Lloyd deMause's "Bipolar Christianity": An Examination/Review/Critique/Refutation

I happened to run across a book named "The Origins of War in Child Abuse" by Lloyd deMause. Or perhaps more particularly, I ran across Chapter 9 of it, named "Bipolar Christianity: How Torturing "Sinful" Children Produced Holy Wars." It is available for free online.

This is a fairly lengthy chapter with copious (200+) footnotes. The overall thesis is that Christians treated children really poorly and that helped lead to holy wars, which fits into the book's larger thesis, as implied by the title, that child abuse is the reason for war. Its high number of footnotes certainly makes it look well-researched and on strong grounding at first glance... but is it? This post will be an examination of some of its claims.

My introductory section is a bit long, so if you want to just get to the examination of how well it represents its sources, skip to the "The Examination" section--or if you just want the overall conclusion, skip to the "The Conclusion" section. 

Note: There is now a sequel post available here in which I go through more of the citations found in the chapter. I note this at the end of this post, but felt it would be good to put it at the start also.

THE INTRODUCTION

For some background, Lloyd deMause is an advocate of what is called "Psychohistory" which is the study of events in history according to psychology. More specifically, Lloyd deMause believes that improved treatment of children is the reason for the perceived improvement of civilization, as ill-treated children internalize this and are more badly behaved as adults. So the progress of civilization over time can be traced to children being treated increasingly well. But deMause is perhaps better known for his controversial assertions of how poorly treated children were in the past, alleging mass infanticide, rape, and torture of children.

The overall accuracy of those claims of his are beyond the scope of this blog post to address. Indeed, this blog post will be of a fairly limited scope in examining the accuracy of deMause's presentation of his sources in the "Bipolar Christianity" chapter. A full examination of the chapter will not be attempted, as there is simply too much to tackle. So, to be clear, what this blog post will be doing is examining the first 24 sources in this chapter and how well deMause represents what they say--originally I did the first 16 (first three paragraphs), but felt I should do a bit more just to be sure and thus went through an additional paragraph, bringing it up to 24.

That may not seem like that much, but it took a good amount of time to do find copies of all of the sources in order to check on them, and I do not feel it is worth it to do more. However, if we examine the sources in the early paragraphs, we can assume with reasonable probability that the accuracy we see in them is the same level of accuracy we will see elsewhere in the chapter--and most likely, the full book, and perhaps his writings as a whole.

We'll use PolitiFact's categories of True, Mostly True, Half-True, Mostly False, False, and Pants On Fire for the accuracy of him presenting his sources.

What level of accuracy it gets will be dependent on several factors. First, all quotes are expected to be exact quotations. Switching a verb's tense is acceptable to make it fit a sentence, but nothing else. Second, if he cites a source that backs him up, but the source for the source does not, that will be counted as inaccurate because he should have looked up the source's source--though not as inaccurate as if he misrepresented his own source.

Unfortunately, deMause can be a sloppy with his citations. There are cases where he gets the page numbers wrong. This raises the question of what to do when he makes a citation, and the quote isn't there, as there is the possibility it's on some other page. In all such cases, I will make at least an effort to try to find if it's on some other page, but if I cannot, it will be marked down harshly. (note that if I do find it, it'll still result in a markdown of one level on the citations, for not getting the page number right)

With that, let us begin! Sort of. The initial part of the essay gives no sources but I wish to briefly analyze it before we get into the actual source analysis.

Before the chapter itself really starts off, we begin with a source by St. Augustine saying "Who would not shudder if he were given the choice of eternal death or life again as a child? Who would not choose to die?" No source is given for this quote, and searching for it only turns up equally non-sourced citations. This is not a promising start, but due to lack of source we will not take it into our considerations. Next:

That all human sin and misery came into the world through the first woman, Eve, is the founding belief of both Judaism and Christianity, and the origin of the most severely misogynistic cultures in history. When a girl was born, said early Hebrews, “the walls wept.”

This portion is not sourced so I will not give an assessment, but I wish to analyze the claims made here. The claim that "all human sin and misery came into the world through the first woman, Eve, is the founding belief of both Judaism and Christianity" (emphasis added) is patently false.

My familiarity with Judaism is much less than my familiarity with Christianity so I cannot speak authoritatively on this subject, but to my understanding the "founding belief" of Judaism would be either the covenant God established with Abraham and/or the covenant established with Moses. Not that much emphasis is put on the Fall of Man in Judaism compared to those. The Jewish Encyclopedia notes that the Fall of Man is not referred to elsewhere in the Old Testament (in contrast to the frequent references to Abraham and Moses) and writes that "In modern Jewish thought the fall of man is without dogmatic importance."

Christianity, however, does focus considerably on the Fall of Man (whether interpreted literally or figuratively). But the New Testament does not teach that Eve was responsible--or more accurately, it was not Eve alone. For example, while 1 Timothy 2:14 writes "And Adam was not the one deceived; it was the woman who was deceived and became a sinner," Romans 5:12-19 (the fullest discussion of the subject in the New Testament) refers only to Adam.

To be fair, some Christians have put more blame on Eve than on Adam. But the "foundational belief" is that sin entered the world through the first woman and first man--at least among those who consider Adam and Eve to have been real people. I would further argue that while the Fall of Man is very important, the actual "foundational belief" of Christianity is the Resurrection of Jesus.

The other claim made is that early Hebrews would say "The Walls Wept" when a girl was born, a citation is not given here, but a different work of his does repeat that claim:

"When a girl was born, said the Hebrews, “the walls wept.”59

59. Barbara Kaye Greenleaf, Children Through the Ages: A History of Childhood. New York: McGraw-Hill, 1978, p. 7."
(from chapter 8 of "The Emotional Life of Nations")

That quote is found in the cited source, which states:

"When a boy was born, the Hebrews said “a blessing has come into the world,” but when a girl was born everyone agreed that “the walls wept."

However, this does not give a source, so its accuracy is unclear. Now we may move onto the actual examination of the sources.


THE EXAMINATION

As noted above, we will use the PolitiFact's categories of True, Mostly True, Half-True, Mostly False, False, and Pants On Fire for the accuracy of him presenting his sources.

Girls were everywhere considered “not worth raising” since they would not carry on the family name, and so infanticide of girls by Killer Mothers by strangling, drowning, exposure and sending to wet-nurses was so common among Christians that high sex ratios (up to 400 boys to 100 girls and higher) were common even among the rich.1

1 Lloyd deMause, Foundations of Psychohistory, New York: Creative Roots, 1982, pp. 117-123. 

MOSTLY FALSE. It is somewhat incredible that he should get a citation wrong when his citation is his own work. And for that matter, why not simply cite the sources directly, rather than playing a game of "chase the citation"? I grabbed a copy and looked at pages 117-123, in which he discusses how demographic data in the past indicates that there were more males than females, asserting that infanticide is the cause. Whether his data and his explanation for it is accurate is beyond the scope of this essay, but in terms of supporting his claim here, he comes up quite short. The problem is that while he can point to some data points showing a male/female ratio as massive as what he claims above, none of those seem to be from Christian civilizations. When it comes to Christian civilizations, the numbers for boys are often higher than that of girls--at least in the numbers he provides--but nowhere during Christian times are numbers that extreme given. So, apparently, Lloyd deMause has managed to misread his own work.

