Things are getting tough. Are the toughest ready to take the plunge?

The photo at the top of this page is one of several I took on December 5, 2016, during my visit to the newly opened National Museum of African American History and Culture. It features a life-size bronze statue of Robert Smalls. Born a slave in 1839, he commandeered and piloted a Confederate transport ship from Charleston, South Carolina, to a Union Army enclave near Beaufort, South Carolina. while he was still a slaveThe requisitioned ship was renamed a Union warship. Later in life, Smalls represented South Carolina as a member of the U.S. Congress from 1874 to 1879 (before and after the dismantling of the first Reconstruction) and from 1882 to 1887.

In many ways, Robert Smalls’ triumph over slavery parallels that of Frederick Douglass, who was also born into slavery. Like Mr. Smalls, he escaped to freedom, in his case by “following the North Star” out of the slave-holding South. Mr. Douglass’s later accomplishments included a prominent abolitionist leader and spokesman, the first black marshal of Washington, D.C., and legal counsel to the Republic of Haiti (a position he resigned two years after his appointment in protest of the U.S. government’s plans to seize control of Haitian territory against the will of the Haitian people).

I highlight these two African American ancestors to show how they were willing to defy all odds and win their freedom and the freedom of enslaved and freed Black people by any means necessary. Both of these men faced fear in their lives. It was the fear of white slave owners and white supremacists who wanted Black people to be brought under political and economic control in place of the plantation slavery system that was destroyed during the Civil War. But they never let their fears paralyze them or make them “clutch their pearls,” so to speak. They stood up to their racist enemies and walked tall as free Black men.

Rev. Jesse Jackson is well known for his call for those who believe in freedom to “keep hope alive.” Neither he nor Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. called us to be “optimists.” The history of African slaves and their descendants in this country demonstrates the relevance of hope (knowing or understanding what one can do to contribute to change) as opposed to optimism (expecting things to change for the better without necessarily doing anything to contribute to that change).

Today, the Supreme Court ruled on Mango Mussolini’s claim for absolute immunity. The ruling states that acts committed by a sitting president in his official capacity are not subject to prosecution, but it does not specify what those acts might be. This horrific decision places the president above the law despite nearly 250 years of American constitutional and common law protections dating back to the Magna Carta of 1215, which partially ended the concept of the “divine right of kings.”

This Supreme Court decision has caused many Democrats and progressives to pull themselves together (after loosening their grip several days after last Thursday’s scandal-ridden CNN presidential debate). Rather than jump into the void with other lemmings, I decided to develop some ideas for positive action to help save American democracy from theofascists and oligarchs. Below are a few ideas for consideration:

• Organize massive street protests across the country to demand that the orange author be arrested and prosecuted for his crimes if Mango Mussolini attempts to disrupt the inauguration of a re-elected Joe Biden. Mango Mussolini was the sitting president when he staged his attempted coup on January 6, 2021. If he attempts to repeat this crime before January 20, 2025, he will be subject to prosecution for his seditious acts because Joe Biden will be the sitting president this time (and if anything happens to Biden, Kamala Harris will be the sitting president).
• Pressure President Biden and Congress, in cooperation with the Mayor of DC and the Governors of Maryland and Virginia, to declare a public safety emergency and deploy all necessary local/Capitol Police and National Guard forces around the U.S. Capitol, the White House, and along Pennsylvania Avenue on the day Congress certifies the electoral vote count and, if necessary, on Inauguration Day, to deter any potential organized violence by the MAGA mob (it won’t look like a democracy, but it will be better than allowing the perpetrator to return to the White House by default).
• Mount an all-out effort to reelect President Biden and give him a Congress where both houses are under effective Democratic control and ready to impose real Supreme Court reform.
• Organize mass campaigns to commit nonviolent acts of civil disobedience to federal or state laws that nullify or threaten our constitutional rights to bodily autonomy; freedom of speech (no book bans or anti-CRT/DEI restrictions); the ability to vote and have our votes counted; the right to love and marry whomever we choose; the right to have our health and environment protected from pollutants; and the right to practice the religion of our choice or no religion at all.
• Sponsor educational workshops across the country on the U.S. Constitution and its amendments, in particular Amendments XIII, XIV and XV (13 to 15) which were promulgated during the first ReconstructionIn this way, American voters will learn what their rights are (they will also learn that the words Christianity, Christ, And immunity do not appear in the Constitution).
• Organize mass demonstrations each A US state is urging President Biden to issue executive orders directing federal agencies to observe and respect the fundamental constitutional rights I have outlined above, regardless of authoritarian and racist/misogynistic Supreme Court decisions.

Finally, let’s put an end to the panicky talk about the Democratic ticket replacing President Biden for the presidency. American history shows that every time an incumbent president leaves office before the end of his current term, his party loses control of the White House in the next presidential election. We cannot risk allowing Mango Mussolini to return to the White House by default (I confess to repeating myself here, but the gravity of our status as a constitutional democracy justifies it, in my humble opinion).

Let me know what you think about this article. Please vote in the user poll below. Thank you for caring about our democracy, whether you love it, hate it, or are indifferent to my suggestions for action.