Search This Blog

Seneca Falls, Selma, and Stonewall

In his inaugural speech, our president said, "We, the people, declare today that the most evident of truths — that all of us are created equal — is the star that guides us still, just as it guided our forebears through Seneca Falls, and Selma, and Stonewall ... " Audience members "of a certain age" will catch those alliterative allusions, but for those who might be wondering, a few brief explanations:
   Seneca Falls: site of the first women’s rights convention, in upstate New York, 1848: http://americanhistory.about.com/od/womenssuffrage/a/senecafalls.htm
   Selma: city in which police attacked peaceful civil rights marchers, in Alabama, 1965: http://www.nps.gov/nr/travel/civilrights/al4.htm
   and Stonewall (Inn): gay bar in which patrons resisted a police raid, in Greenwich Village, New York, 1969: http://www.npr.org/blogs/itsallpolitics/2013/01/22/169984209/stonewall-explaining-obamas-historic-gay-rights-reference
   The full text of President Obama's speech: http://www.salon.com/2013/01/21/obamas_second_inaugural_address/

No comments:

Post a Comment