The earlier portions of the essay I included in my quote are not given citations. For this reason, they will not be calculated into the truthfulness rating, but I feel they should be examined.  But, once again, these points have not been factored into the "Mostly False" rating (though to be honest, they would not change it anyway) as I am examining the accuracy of the representation of the sources. And the source given does not support the claim made concerning the high sex ratios in Christian times.

Coleman found boys outnumbering girls up to two to one in a 9th century French tax record, and concluded higher infanticide of girls was the cause.2

2 Emily Coleman, “Infanticide in the Early Middle Ages.” In Susan Mosher Stuard, Ed., Women in Medieval Society. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1976, pp. 47-70.

MOSTLY TRUE. This book can be examined here. The problem is, however, while she raises higher infanticide of girls as a likely possibility, she does not conclude it was the cause. See page 63, where she says "We make no claim to the solutions [to the considerable outnumbering of girls by boys] here."

Newborn girls, like Eve, “were considered as full of dangerous pollution…and were therefore more often killed, exposed, abandoned, malnourished, raped, and neglected than boys. Everyone agreed girls should be fed less than boys; as Jerome put it, ‘Let her meals always leave her hungry.’”3

3 Lloyd deMause, The Emotional Life of Nations. New York: Other Press, 2002, p. 294. 

MOSTLY FALSE. So here he cites himself... which is very odd. Why does he not simply offer the citation he provides there? I have difficulty coming up with a reason for him doing this other than "this might get people to buy his book." Anyway, this is on page 294, sort of. Here is what he writes:

"Girls from birth have everywhere been considered full of dangerous pollution–the projected hatred toward mothers of adults–and were therefore more often killed, exposed, abandoned, malnourished, raped, and neglected than boys. Everyone agreed girls should be fed less; as Jerome put it, "Let her meals always leave her hungry."61

61 F.A. Wright, Select Letters of St. Jerome, Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1933, p. 357."

Technically, he doesn't quote himself quite correctly, as in Bipolar Christianity he puts in that girls "were considered as full of dangerous pollution..." whereas in the book he's supposedly quoting from, it says "have everywhere been considered full of dangerous pollution." This is admittedly a minor point that does not change the meaning, but I do expect a quotation to be exact--though compared to other quoting errors we'll see from him, this is relatively benign.

So now we come to the question of his citation here. The quote is actually on page 361; deMause gives the wrong page number. One may see it here. The letter is also available here in a format I think is easier to read, though it is a different translation.

So here is the phrase:

"I do not wish here to give long rules for eating, since I have treated that subject more fully in another place; but let her meals always leave her hungry and able at once to begin reading or praying or singing the psalms."

Jerome's statement, however, is in reference to one individual who happened to be female; the usage of "let her meals always leave her hungry" is not, as deMause frames it, some general statement for women. Indeed, there is no indication that her being female has anything to do with Jerome's advice here--this appears to be intended as a general suggestion for raising children by Jerome. Thus, it would apply to males as well. In any event, deMause has not supported his claim that women were fed less nor his claim that women "were considered as full of dangerous pollution." 

Of the 600 families in Delphic inscription records, just one percent reared two daughters.4

4 Susan Scrimshaw, “Infanticide in Human Populations,” in Glenn Hausfater and Sarah Hrdy, Eds., Infanticide: Comparative and Evolutionary Perspectives. New York: Aldine Transaction, p. 439.

MOSTLY FALSE. There is no mention of Delphic inscription records on page 439. To be fair, page 439 is the start of the article, so perhaps the mention of page 439 is to show where it starts. But the article is from pages 439-462. I skimmed through it but did not see any mention of Delphic inscriptions, though it is possible I missed something. However, then we come to this problem: The "Delphic inscription records" are from a pre-Christian era (this is confirmed by his mention of them elsewhere--for example, he refers to them in the "Foundations of Psychohistory" mentioned in the first footnote we examined). Thus it is incorrect of deMause to try to use it to refer to Christian families.

As Christian girls grew up, they were constantly told of their worthlessness and sinful lustfulness. Women, said Tertullian, were “irrational, more prone to lust than men, and at every turn waiting to seduce men,” so husbands had to beat them all the time to keep them from sinning.5

5 Jennifer Carpenter and Sally-Beth MacLean, Eds., Power of the Weak: Studies on Medieval Women. Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1995, pp. 10-11. 

MOSTLY FALSE. deMause claims that Tertullian said that quote. The problem, however, is that if you look at the applicable page number of the source, that is not a quote Tertullian said, but a summary of his beliefs by someone else. From my understanding of Tertullian, it is an uncharitable though not exactly inaccurate summary of his beliefs. However, it is silly to take someone else's paraphrase and claim Tertullian said it, as is the case here. But even worse, the mention of "so husbands had to beat them all the time to keep them from sinning" is not found in the citation! Nothing about beatings is mentioned! That's simply him throwing out a claim without giving any citation for it.

“A good woman and a bad one equally require the stick” ran a Florentine saying, and medieval laws concluded: “Provided he neither kills nor maims her, it is legal for a man to beat his wife…”6

6 Frances and Joseph Gies, Women in the Middle Ages. New York: Harper Collins Publishers, 1978, p. 46.

MOSTLY TRUE. This may be found here. Of course, this turns into an annoying game of "chase the citation" (that is taking a citation, looking it up, only to find another citation). First, here is what Women in the Middle Ages says:

"Despite such pieties as the Roman de la Rose's "Serve and honor all women," wife-beating was common. "A good woman and a bad one equally require the stick!" ran a Florentine saying.27 The thirteenth-century French law code, Customs of Beauvais, stated: "In a number of cases men may be excused for the injuries they inflict on their wives, nor should the law intervene. Provided he neither kills nor maims here, it is legal for a man to beat his wife when she wrongs him."28"

While it does mention the saying, the latter quote is, while problematic to the modern ear, less extreme than deMause makes it sound. He leaves out the very important qualifying phrase "when she wrongs him" and the opening "In a number of cases men may be excused" indicates it is the exception rather than the rule.

But as to its citations? Well, the citations are:
27. Edgcumbe Staley, The Guilds of Florence. New York, 1967, p. 91.
28. Coutumes de Beauvaisis, ed. A. Salmon. Paris, 1899, p. 335.

We'll start with the second. Looking it up, the source is apparently here, though it is possible it refers to the second volume. Now, I unfortunately cannot read French, so I cannot confirm it--but running some phrases through Google Translate, I do not see something similar to the citation. It is possible the page number is wrong, the translation is in error, or something else.

As for the first, we can see that here. The quote is there... but does not give a citation itself, though I suppose it's often hard to give a source for a saying. Though it implies this may be in reference to trials. So this citation is, while exaggerated, true enough to qualify for Mostly True.

St. Paul said that women had to cover their heads in church because otherwise “lice-like demons would leap like sparks from female hair and poison the church.”7

7 Corinthians 11:10.

PANTS ON FIRE! "Lice-like demons would leap like sparks from female hair and poison the church" is not in 1 Corinthians 11:10. Look it up in a Bible, and even look at the verses around it--it's not there at all. In fact, this quote is found nowhere in the Bible. Perhaps this is an interpretation someone offered of the verse, but such an interpretation is not what is cited (further, a search for that phrase only turned up deMause's writing here or people asking if it's a real quotation). This citation is thus completely nonsensical. It's especially absurd because the Bible is one of the easiest books in the world to look up a citation--did he simply not bother?

Also, while a minor note, it is interesting that it only gives "Corinthians 11:10". Why? Because there are two epistles to the Corinthians. This suggests the author either made a typo he didn't catch... or is so unfamiliar with the epistles to the Corinthians he does not know there are two of them.

