Go West, young—er—lady!

 

Frances Perkins (and all those men) watching 
President Franklin D Roosevelt sign the social security act, 1935

Remember Horace Greeley from when you studied American history in school? He was a nineteenth-century newspaperman, served briefly in the House of Representatives, and was a utopian reformer who believed the American West was the land of opportunity. He’s best remembered for the advice, “Go West, young man!” It became the slogan that expressed the American belief in individualism—a man can pull himself up by the bootstraps, care for his family, make living, and do anything he wants if he is only strong and brave and works hard. It’s an idea that many Americans still take patriotic pride in. But it’s a myth.

During the Depression, along came Frances Perkins, a reformer who fought for workers' rights, became the first woman to serve in the presidential cabinet as Secretary of Labor, and is genuinely considered responsible for social security as we know it. (She was also an ardent feminist.) A witness to the 1911 Triangle fire in which 146 women and girls died, trapped inside a locked factory, Perkins determined that America had to take care of all its citizens, and in contrast to Greeley, she touted another American tradition: communities take care of their own, people look out for each other. Compassion and caring are the American way. She persuaded President Franklin Delano Roosevelt to implement a social security program, but his first response was, “Nothing like this has ever been done before.” So if you want to talk about a uniquely American tradition, talk about the tradition of caring for all our citizens.

As originally written, Social Security did not just mean old-age assistance. It was an attempt to use government taxes to take care of all in our society—the poor, the homeless, neglected children, the disabled, the unemployed, the mentally and/or physically ill--all those who could not follow Horace Greeley’s idealistic and unreal advice. She said, “People are what matter to a government, and a government should strive to give the very best life to the people under its jurisdiction.”

Perkins saw social security as a permanent part of our government. “It is safe forever, and for the everlasting benefit of the people of the United States.” Of course, for a few generations now, we have known it is not safe. Conservatives first target is often social security, and now Lindsey Graham has confirmed that should the party take Congress in November, the Republicans will be coming after social security and Medicare.

I’m no politician nor one to advise them, but that seems like a foolish, shortsighted vision to me. For one thing, so much of the country depends on government aid in one way or another, Republicans would lose a lot of votes. Perhaps they think that would be okay because some among them on planning on rigging elections ( see Trump loyalists form alliance in bid to take over election process in key states | US politics | The Guardian ). But beyond that, withdrawing government aid to many segments of our society would further increase the already dramatic division between the haves and the have-nots. We might return to Depression days (which was when social security started) with throngs of hungry Americans in the street while the rich sat in their penthouses and ate caviar. Far-fetched? Maybe, but too darn close.

America under trump was downgraded in the international order (for example, Trump's Foreign Policy Has Destroyed America's International Standing - Rolling Stone). If we were truly to become a country of hungry, homeless, sick people, neglected children, etc. America would quickly lose its standing in the world. Perhaps that seems far-fetched, but as of now, without congressional interference, social security is set to "run out" in 1934 unless Congress takes action. That doesn't mean all payments will suddenly stop, but it does mean recipients will take a twenty-five percent cut.

Republicans will argue we cannot afford social security, but my understanding is that is gaslighting. We pay into social security, and the money we receive is ours, not the governments. Trump’s tax cuts increased the national debt more than social security ever will, but Biden’s administration has already decreased the debt and the Inflation Reduction Bill is set to effect additional substantial decrease.

I don’t mean to preach, but I think these are things that each of us should study and keep in mind when we go to vote in less than ninety days. If you want to read more about social security and its history, please read Heather Cox Richardson’s column of last night, Letters from an American August 13, 2022 - by Heather Cox Richardson (substack.com)

 

On cleaning refrigerators and hand washing dishes

 

My mom is on my mind today. I am becoming her all over again. In many ways, that would be a good thing. I’d like to have her graciousness in almost all situations, her light laughter, her intellectual curiosity, her devotion to what she thought was right. And, yes, I’d like to cook like she did. But those are not the traits I’ve apparently inherited. I got her frugality.

Mom lived through the Depression as a young wife, then a too-young war widow, and again a bride. She carried the lessons of those years with her throughout the rest of her long life. Of course we saved aluminum foil for the war effort; she used paper towels twice—once on counter or stove-top and then it went in a special cubbyhole to be re-used for a spill on the floor. We never threw anything out, and boy did I know about the clean-plate club. Mom canned her own vegetables, from the struggling produce Dad coaxed to life in a tiny Chicago back yard, and she hung her laundry on the line to dry, which meant she had really muscular shoulders and arms. When we cleaned out her refrigerator for the last time, my brother said, “She has all these petri dishes in the back.” There were jars of who-knows-what—leftovers, jam, and so on.

