Despite the slow-motion tragedy playing out in Washington, D.C. since the election of the current president, I am oddly optimistic about the future.
November 2018 brought change to Washington. The House flip from Republican to Democratic was a necessary correction to an institution that has been unable to do much at all in the last two years, besides approving a tax bill favoring the wealthiest Americans while bankrupting the federal government. And winning the majority was even sweeter because of the big increase in women elected across the country. Women were 19.3 percent of all members of the House in 2018. November’s election upped the number to 23.4 percent of all members. Even with the loss of Senator Claire McCaskill, there will be one additional woman senator next year. These women look like America. They are young, LGBTQ, Muslim, and women of color — and each will sit in a seat that was only open to men until 1917 when Jeannette Rankin was elected to represent Montana in Congress.
In Washington, D.C. and in a few states, we have continued to be challenged in fundamental ways by the disintegration of long-held norms. Wisconsin and Michigan followed the path set out by North Carolina in 2016, stripping the incoming elected Democratic governors of key powers including appointments, increasing barriers to voting, and limiting the ability of the Democratic attorneys general in those states to bring suits against the current administration in Washington. The Republicans couldn’t win the election, so they used other means to grab power from the rightful victor (and the voters).
Democrats weren’t immune from mostly Republican-led gerrymandering schemes. In New Jersey, Democratic legislators are proposing a constitutional amendment that changes to the redistricting process in a patently partisan way, ensuring Democratic majorities in the legislature. But unlike Michigan, North Carolina and Wisconsin, leading state and national Democrats condemned the move (including New Jersey’s governor and former U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder). Many Democrats concede that the Republicans may be winning the gerrymander fight for now. But most agree that Democrats shouldn’t use unprincipled tactics to defend our democracy.
Our state legislative delegation is entirely changed, and that is bittersweet. We have lost the visionary and pragmatic legislative leadership of Stan Rosenberg in the state Senate. John Scibak and Steve Kulik brought a needed understanding of local governance and the needs of individual residents to the complex responsibilities of state government. And I will always miss the towering intellect and gentle wit of Peter Kocot.
The elections to fill those seats were like nothing I’ve ever seen. The upper Valley had only good candidates to work for and to choose from. Women ran for every open seat and won almost every one. Women and young people engaged in electoral politics because they saw its relevance to their lives in a post-Obama era. We had a Statehouse delegation that was largely male; now it is largely female. Is that transformational? Not yet, but I think the odds are good.
What about at the local level? We rage and rant and about the events in Washington, and we fume about the neglect that we perceive coming from Boston. Local government is left to devise solutions to problems that D.C. and Beacon Hill have left unresolved or more likely just unfunded. The opioid epidemic, the tragedies of hunger and homelessness, the lack of living-wage jobs and affordable housing — local communities have to manage these challenges with inadequate tools and erratic or non-existent funding. But solutions to some of those problems can also be found at the local level. Hampshire Hope, Monte’s March, the Friends of the Homeless. All are local people making change in our communities. The good thing about local government and local nonprofits is that they’re local. The price of admission is free — you just have to show up.
Democracy begins at home. Every city and town in this country needs people to serve on committees and boards and to run for local offices. Every nonprofit needs volunteers and board members. Not everyone can go to Congress or the Statehouse, but we all can serve, even in small ways, in our communities.
Martin Luther King, Jr. said in his letter from the Birmingham jail: “Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere. We are caught in an inescapable network of mutuality, tied in a single garment of destiny. Whatever affects one directly, affects all indirectly.”
We strengthen our network of mutuality by working together across race, gender, sexual orientation, income, education and party. I see this in action across our Valley, and it gives me hope.
Clare Higgins, of Northampton, a former mayor of the city, is executive director of the nonprofit Community Action Pioneer Valley. She can be reached at opinion@gazettenet.com.