Plus, of course, women were liable to turn into witches at any time and remove a man’s penis; as John Chrysostom maintained, “All witchcraft comes from carnal lust, which in women is insatiable.”8

8 Wolfgang Lederer, The Fear of Women. New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1968, pp. 199-200.

HALF-TRUE. Oddly, rather than cite a primary source showing where Chrysostom actually said this, it gives this secondhand source. This is something we will find repeatedly--rather than cite a Christian writer directly, he will instead cite someone quoting them. This is problematic, as our example will show.

The source for this Chrysostom quote offered by the work is "Malleus Maleficarum, p. 47". Looking it up here, the statement is there... but it doesn't present it as a quote, and most certainly doesn't attribute it to Chrysostom. While I can't rule out the possibility Chrysostom said it somewhere, the citation does not attribute it to him. Did deMause not check the source given by his source? This is exactly why secondhand sources are so dangerous for quotes. For the record, nothing about a man's penis is in Malleus Maleficarum on that page.

I'll be charitable and say "Half-True" rather than False only because his source actually made that claim, even if his source was incorrect (and he very well should have checked its source's source to be sure!)

Parents in early Christian families routinely beat their little girls badly from early infancy in order to punish their lustfulness. The historical records contain hundreds of descriptions of beating girls “to discipline them, as with this father who punished a little girl for four hours: ‘the little girl in the diapers would not receive her discipline. She cried and cried and he kept hitting her…He told me, you spank her till she breaks…But she didn’t break and, after four hours, he couldn’t continue.’”9

9 Philip Greven, Spare the Child: The Religious Roots of Punishment and the Psychological Impact of Physical Abuse. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1991, p. 37.

FALSE. Note that he is claiming this is about "early Christian families." But if you look up the citation given, you will discover that what is being described is the Northeast Kingdom Community Church, "a small apocalyptic sect, founded in 1972 in Chattanooga, Tennessee."

I'll repeat that for emphasis. This quote, supposedly from a parent in an early Christian family, is referring to a family from the last several decades. The ridiculousness and astonishing misrepresentation speaks for itself. For the record, the source that Greven supplies for this is:
Colin Nickerson, "Affidavits Allege Sect Beatings," The Boston Globe, July 14. 1984, p. 31.

This article does not appear available online, so I was unable to check on it, but I offer it for reference for anyone curious. In any event, deMause's misrepresentation, intentional or not, is downright shocking.

Why False rather than Pants On Fire? Because if you look at his phrasing, it is technically not saying this quote is concerning early Christians. That is, of course, the impression any reader would take away, of course. He makes his claim regarding "early Christian families" and then says that in the "historical record" one can find examples, and technically anytime before the very present is a "historical record." So he manages to squeak by with a simple False.

Teaching girls in schools was not allowed, Aelred said (1170), because the teacher might be tempted to show them affection. Teachers, he said, were “angry one minute and smiling the next, now threatening, now flattering, kissing one child and smacking another. When she sees one of them crying after being smacked she calls her close, strokes her cheek, puts her arms around her neck and holds her tight,” 10 producing a moment of forbidden closeness.

10 Susanna Greer Fein, “Maternity in Aelred of Rievaulx’s Letter to His Sister.” In John Carmi Parsons and Bonnie Wheeler, Eds., Medieval Mothering. New York: Garland Publishing, 1996, p. 146. 

MOSTLY FALSE. Here Aelred is misrepresented. I shall quote a more full version. (note: By "the sister" it refers to nuns) I'll cut into the middle of a paragraph, as the earlier portions aren't really relevant. Note the bracketed insertions are in the work:

"As recluse, the sister must spurn motherhood of all kinds except in an interiorized emulation of the Virgin and Jesus. Moreover, Aelred's rhetoric of instruction positions here not as mother but instead as a daughter ready to accept the counsel of "abbot as mother." Since this counsel is also from a sibling of opposite gender, the subject of maternity becomes nuanced further with thoughts of bodily difference relatedness, and shared family heritage, for which lack of offspring would have had some import.

The topic of motherhood often enters the latently charged context of De institutione inclusarum, where it is shaded in ways ranging from condemnation of sinful pregnancy to full-blown meditation upon God's incarnation in Mary. As one would expect, when Aelred advises his sister on external behaviors, the sentiments that prevail are anti-maternal. The rules, for example, prohibit Aelred's sister from ever establishing a school for girls, for teaching children may lead to misplaced affections:

Swayed by their childish dispositions, [the recluse] is angry one minute and smiling the next, now threatening, now flattering, kissing one child and smacking another. When she sees one of them crying after being smacked she calls her close, strokes her cheek, puts her arms around her neck and holds her tight, calling her: "my own baby girl, my own pet." There before her very eyes, even though she may not yield to them, the recluse has worldly and sensual temptations, and amid them all what becomes of her continual remembrance of God?"

As we can see, this has nothing to do with problems of teaching girls in particular. Nor is Aelred saying this is how teachers were. He is warning that a nun is in danger of acting in such a way should they be a teacher, as they would be swayed by the childish dispositions of the children--and this is due to the children being of young age, not because they were female.

Christian priests and nuns backed bloody beatings as necessary to punish the child’s endless sins, since, as Augustine put it, “If the infant is left to do what he wants, there is no crime it will not plunge into.”11 

11 Elisabeth Badinter, Mother Love: Myth and Reality. New York: Macmillan Publishing, 1984, p. 30.

HALF-TRUE. As with Chrysostom,  a direct citation is not given. This is often a sign of a misquote of some kind, if they are unable to actually point to where someone said it. Now, I looked at the book. Page 30 does give the first quote, and attributes it to City of God, Book XII, Chapter 22. The problem is, the quote isn't there. So like the Chrysostom citation, I will give a "Half True" because his citation did say it, but the citation's source (which he should have verified, it's not like it's hard to look up Augustine's works!) did not. Things get worse for the next citation:

“Better that you should beat a child within an inch of its life than that they would be cast into the Lake of Fire for all eternity.”12

12 Ibid., p. 38.  

FALSE. That quote isn't found on page 38 of "Mother Love" at all. I considered the possibility that perhaps he got the page number wrong, as he does screw up some other citations in this manner by listing the wrong page. However, I looked up Augustine in the Index and could find this quote on no page Augustine was mentioned.

It is possible, of course, that Augustine did say this somewhere. But deMause's source does not back him up on this.

The constant sinfulness of all Christian children demands the maximum torture or even death as punishment. Moses told the Israelites that “If a man have a stubborn and rebellious son, which will not obey the voice of his father or the voice of his mother…all the men of his city shall stone him with stones, that he die.”13

13 Deuteronomy 21: 18

TRUE. It's actually Deuteronomy 21:18-21, but that's a minor point. However, this is part of the Jewish "Law" and most Christians consider it non-binding. Further, see here for an explanation of the passage irrespective of whether it is binding.

Little changed in the next 1600 years of Christianity, as John Calvin decreed: “Those children who violate parental authority are monsters. Therefore the Lord commands all those who are disobedient to their parents to be put to death.”14

14 Barbara Kay Greenleaf, Children Through the Ages: A History of Childhood. New York: McGraw-Hill Book Co., 1978, p. 90. 

MOSTLY FALSE. This quotation is found in the book... sort of. Here is what is actually attributed to Calvin in the book:

"Those who violated the parental authority by contempt or rebellion are not men but monsters. Therefore the Lord commands all those who are disobedient to their parents to be put to death."