Mom never thought I learned those lessons of frugality quite well enough. When I was married and running a household of six, she lived down the street and dined with us most nights. She’d ask what to do with leftovers and then, before I could answer, she’d say, “I know! Just pitch it!” (I do the same to Jordan today because I think she’s too quick to throw things away.)

Today I cleaned out my refrigerator—eliminated thirteen jars of various sizes that held a dab of this and a bit of that—jam, sauerkraut with mold, chutney, things I couldn’t identify. And I don’t have a dishwasher, so I hand-washed most of those jars. I declared three beyond recovery. Still I was at the sink for a long time, and I thought of Mom again.

For much of my childhood she cooked—and let me experiment—in a kitchen probably almost as old as our 1893 house. I can still see that old Roper gas stove and the scarred porcelain sink that stood in one corner. There wasn’t much money. Dad was a doctor, but was mostly in administration, not practice, and he supported his mother and sister in Canada as well as our family. But in the Fifties, money came from somewhere and Mom got her dream kitchen—the whitewashed knotty pine she loved, turquoise Formica counters, and a round picnic table with benches that curved around it. And a dishwasher! We thought that was the ultimate luxury.

Thich Nhat Hanh, the revered Buddhist monk who just died, preached that staying in the moment should be a goal. He apparently once said, “When washing dishes, wash dishes.” It made me think of Mom and how many dishes she must have washed in that old kitchen. I thought of it again today as I was washing those jars. My writing sisters in an online group heartily embraced that philosophy this morning in our daily discussion, but I rebel. Washing dishes is one of those things you can do with your mind turned off the process. So I often plot and plan while my hands are in soapy water.

I admit I was a bit proud of myself this morning. Those jars had been staring balefully at me for a long time. Tomorrow, I’m tackling my pajama drawer because the other day, when sub-freezing temperatures were about to hit, I looked for a special pair of flannel pajamas and could only find the bottoms. I bet there are a lot of things in that deep drawer that I never wear. When you’re mostly quarantining, it’s a good time to clean out. Oops, do I sound smug?

Mom, the Great Depression, and the Trumpeter

A hopeful sign of spring

My spider plant got left out in the cold

but one brave shoot is poking its head up

Spring and good times are coming

Like many Americans, my reaction to the dramatic drop in the stock market ranged from disappointment (there’s that trip I wanted to take my daughter on and my friends who wanted to replace the windows in their house) to mild and brief panic. No, I am not old enough to remember the Great Depression, but my mom lived through it, and I have heard the stories. More directly, I saw the lifelong impact it had on her.

Born in 1900, Mom was in her thirties in the years of the Depression, a mother at thirty-two, a widow at thirty-four. The years of scraping by and making do showed in her housekeeping. She hated to throw out leftovers and would squirrel them away in small containers in the back of her fridge. In her later years, we would periodically clean out those containers and find many with mold growing. When I was a young wife and mother and would say of leftovers, “Just pitch it,” she mocked me and finally made me see the error of my ways. Her frugal habit is surely the origin of my soup of the week—I collect and freeze leftovers and put them all together when there’s enough to make a pot of soup with the addition of broth or canned tomatoes (this week it definitely tastes of lamb).

Mom re-used paper towels. She’d clean a spot on a counter or something and then stash the slightly-used paper towel in a special place she had for them. Spill on the floor? Out came one of those slightly used pieces of towel. She saved bits of string. And foil? The smallest pieces were saved and re-used. Of course, she washed out plastic bags when they became available. Socks beyond darning (who has a darning egg these days?) became dust rags, great for running your hands over stairs.

Mr. Trump would be in the cross-hairs of Mom’s ire for many reasons, among them the fact that he has not taken responsibility for this historic drop in the market the way he was quick to take credit for the meteoric rise in the Dow Jones. The rumor that he once said a president in office when the market dropped a thousand points in a day should be shot into the air from a cannon is that—a rumor, or as he likes to say, “fake news.” But he does consistently ignore that the rise in the market began well back in the Obama years—he probably dismisses the  calendar and history. I’m sure he’ll never mention any possible connection between his disastrous tax bill and the market fail.

I saw a cartoon on Facebook recently that should give us all pause. It showed a homeless person, asleep on a park bench, covered by newspapers for just a bit of warmth. The caption suggested that instead of measuring our economy by how well the wealthiest among us are doing, we should measure by how the poorest are doing—or not doing.

Food for thought.