Letters: Seeing more than skin color; Respecting Bellefonte’s heritage

Seeing more than skin color

In considering the relation between white police officers and Black suspects, we should all remember Martin Luther King Jr.’s direction to consider mutually not skin color but moral character.

To do this we must all remember that there is more to each of us individually and morally than the body.

And to remember this we should all hear the great word of trust and joy that is directing together all the shining stars.

To this you may reply that one dying asphyxiated with a knee pressed into his neck demands a response more direct.

But I say, if, for justice, you travel to the universe’s edge and press your hand through the boundary, you will find your hand in God’s, who says, if we do not see through to the sacral core of each other mutually, we do not really see each other at all.

A pass for ‘a man of his time’

“Why?” I wondered when I read that a statue of Ulysses S. Grant had been dragged down in San Francisco and a statue of George Washington taken down in Portland. Why would people whose politics are much like my own do something that would give aid and comfort to the reelection campaign of Donald Trump?

It is argued that being “a man of his time” is no excuse for any man who owned a slave or fought to preserve slavery. Monuments honoring them should be destroyed! For Jefferson Davis and Robert E. Lee, definitely.

But for Washington, Grant and Pennsylvania signers of the Declaration of Independence like Ben Franklin, maybe we should give them a pass — despite having only that excuse, “a man of his time.”

I think of my ancestor, another John Rippey. He was a captain of Pennsylvania militia down in York County. When General Washington was battling the king over at Brandywine Creek I’ll bet Captain John was thinking Washington was doing good work — monumental, even — for freedom. Maybe freedom, eventually, for all people.

I think of yet another John Rippey, my great-grandfather, a Union Army surgeon, who mourned in his diary on hearing Lincoln had been shot. I like to think Surgeon John was thankful Lincoln finally found a general like Grant who could stick a sword through slavery. And pleased later when President Grant sent his tough attorney general after murderous gangs such as the Ku Klux Klan.

Yes, definitely. Give them a pass.

Respecting Bellefonte’s heritage

Thank you, Harry Breon, for giving us the history of our Bellefonte Red Raiders. I grew up in Bellefonte and was a Red Raider all through high school and proud of it. We respected our heritage and still do. Stop trying to change history, whoever you are. We are happy with it and you should be also.

Stand up for fairness in governance

Senator Jake Corman and Representative Kerry Benninghoff did it! They successfully stalled the Fair Districts legislation to death. Just exactly what they wanted to do all along, despite telling us that they supported the idea of ending gerrymandering and bringing openness and fairness to the process of drawing our state and Congressional district boundaries.

The Fair District legislation would have created an independent citizens’ commission, removing this important process from the political hacks of whichever party is in power in Harrisburg. The majority of Pennsylvania voters wanted this, but the legislation is dead for now thanks to Senate Majority Leader Corman and House Majority Leader Benninghoff.

Corman has been in the Pennsylvania Senate for 22 years and Benninghoff in the House for 24 years. No wonder they like their gerrymandered districts just as they are.

The best way to have Fair Districts and openness in our state government is to vote Benninghoff out in November and Corman out in 2022.

On Nov. 3, please stand up for fairness in our governance by removing Rep. Benninghoff for ignoring the will of the people on Fair Districts and vote for Peter Buck as our representative from the 171st District.

Centre County deserves better.