This is similar, but not exactly the same. The word "children" is inserted into it by deMause, "violated" is changed to "violate", "by contempt or rebellion" is removed, and "not men but monsters" is changed to simply "monsters." It is problematic that this is not quoted properly. Especially concerning is the insertion of "children", as its insertion seems to have been done to try to buttress deMause's points.

But another problem is that this work does not say where this quote from Calvin is. Calvin could very well have said it, but no source is given, and I have learned to be extremely wary of any supposed quote attributed to someone without a source cited. Due to failure to actually back up where this was from, I would have normally given this a Half-True, but deMause's change to the quote dropped it down.

If a young woman should simply speak to someone who was not approved by her father, that was enough of a sin for Constantine, the first Christian emperor, to decree a penalty of “death by having molten lead poured down her throat.”15

15 Jack Holland, Misogyny: The World’s Oldest Prejudice. Philadelphia, Running Press, 2006, p. 88.

FALSE. The citation actually says:

"Several years after the Edict of Milan, Constantine, as the first Christian emperor, revealed the stern hand of the new, increasingly absolutist morality. He passed a law that meted out the death sentence to any virgin and her suitor for the crime of eloping together. The penalty for any female slave held to have collaborated in the enterprise (and they were always suspected of such collaboration) was death by having molten lead poured down her throat."

As we can see, deMause's claim is nonsense. The source refers to a virgin and suitor eloping together, not someone simply speaking to a non-approved person (note that both suffer the punishment). And the punishment of molten lead refers to a female slave who aided in the enterprise, not the woman who eloped. While a harsh law, deMause's representation of it--or at least his representation of the source he cited--is thoroughly inaccurate.

It was in fact sometimes a practice during the Middle Ages to “bury an un-baptized infant with a stake through its heart so that it would not arise and injure many,” so full of sin it was at birth.16

16 Barbara A. Kellum, “Infanticide in England in the Later Middle Ages.” History of Childhood Quarterly: The Journal of Psychohistory 1(1974): 379.  

TRUE. The statement in the work is "The “despoiling” child could do even more damage, though, if he died unbaptized. Thus, Burchard of Worms (ca. 1008-12) referred to the custom of burying an unbaptized infant with a stake through its heart so that it would nor arise and injure many." The citation given for this is "McNeill and Gamer, op. cit., p. 339" which refers to a previous citation of "John R. McNeil and Helena M. Gamer, trans., Medieval Handbooks of Penance, (New York: Columbia University Press, 1938)".

We can find the relevant portion here:
https://archive.org/details/MedievalHandbooksOfPenance/page/n357

The practice is, notably, condemned. But it appears it happened, even if it is unclear how frequent it occurred (deMause does only say "sometimes"). So I will count this as true.

I planned to stop here, as I felt this examination of the first 16 citations had been sufficient evaluation of how reliable we could consider deMause to be. But thought I should be fair and go on a bit longer to get a larger sample, so I decided to go on for an additional paragraph. The result? Well, you'll see.

Most of the murders, abandonments and tortures of Christian children were accomplished by deeply depressed mothers and wet-nurses, since fathers until early modern times had little to do with children during their early years. Jean Gerson felt he had to advise fathers as late as the 15th century: “Let us not be ashamed of speaking to children.”17

17 Daniele Alexandre-Bidon and Didier Lett, Children in the Middle Ages: Fifth–Fifteenth Centuries. Notre Dame: The University of Notre Dame Press, 2000, p. 45.

HALF-TRUE. The source appears to only apply to the second sentence, not the first (which is uncited). However, this quote is not found on page 45. Through looking up Jean Gerson in the Index, I was able to locate it on page 63, though he leaves out a part:

“The most secular images of the late Middle Ages let us witness great complicity between father and child, in work as well as play: little ones gather acorns as the father cuts down an oak, scare up birds in the field while he sows wheat, hold the sheep’s feet while he shears them, and, during the grape harvest, want to help trample the grapes in the vat.

As a result, in literary sources as well as iconographical documents, even before the famous advice of Jean Gerson who, at the beginning of the fifteenth century, writes: “let us not be ashamed of speaking to children as good and kind mothers would,” fathers “mothered.””

His phrasing is unfortunately sort of confusing here due to the quotation marks (no doubt made more confusing by my usage of quotations), but the author is saying that even before Jean Gerson, fathers played a motherly role. Nor does the source's page really support the claim that fathers prior to "early modern times" (whenever that's supposed to refer to) were not part of their childrens' lives. This would have gotten a Mostly True if not for the wrong page number, which pushes it down.

Marriage itself was sinful when spouses had sex for any reason other than to produce a child. Fathers who paid some attention to their young children only did so to express their ownership of them: “The father then lifted the baby in the air above his head and kissed it on the thigh, calling out ‘My Cattle,’ for that was what it represented to his imagination.”18

18 Ibid., p. 28.

FALSE. This claim is not found on page 28 of the source (and I double checked to make sure this was the same edition that was cited). It is possible that, like the above quote, he simply got the page number wrong. But I do not know how to look this quote up in the book--there is not anything I can think of to look up in the Index. So for now, I will count it as False.

Girls would not be around to take over their father’s cattle, of course, since by the time they were 15-20 years old, the fathers would hand them over to an older man to marry.19

19 Olwen Hufton, The Prospect Before Her: A History of Women in Western Europe: Vol. One. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1996; David Herlihy, Medieval Households. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1985, pp. 104-107.

TRUE. I was not able to really get much out of the first citation (it’s very long, and no specific pages are cited), but the latter is easy to find. It is indeed true that by that age, girls usually were married.

(Actually to be raped, since the girls would often not have even met their so-called “husbands,” so what are called by historians “arranged Christian marriages” were actually “arranged rapes.”) Girls were raped so often by neighbors or employers they were often forced into lives of prostitution if they should give birth. In addition, “throughout medieval Europe daughters were loaned to guests as an act of hospitality.”20

20 Samuel X. Radbill, “Children in a World of Violence: A History of Child Abuse.” In Ray E. Helfer and Ruth S. Kempe, The Battered Child. 4th Ed. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1987, p. 9. 

FALSE. The actual quote is "In some cultures daughters, as well as wives, were loaned to guests as an act of hospitality." As we can see, the quote in question does not specify it being in medieval Europe--he also neglects to mention the fact wives were mentioned also. One may see the source here. It does mention that this is seen in "French medieval literature" (among some other examples that were not medieval) but even if that is true--no examples are given--that would apply only to France. Given that it says "as well as wives," which seems like it would have been very frowned on in the staunchly anti-adultery church, it would appear that this is something that was not used in European cultures. I considered Mostly False versus False, but the lack of examples in the source combined with the misleadingly edited quite prompted me to remove it to False.

The source also does not back up the preceding sentences concerning the marriages being rapes, but to be fair perhaps it was not supposed to, so I have not counted them in my grading above. Still, it is notable that no citation is given for the girls often not meeting their husbands (it isn’t in the citation), nor does deMause explain how, even if that is the case, lack of meeting one’s husband before marriage qualifies something as rape. Nor does he indicate how, as indicated by his sarcastic quotations, it means they aren’t husbands. Similarly, there is no citation to support the claim of the frequency of rape despite the fact such a thing is incredibly important. Perhaps a previous chapter of the book covered it. But in any event, my assessment of "False" was not based on those sentences--I am addressing them only for the sake of completeness.

