and jacket with purse on a street in the downtown business district. Mixed race crowd. Particularly noticeable is a white adolescent boy with dark t-shirt, jeans, and sneakers reading her sign as he walks past her, heading in the opposite direction.

    “Daisy Bates takes a walk – Activist Daisy Bates picketing with placard: ‘Jailing our youth will not solve the problem in Little Rock. We are only asking for full citizenship rights.'” Ca. 1957.

    Via NYPL, Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, Demonstrations Collection, image id 1953728.

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    World War Two Poster Marking the Dignity and Humanity of Black Women on the Home Front

    Poster. The women described in the detailed caption below are separated into different quadrants with the help of a big 'V', which itself is underlined by the text 'for victory'.

    The American Front for Victory – This poster from World War Two operates on two levels. First, it emphasizes the contribution of “The American Front” to the victory for which the nation was fighting. American front because this was about the home front, the people, many of them women, contributing to victory in industry, in agriculture, through service, and with their savings. Second, the name makes an important statement about the women it pictures working. They are Black. In large parts of the country, racist Americans cast the fitness of Black people as American citizens in doubt, to say nothing of questioning their very humanity.1 Here, by contrast, four Black women are depicted doing dignified work for the national cause.

    Moving clockwise from the top, one woman, wearing some kind of civilian uniform, is holding a bucket marked “save” and is participating in either the sale or purchase of “Defense Bonds”; another is working a potato field with the words “strong bodies” underneath; there is a woman in a nurse’s uniform above the label “volunteer service”; and a woman can be seen working on an airplane, perhaps installing its propeller. This is a poster proclaiming the importance of the home front and the dignity and honor of the Black women fighting on it.

    Source: Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, Art and Artifacts Division, NYPL, image id psnypl_scf_061.

    1. See a related poster for American men on this blog, one of them Black, captioned “Bonds and justice will smash the Nazis. Not bondage!" ↩︎

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    Yellow poster with brown and a bit of blue. The heads of three Black men are sketched. One is wearing a World War One helmet, one is wearing pilots headgear, and the other appears to be civilian.

    Books Are Weapons – World War Two poster by NYC WPA War Services promoting knowledge about Black history and culture, the war's colonial entanglements in Africa, and the role of Black Americans in national defense. The books referenced were housed in the New York Public Library's renowned Schomburg Collection.

    Source: Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, Art and Artifacts Division, NYPL, image id 5211531.

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    A black man's left forearm and fist and a white man's left forearm and fist shown striking a big swaztika. The black man has a broken chain dangling from his wrist. The text reads, 'Bonds and justice will smash the Nazis. Not bondage!'

    Bonds and justice will smash the Nazis, not bondage!

    World War Two poster – The word "bonds" can work three ways here: the bonds or chains pictured here as broken, the bonds that unite us, and U.S. war bonds. The second of these offers the most powerful contrast to "bondage."

    Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, Art and Artifacts Division, NYPL, image id psnypl_scf_065.

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    Eighteen Points toward Strength and Solidarity in a Time of Fear and Despair

    I wrote these to steady myself, but maybe they will be of interest and possible use to others.

    1. More people have lived under despots of some kind than have not. Life still finds a way. So do freedom and justice.
    2. Despotism has played a large role in this country’s history, too, and the oppressed didn’t quit, even sharing their light. Recall the histories of Black Americans and of other othered groups.
    3. Hate the hubristic orange oaf and rocket oligarch for their abuses, if you want, but look for ways to leverage your emotions. Don’t let an understandable sense of powerlessness control you. Don’t allow the president and his helpmates to continue their assault unopposed.
    4. Start with the basics: Stay informed, but use your attention mindfully; protect your loved ones; rediscover the power of community.
    5. Remind yourself that this administration is no monolith. Neither are the Republican caucuses in the House and Senate, never mind the states.
    6. Every action the administration undertakes will challenge the unity that the GOP enjoys among its own. Overreach will make the coalition that is intent on destroying our government more vulnerable to fracture.
    7. Bide your time, if need be, but look for opportunities to raise awareness of specific problems. Look for ways to push back. Trust that your representatives are doing the same, but also verify.
    8. Get over your disgust at all people who elected this president. Most of these people share many of your values. Some are potential allies. Saying, “Told you so!” might feel good, but there’s no more time for that.
    9. Even the president’s supporters can be persuaded to protest against specific policies, including by calling their representatives. Look for the issues that people care about. With time, you might help them to see connections to other issues, but take baby steps, show humility.
    10. The corruptibility of people will favor the current presidency in parts of the government and in civil society, but the presidency’s actions in this regard will make it vulnerable to infighting.
    11. Find strength in how weak the administration’s actions reveal it to be. It does not trust normal legislative processes, not even when its party controls both houses of Congress.
    12. These people do not trust the FBI, the military, the government they head, or the people who elected them, but they trust in their own ability to purge and to lead the first three against as many of the people as they think necessary. They are wrong. Reliance on force without justice and public support on their side makes them weak.
    13. They think inciting the mob through social media posts is an effective mode of governance. While dangerous, this behavior is another sign of their weakness.
    14. They think threats of primaries are a viable long-term alternative to cooperation with members of their own party in Congress. The rich doners who make these threats viable strengthen neither their party nor the administration over the long term. Skilled cabals might exact high prices, but they do not last.
    15. They know that their rhetoric about trans and other queer people is favored by only a minority, and then largely in the abstract. The same goes for the racist, anti-DEIA cover they employ to discriminate while pretending that they are all about merit.
    16. Having only terrible arguments in their quiver, they rely on epistemic violence and memory erasure—lies, disinformation, public attacks on those who call them out, bullying teachers, strong-arming universities and schools, crying “censorship” in spaces they haven’t managed to dominate, deleting vital data from government websites, and more.
    17. Their attack against us and our government has been expanded to include our allies, too. Don’t get indignant when people in theses countries call all of us out on our tariffs and worse. Look for ways to show solidarity instead.
    18. We’re feeling exhausted by the assault on all fronts, but this assault takes people, and they are consuming their own at an alarming rate.
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    The AHA’s members and their colleagues teach students how to think, not what to think. Preparing future generations to read, think, and analyze provides a much stronger foundation for informed patriotism and civic participation. This executive order does just the opposite, providing a blueprint for widespread historical illiteracy.…

    – James Grossman, “On the K–12 Education Executive Order,” American Historical Association.

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