A Public Seminar Happy New Year?

Reflections between hope and despair, with musical accompaniment

I wanted to declare, without hesitation: Happy New Year! But I couldn’t, as New Year’s celebrations passed. I fear a very unhappy one, with more of what we have been experiencing. Democracy, free speech, academic freedom, human rights, and the movements for class, gender, sexual, and racial justice are all ...
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A Public Seminar Happy New Year?

With the 116th Congress the Party Gap has Become a Party Chasm

The Democratic Party is doing something right by women

On January 3rd 132 women took the oath of office to be a Member of Congress. Included in this number are 25 Senators, 102 Representatives and 5 delegates. This is the largest number of women who have ever served in Congress at one time. While many have greatly lauded this great leap upward ...
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With the 116th Congress the Party Gap has Become a Party Chasm

Celebrating Gloria Steinem

We All Stand on Her Shoulders 

Gloria Steinem, the best-known face of second wave feminism, will turn 85 in March. And while it’s a persistent temptation in our youth-obsessed America to pay more attention to the young than the old, Steinem has not been forgotten. In fact, a new play about Steinem, “Gloria: A Life,” opened ...
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Celebrating Gloria Steinem

When Tribalism Trumps Originalism

The Insane Jurisprudence of the Win-at-All-Costs Republican Party

A Republican-appointed federal district court judge from Texas, named Reed O’Connor, issued a less than timely ruling just before Christmas stating in absolute terms that there is no question that Obamacare (the Affordable Care Act -- ACA) is nothing less than unconstitutional. In other words, the judge was firm in his decision, ...
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When Tribalism Trumps Originalism

When Is a Lie a Lie?

Trump, Journalism, and Objectivity

Public Seminar is pleased to announce that Ian Olosov's essay, originally printed at Public Seminar on March 13 2017, was one of four essays to win of the American Philosophical Association 2018 Public Philosophy Op-Ed contest. Congratulations Ian! It is neither fake news, nor really even new news, that the press is struggling ...
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When Is a Lie a Lie?

Can There Be Dignity In A Vast Majority?

Democrats have the votes. Now we need to listen to each other.

What if the Democratic Party now has the support of the majority of American citizens? Certainly Democrats did well in the 2018 elections. More revealing than the tally of races won is the fact that Democrats received majorities of the overall votes cast for Senate candidates, for House candidates, and for gubernatorial candidates. In the House elections, Democrats ...
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Can There Be Dignity In A Vast Majority?

“Well Known as Miss Betty Cooper”

Gender Expression in 18th-Century Boston

In the years before the American Revolution, Boston newspapers routinely advertised the sale and recapture of enslaved people alongside news of Massachusetts’ resistance to British rule. In these ads, enslavers provided descriptions of fugitives in order to assist slave catchers in returning them to bondage. One 1771 advertisement sought the recapture ...
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“Well Known as Miss Betty Cooper”

1968 in the Time of the Plague

The morphing meaning of a remarkable year

As a scholar of the 1960s, I had looked forward for several years to 2018 with both excitement and misgivings. 2018 would be, at last, the Big One: the 50th anniversary of 1968, widely anointed the most remarkable year in a remarkable era. The limelight beckoned for the spirited sub-field of ...
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1968 in the Time of the Plague

Confronting the U.S. Census as a Weapon of White Supremacy

The race question has been crucial to civil rights, but it also perpetuates racism

On March 26, 2018, the Trump administration announced that it would add a citizenship question to the 2020 census. Since then, many serious objections have been raised, highlighted through multiple lawsuits. Some are concerned that such a question will cause an undercount, others that it will result in further marginalization of immigrants, less ...
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Confronting the U.S. Census as a Weapon of White Supremacy

JFK’s Queer White House

What we can learn about a straight President by looking at the gay men in his orbit

President John F. Kennedy has become infamous for his vivid, and some might say almost compulsive, heterosexual affairs. But straight men can have a gay side, and JFK’s life was filled with prominent gay men, friendships which open the door to other histories. At least one of these intimates, Kirk ...
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JFK’s Queer White House

Older Workers at Risk in Next Recession

November 2018 Unemployment Report for Workers Over 55

The Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) today reported an unemployment rate of 2.9% for November, an increase of 0.1 percentage points from October. Older workers are benefiting from a historically low unemployment rate. Now is the time to prepare for older workers' higher risks in recessions. Older workers least prepared for retirement are most likely ...
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Older Workers at Risk in Next Recession