Medieval girls were sometimes told to carry knives as they walked down the street—to ward off rapists21

21 David Nicholas, The Domestic Life of a Medieval City, Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1985, P. 64.

TRUE. Of course, this doesn't mean much, as some women in the present day do this, even if their weapons of choice are different. His argument seems to come from the next part of the sentence, and we'll examine the faults there: 

—since the Christian men who might have protected them “seemed to regard their rape as a trivial issue.”22

22 Anna Clark, Women’s Silence, Men’s Violence: Sexual Assault in England, 1770-1845. London: Pandora Press, 1987, p. 44.

FALSE. You may notice the problem even without having to look up the citation. He starts out talking about "Medieval girls" but then points to book referring to that has "1770-1845" in its title. One hardly backs up a claim about Medieval times by citing a book concerning the 18th and 19th centuries!

There is an additional problem. The context of this is the discussion of the distribution of pamphlet literature, and it mentions how the issue of rape wasn't mentioned in them, for example a warning to women about the dangers of rape. However, the book notes that this pamphlet literature was written for men, who wouldn't have been that interested in reading about such thing. So this was not a statement that they saw rape as "trivial issue", but rape in their literature as a "trivial issue".

When psychoanalysts today work with women who have been raped as young girls, they often find they cannot live with their buried rage and humiliation, so they often identify with the rapist and abuse their own children (identification with the perpetrator), saying “I am a man, I get to have whatever I want.”23

23 Ellen F. Wilson, “The Internal Obstructive Object in the Analysis of a Woman Who Envies Her Rapist.” The Psychoanalytic Quarterly 128(2009): 806.

HALF-TRUE. First, it is not clear what the number "128" is. 2009 corresponds to Volume 78 of the Psychoanalytic Quarterly... a typo, perhaps? Fortunately, the page number stated in the citation for the 2009 volume does lead to the applicable article. A problem, however, is that the quote is not on page 806. Perhaps it is meant as a paraphrase, but again it is not presented as such. Something similar is a quote from the patient the article is about, which is (brackets original): "When I watch it [a pornographic movie], I am the man. I feel his excitement. And then my thought is, this is the ultimate form of penis envy. It's about power. He gets to have whatever he wants. But I want to see him–his total dominating way, the way he gets off. He doesn't care if she wants to be involved or not." But again, this doesn't match up with the quote that he presents in quotation marks.

Unfortunately, the claim that they "often identify with the rapist and abuse their own children" is not, as far as I can tell, in the article--though I will admit to skimming outside of the cited page. The article concerns work with one person, and I did not even see a statement that she abused her child outside of on page 798, that "when they [husband and child] would not or could not respond as she desired, she repeatedly erupted in rage"--but no statement it was anything physical. Further, the woman at question was raped at the age of 17, which I would not count as a "young girl" though that is admittedly subjective. Simply put, a single case of someone who was raped that I do not believe was stated to abuse anyone is not actual proof of deMause's claim. Unless only the quotation was supposed to be what he was providing proof for, in which case he really should have given a source for it.

Thus the sexual assaults on young girls fed their abusive assaults upon their children when they became mothers. So, too, the extraordinarily traumatic genital mutilation of little girls that was so common around the world for so long was passed on as severe abuse to generations of children.24

24 Patricia Raya, “Female Genital Mutilation and the Perpetuation of Multigenerational Trauma.” The Journal of Psychohistory 37(2010): in press.

MOSTLY TRUE. Having looked through the article, I do not see much that supports this. The article is mostly about trauma caused by female circumcision. It is only in a brief part near the end that it suggests that the trauma itself is what caused this practice to be passed down for generations. But this portion is rather speculative--a more plausible explanation, it seems to me, would be that it's simple tradition that keeps going rather than the effects of trauma. But even if we accept it as accurate, we run into a rather obvious problem: deMause is talking about the effects Christianity has had, but female circumcision has historically been a rarity among Christians. Thus it is not particularly relevant to his point. Nevertheless, the source does touch on it, so I decided to give it a Mostly True.

And that ends our examination. It is ironic that he begins his next paragraph with "You will not discover most of these horrible aspects about Christian misogyny from the hundreds of books written on medieval Christianity, since most of the authors are both male and believing Christians, and idealize Christianity regularly." Perhaps we will not find it from those books--but as we've discovered from our trawl through his sources, we won't "discover" it from the books he has offered so far either.

Indeed, this claim of authorial bias on the part of historians doesn't actually make that much sense, because many of those Christian historians were Protestants. An argument that during the medieval period all these horrible things were happening would be beneficial to Protestant arguments, as they could try to argue that it's all the fault of the Catholic Church getting away from true Christianity and that's why the Protestant Reformation was correct. Certainly, they would not have a real bias against the idea of Christianity in the medieval period being warped. Thus this argument of deMause's does not hold water.


THE CONCLUSION

Here is the final count:

Pants on Fire!: 1
False: 6
Mostly False: 6
Half-True: 4
Mostly True: 3
True: 4

Anyway, as we can see, deMause is hardly accurate in representing his citations--more than half of these are Mostly False, False, or Pants on Fire, meaning he's wrong more often than he's right. I will admit the ratings are subjective, but even if you bumped all of them up 1 slot you'd end up with most of them being half-true or worse.

And there are some pretty big whoppers in there. He pulls forward a quote supposedly from the Bible that is not only not in the verse he claims it is, but isn't in the Bible at all. He takes an account from the 20th century and presents it as if it's from early Christianity. He takes a statement about men's attitudes towards rape in 18th/19th century pamphlet literature and presents it as if it's about men's attitude towards real life rape in the medieval period. He seems to have some kind of phobia of providing primary sources for quotes of past figures, instead only citing other people quoting them, leading to misattributions or quotes that do not seem to be real at all. He gives quotations that aren't actually found in the works he attributes them to, or edits them to make them more palatable to his claims. More could be listed, and anyone who wishes to see the full examination is free to scroll up and look at them if they have not already. Some of the errors he makes are just plain shocking.

And remember, this was for the most part simply an examination of how well he presented his sources. It could very be well that the sources he utilized were incorrect themselves, or he ignored sources damaging to his claims. If someone cannot be trusted to represent their chosen sources accurately, what confidence do we have that their choosing of sources was accurate? Perhaps even those that I gave a "Mostly True" or "True" to in regards to how well he represented them, were not factually correct themselves.

It is possible that perhaps after these early parts of the chapter, suddenly everything changes, and all of his claims are perfectly backed up by his sources. However, I did look at a few out of curiosity, and to be honest his hit/miss ratio seems to be about the same. Similarly, it is possible that his other chapters do not suffer from the problems this chapter does (an examination of a few sources on another chapter, however, does not fill me with confidence). Or maybe just this one book is the problem, and other writings of his are accurate. But even if it's a small sampling, he misrepresents his sources so poorly and so frequently here that I feel everything else he writes should be viewed with suspicion.

Perhaps if I feel like it, I shall come back and investigate some more of his citations... but for now, I feel this is sufficient examination. For my part, this examination has caused me to have little faith in the accuracy of any of deMause's claims, whether expressed in this chapter or other works of his. But in the end, the reader is free to draw whatever conclusions they wish based on my research. I make this available as a resource to save others the trouble of doing what I did.

Note: I have now gone and examined a lot more of the citations he offered in this chapter. You may read it here. 

Breaking the Duopoly: Ranked Choice Voting and the American Solidarity Party

It is true I have not posted anything for quite a while, but it doesn't mean this blog has been abandoned. The truth is I have a number of planned articles, but it is taking me quite a while to get them to a stage where I am satisfied with them. But in the meantime, I offer some thoughts on the American political situation; specifically, the duopoly that controls it, and how to possibly break free of it.

The US has what is called a two-party system, which is when, as the name implies, there are two parties that dominate political discourse, in the US the Democrats and Republicans. Not only that, the US is a particularly extreme form of a two-party system. The United Kingdom is considered to have a two-party system, where the Labour and Conservative Parties are the clear frontrunners and frequently either is able to make a majority by itself. But there are other parties represented in parliament and sometimes neither Labour or Conservative have over half of the seats and as a result must form a coalition with another party in order to achieve a majority. In the US, however, it is a rarity to have even one person from a third party be in the United States Congress. One may point to Independents, but not only are they rare, they generally are for all practical purposes a Republican or for all practical purposes a Democrat. For example, the two Independents in the US Senate right now are Bernie Sanders and Angus King, who are essentially Democrats (certainly, they caucus with Democrats). Yes, they may not be your "typical" Democrat but a good number of those who are officially listed as Democrats would not be considered your "typical" Democrat either.

What exactly causes the dominance of these two parties? There are various reasons, but one of the biggest is first-past-the-post voting being used almost everywhere in the US. If you are unaware, first-past-the-post voting essentially says that whoever gets the most votes in an election wins. In other words, if one candidate gets 42%, one gets 32%, and another gets 28%, it means that the person who got 42% will win despite not winning a majority. It also means that something has gone horribly wrong in the world of math because they all total to 102%. Such a system, while not guaranteeing a two party system, strongly favors it, primarily due to concerns of your vote being "wasted."

There are various suggestions on how to change this up, but in my view the simplest would be to implemented Ranked Choice Voting in all elections, where one ranks the candidates in preference. A key point here is that  even if someone doesn't understand the mechanics underlying it, they can easily grasp the idea of ranking candidates in how much they like them.

Here's how it works. After everyone votes for the candidates by ranking them, all of the first choices are then added up. If a candidate wins a majority, they win the election. If not, whatever candidate got the least votes is thrown out, and anyone who voted for them instead has their second choice counted as their vote. If someone gains a majority, then they win; if not, the remaining candidate with the least votes is thrown out, and anyone who had them as their first choice will have their vote re-assigned to their second choice (or their third choice, if their first and second were the two eliminated candidates). This continues until one candidate has a majority and is declared the winner.

The way this breaks the two party system is fairly obvious: Under the current system of first past the post, one worries about throwing their vote away for a candidate. Under the above system, however, that no longer happens. Let's illustrate.

Suppose there is Candidate A, Candidate B, and Candidate C. A and B are the clear frontrunners, with C being very unlikely to win. You like Candidate C the most, are ambivalent on Candidate B, and hate Candidate A. So you face the dilemma: If you vote for Candidate C, there is a high probability your vote won't do anything at all, and you risk handing Candidate A the win. So do you vote for Candidate B, who you don't particularly like but will help prevent Candidate A from winning? Under Ranked Choice Voting, you don't have to worry, because if Candidate C is unable to win, your vote will be "transferred" to B.

Now, this would likely not end the two-party system in the United States. Australia has ranked choice voting and, like the US, has two major parties that are significantly ahead of the others in terms of electoral success, the Labour Party and Liberal Party (due to political shifts, the "Liberal Party" is ironically the conservative one). But they don't control discourse to the extreme extent that the Democrats and Republicans do.

Ranked Choice Voting is not the only other possibility. Perhaps some kind of proportional representation could be used. But I favor Ranked Choice Voting for several reasons. First, it's the easiest to implement. Proportional representation requires a major shift to how officials are elected--Ranked Choice Voting is relatively small. Second, it is simple and easy to grasp.

If you are wondering about the President, note that one does not even need to get rid of the electoral college under RCV, as you simply have the RCV apply on a state-by-state basis. Granted, I know many would like to see the electoral college go away, but to do so would require a constitutional amendment (very hard to accomplish!). The point is that you can do Ranked Choice Voting within the current constitutional framework of the electoral college, as it allows states to decide how to allocate the electors--they can easily do this via ranked choice voting, should they choose.

Unfortunately, implementing this could be difficult. If there's one thing Republicans and Democrats agree on, it's that they like staying in power. Maine managed to implement Ranked Choice Voting, but to get it done they had to essentially bypass their legislature via referendum; not all states have that ability. Still, one state implemented it, so perhaps others will follow.

There are some reasons to be hopeful. For about a century, Senators were not elected by the people of the state, but by state legislatures, but a constitutional amendment was passed to change that. Passing a constitutional amendment requires 2/3 of the Senate (and House) and 3/4 of State legislatures to agree to pass it. In other words, despite the fact this could result in all of the Senators losing their positions due to the change, and despite the fact state legislatures were giving up power through this change, people were able to convince them to pass the amendment. Further, this isn't a full loss for Democrats or Republicans. Ranked Choice Voting all but eliminates the possibility of a third party candidate being a "spoiler", which would be to their advantage. Thus, there is at least hope for this to happen in the US.

But in the meantime, what to do? Well, even beyond first past the post, I feel there are some ways to help break the duopoly. A major problem with many third parties is that they tend to just be more extreme versions of Democrats or Republicans. When you are pulling from only one party, it's difficult to win. So to become truly viable, a third party has to be offering something that's a mixture of both of their positions.

There are two major categories that political positions fall into. There is social, and there is economic. Republicans have conservative social and conservative economic positions, whereas Democrats have liberal social and liberal economic positions. But what about those voters who have conservative social and liberal economic positions? Or liberal social and conservative economic positions? They are not being represented by those two parties. What third parties are there?

Socially liberal, economically conservative is represented by the Libertarian Party. Socially conservative, economically liberal is represented by the American Solidarity Party. (note that these descriptions are oversimplified, but give you the general gist of their parties) While the Libertarian Party is the much larger of the two--indeed, it is the largest third party in the country--I feel the American Solidarity Party has the potential to be much bigger and provide a real alternative to the duopoly we have.

Why do I think that? Well, a picture tells us a lot:

Source

As we can clearly see, a very substantial portion of the electorate falls into the socially conservative, economically liberal quadrant (upper left). That is the portion of the population that the American Solidarity Party has appeal for. Meanwhile, the socially liberal economically conservative quadrant (lower right) that the Libertarian Party represents has the smallest amount of the population.

Why is the Libertarian Party currently more successful than the American Solidarity Party, then? I feel it's because the LP has been around for decades whereas the ASP is relatively recent (founded in 2011). It takes time and effort to build up a political party, especially when the odds are stacked against you. But the amount of strides they've managed to make in that time are actually impressive. The mere fact that any member of the party has been elected somewhere already puts them ahead of about 99% of the third parties in the country.

So if you want to break the duopoly, the best way in my view would be to implement Ranked Choice Voting. In the meantime, I believe that the Libertarian Party or American Solidarity Party are our best shots at a third party rising up to become a real contender. The Libertarian Party has the advantage of being much more entrenched and with a greater level of electoral success, but I believe the chart shows the American Solidarity Party has more potential to rise up.

But all of this is a bunch of musings. What can people actually do about this?

I am not sure of the right path to take for Ranked Choice Voting, unfortunately. But when it comes to third parties, the options are fairly simple on how to support them. The obvious thing is to vote for them, but an issue with that is that (1) they may not have a candidate on your ballot, and (2) it's the time before the election that ends up making the most difference.

What's more beneficial is to actually join up with one and work to promote it. But not everyone has the time or zeal to do so. Bumper stickers and yard signs can also help, but those can feel awfully tacky and one may be hesitant to broadcast their politics in such a way. So if you are uninterested or unwilling to do those, I submit the following: Make a small donation to them. A party needs money to be able to get itself known--and to get ballot access!--but in order to have that money, people need to donate.

Indeed, consider how many people complain about the duopoly. If every single one of those people made even a $1 donation to a third party, that third party would instantly become a real force in politics. Certainly not to the extent of the Republicans or Democrats, but I expect they could elect at least a few people to the House of Representatives, and in doing so would raise their profile and could reach further success in the future.

So if you have actually read all of this, here is my request: Go to the website of a third party and donate at least one dollar. This should take no more than a few minutes and, of course, the monetary charge is minimal. I think the American Solidarity Party has the best odds of making real change (donation page available here), but if you have major problems with them you can try a different third party. Now, you might think that's not much, but every bit helps, and again: If everyone who complained about the duopoly would do even just this, we'd start seeing real change. So that is my request to you: Go over and donate one dollar or more to a third party. It'll take less time to do so than it did to read this post!

Easter is Not Ishtar

Sometimes you come across claims that are so silly you wonder if it's even worth arguing against. But you also know that people not familiar with such things may fall for it, so you want to put out a correction anyway. And here I will tackle the claim by some groups that the celebration of Easter is based on the pagan goddess Ishtar (and therefore pagan itself) due to the similarity in their pronunciation.

The first problem with this is that the original writing of Easter, as we see in Old English writings, often had the e and r reversed. Here are some examples we see from the Oxford English Dictionary:

Ælfric De Temporibus Anni (Cambr. Gg.3.28) (2009) iv. 84 On sumon geare bið se mona twelf siðon geniwod, fram ðære halgan eastertide oð eft eastron.
Anglo-Saxon Chron. (Laud) anno 1101 To Cristesmæssan heold se cyng Heanrig his hired on Westmynstre & to Eastranon Winceastre.
MS Trin. Cambr. in R. Morris Old Eng. Homilies (1873) 2nd Ser. 101 (MED) Þe þre dage biforen estre [ben] cleped swidages.
Laȝamon Brut (Calig.) (1978) l. 9230 He ferde to Lunden. He wes þere an Æstre.

Obviously, the spellings weren't exactly standardized, but we can clearly see that we were seeing an R immediately after the T, not an E. So even appealing to a supposed similarity in pronunciation doesn't necessarily work very well, because -re is obviously pronounced differently than -er. Some modern British spellings do pronounce a -re as -er, such as theatre being pronounced as theater, but to my understanding this pronunciation oddity (like English pronunciation oddities in general) came about much later in English, and thus Eastre would have still have a pronunciation rather different from Ishtar.

That already poses a problem for this hypothesis. But claims of the Easter holiday being related to Ishtar due to Easter and Ishtar sounding similar fall apart even more when one looks beyond English. Let's look at how Easter is written in various languages.

Dutch: Pasen
German: Ostern
Italian: Pasqua
Portuguese: Páscoa 
Spanish: Pascua

As we can see, in most languages, Easter isn't written anything like it is in English, and instead starts with a "Pas" sound. Easter sounding like it does in English is limited to only the Germanic languages like English or German, as the term Germanic implies (and even in German, "Ostern" is noticeably different from Ishtar). Other languages have stuck closer to the original Hebrew term of פסחא for Easter (pronounced Pskha). Indeed, this root form is still found in English in the word paschal, which means to be related to Easter. 

This of course brings us to another major issue with this idea: If the name Easter came from Ishtar, why is this only the case in English? Ishtar was a goddess from the Middle East; if Easter comes from that, how in the world did it get all the way over to the British Isles from the Middle East without leaving traces in all of the countries and languages in between?

A slightly more plausible claim is to claim that the English word of Easter may be derived from Eostre, the name of a pagan goddess apparently associated with spring. I say slightly more plausible because while even if that was the origin of the English word Easter, which it may not have been (our only source for this claim is a writer named Bede mentioning it in passing, and there is no proof anywhere else this goddess ever existed), it still doesn't matter. Why? Because those who celebrated Easter were not in the areas where Eostre is alleged to have been worshiped at all, and spoke languages like Greek or Latin, entirely different language than English or even proto-English. Before the word Easter ever existed in English, it was a known and celebrated holiday. So even if this etymology is true, one cannot conclude any pagan influence on the Easter holiday itself based on it. Furthermore, it should be noted that this supposed derivation, even if true, may have been indirect. It is not clear (from what I can tell) whether Bede said that Easter was named after Eostre, or whether it was named after Eosturmonath, which was named after Eostre. So even if Bede's claim about Eostre is correct, Easter may not have been named after Eostre, but named after a month that was supposedly named after Eostre, giving no more of a direct name than "Fourth of July" does to Julius Caesar. (as an edit long after this post was originally made, I should note this post argues that the "based on the month" interpretation is the one that makes the most sense)

Some have attempted to still connect this to Ishtar (or Astarte) by claiming that Eostre was just the English version of that deity. But this is simply complete speculation. But even if it is true, we still have the same problem noted above, that this name came after the holiday had already been created and celebrated.

As should be obvious at this point, the claim that the holiday Easter has anything to do with Ishtar or even Eostre due to sounding similar simply does not add up. This similarity only exists in English (and to a more limited extent German), languages that only existed well after the holiday was already being celebrated. The languages people did use back then were Greek and Aramaic, and the words for Easter and Ishtar in those languages sounded nothing alike. It's a claim so blatantly false that it shouldn't even need refutation, but as noted sometimes you have to point out the errors in even the weakest claims to make sure no one falls for them.

As long as I'm at it: "Luck" and "Lucifer" are other words that you might see a few people claim are related. However, it is complete coincidence that they sound similar at all in English. The origin of "Luck" in English comes from German, and the origin of "Lucifer" in English comes from Latin. And just like Easter and Ishtar, as soon as you slip into another language the similarity completely disappears. For example, in Spanish the words are "Suerte" and "Lucifer," which sound nothing at all alike.

For a more in-depth examination, you may read this follow-up post.

The Fourteenth Amendment and Citizenship Clause

Several months ago, there was a big discussion concerning the meaning of the Citizenship Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. The argument was spurred on by President Trump arguing that the Citizenship Clause did not guarantee citizenship to the children of illegal aliens and that the policies stating as such could be revoked by a law by congress or possibly just an executive order. Since then, the whole issue has fallen off the map and not been brought up, making some believe it was just a stunt for the midterms. But regardless of whether it has been forgotten or not, there was a lot of discussion at the time and I wanted to weigh in on a few errors I was often seeing.

For reference, here is the first section of the Fourteenth Amendment in which the Citizenship Clause is to be found:

All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside. No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.

The bolded is the pertinent portion, and its meaning has been debated. Now, the errors I mentioned seeing were specifically the usage of quotes from two Senators, which actually ties in a bit with the previous post of the importance of looking up quotes and seeing context. Here they are:

"This amendment which I have offered is simply declaratory of what I regard as the law of the land already, that every person born within the limits of the United States, and subject to their jurisdiction, is by virtue of natural law and national law a citizen of the United States. This will not, of course, include persons born in the United States who are foreigners, aliens, who belong to the families of ambassadors or foreign ministers accredited to the Government of the United States, but will include every other class of persons." -Senator Howard

"The provision is, that "all persons born in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens." That means "subject to the complete jurisdiction thereof." Now, does the Senator from Wisconsin pretend to say that the Navajoe Indians are subject to the complete jurisdiction of the United States? What do we mean by "subject to the jurisdiction of the United States?" Not owing allegiance to anybody else. That is what it means." -Senator Trumbull 

Alternatively:

"It is only those persons who come completely within our jurisdiction, who are subject to our laws, that we think of making citizens; and there can be no objection to the proposition that such persons should be citizens." -Senator Trumbull

Both of these were stated during the debates on the ratification of the Fourteenth Amendment, with the first being the most important given that Howard was the one who proposed the amendment. Indeed, it is the one most cited, I believe, so let's examine it in context.

The most key phrase, of course, is "This will not, of course, include persons born in the United States who are foreigners, aliens, who belong to the families of ambassadors or foreign ministers accredited to the Government of the United States, but will include every other class of persons." Not infrequently, a bracketed "or" is added between "aliens" and "who" to supposedly clarify the meaning. However, that is simply reading one's assumptions into the text.

This sentence is confusing in structure. It is not properly constructed and leaves it unclear whether he's saying someone who fulfills all three of those categories is excluded, or if he's listing three separate categories, or if he's using the word "aliens" to clarify the meaning of "foreigners" and thus he's ultimately just saying "foreigners who belong to the families..." and there aren't categories to his statement at all. I have seen various arguments on what he meant by that.

However, this quote did not occur in isolation, and thus there is little need to speculate based on just the language. Its meaning can be proven quite decisively by looking at its context. This quote comes from page 2890 of the Congressional Globe, 39th Congress, 1st Session. One may find that here or alternatively if you'd prefer it in text rather than image, archive.org has put it all into text form here (a quick search for "Mr. HOWARD. I now move to take up House joint resolution No. 127." will pop up the right part). Do note that the second seems to have been a machine scanning it and converting it into text, so a few words are mixed up, most particularly constantly rendering "born" as "bom."

Now for the full context. This begins with Senator Howard giving the above quote. There is a brief aside where Senator Doolittle suggests a change to specify Indians are excluded (while Native American is the more common term nowadays, I will use Indian as that is what is used in the congressional discussion), which Senator Howard essentially blows off. Now we come to the critical part, which is something often skipped over by those who use the above quote from Senator Howard.

Senator Cowan starts talking at this point to complain about the amendment. His reasoning? He thinks it would be a bad idea, because it would allow foreigners to become citizens. His entire speech makes no sense if he believed that Howard meant to exclude children of foreigners. But this particular section of it makes it even more explicitly obvious he believes the Citizenship Clause confers automatic citizenship to children of foreigners:

"Therefore I think, before we assert broadly that everybody who shall be born in the United States shall be taken to be a citizen of the United States, we ought to exclude others besides Indians not taxed, because I look upon Indians not taxed as being much less dangerous and much less pestiferous to society than I look upon Gypsies."

Note also that he suggests excluding others "besides Indians not taxed", showing that this is a separate issue from Indians, who he regards as excluded under the current text. This pertains to a later point. In the meantime, Senator Conness after this begins speaking and argues against what Senator Cowan just said. He does not say that Cowan's interpretation is wrong. He simply says that his worries as to the result of automatic citizenship of children of non-citizens are unfounded. His speech, much like Cowan's, makes no sense if they did not believe that all children of foreigners became citizens. And, like Cowan, he gives a particular quote that erases all doubt:

"The proposition before us, I will say, Mr. President, relates simply in that respect to the children begotten of Chinese parents in California, and it is proposed to declare that they shall be citizens. We have declared that by law; now it is proposed to incorporate the same provision in the fundamental instrument of the nation. I am in favor of doing so. I voted for the proposition to declare that the children of all parentage whatever, born in California, should be regarded and treated as citizens of the United States, entitled to equal civil rights with other citizens of the United States."

The reason for the emphasis on Chinese and California here is because Senator Conness was from California which had a lot of Chinese, but he is clearly indicating that this applies to other foreigners in other states.

Both of these Senators clearly believed that children of non-citizen foreigners were included in the Citizenship Clause as shown by their entire argument on it. No one else came forward to claim their interpretation was wrong, including Senator Howard who has two perfect opportunities: A brief interruption during Conness's speech, and the fact he talks immediately afterwards. It is incomprehensible that if children of foreigners were meant to be excluded, Senator Howard wouldn't simply point that out to end the argument quickly in the multiple opportunities he has.

The simple bottom line is that it despite how you might feel the quote looks by itself, it is abundantly clear from both how Senator Howard's quote was reacted to as well as his own reactions to those reactions that he was saying that only those who belong to the families of ambassadors or foreign sovereigns are excluded. Other foreigners living in the United States qualify.

Now we come to Trumbull's quote, which comes afterwards. After Conness finishes his speech, the matter of foreigner's children being citizens is essentially tabled for a lengthy argument about whether or not Indians are excluded by the text and a big debate starts over it. I will now give fuller context of Trumbull's quote. I beg the reader's indulgence for the length, but it is necessary to make the point. For the context of the context, this is concerning the suggestion that the words "excluding Indians not taxed" be added to the Fourteenth Amendment to leave it clear that "wild Indians" are not counted. 

Mr. TRUMBULL. Of course my opinion is not any better than that of any other member of the Senate; but it is very clear to me that there is nothing whatever in the suggestions of the Senator from Wisconsin. The provision is, that "all persons born in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens." That means "subject to the complete jurisdiction thereof." Now, does the Senator from Wisconsin pretend to say that the Navajoe Indians are subject to the complete jurisdiction of the United States? What do we mean by "subject to the jurisdiction of the United States?" Not owing allegiance to anybody else. That is what it means. Can you sue a Navajoe Indian in court? Are they in any sense subject to the complete jurisdiction of the United States? By no means. We make treaties with them, and therefore they are not subject to our jurisdiction. If they were, we would not make treaties with them. If we want to control the Navajoes, or any other Indians of which the Senator from Wisconsin has spoken, how do we do it? Do we pass a law to control them? Are they subject to our jurisdiction in that sense? Is it not understood that if we want to make arrangements with the Indians to whom he refers we do it by means of a treaty? The Senator himself has brought before us a great many treaties this session in order to get control of those people.

If you introduce the words "not taxed," that is a very indefinite expression. What does "excluding Indians not taxed" mean? You will have just as much difficulty in regard to those Indians that you say are in Colorado, where there are more Indians than there are whites. Suppose they have property there, and it is taxed; then they are citizens.

Mr. WADE. And ought to be.

Mr. TRUMBULL. The Senator from Ohio says they ought to be. If they are there and within the jurisdiction of Colorado, and subject to the laws of Colorado, they ought to be citizens; and that is all that is proposed. It cannot be said of any Indian who owes allegiance, partial allegiance if you please, to some other Government that he is "subject to the jurisdiction of the United States." Would the Senator from Wisconsin think for a moment of  bringing a bill into Congress to subject these wild Indians with whom we have no treaty to the laws and regulations of civilized life? Would he think of punishing them for instituting among themselves their own tribal regulations? Does the Government of the United States pretend to take jurisdiction of murders and robberies and other crimes committed by one Indian upon another? Are they subject to our jurisdiction in any just sense? They are not subject to our jurisdiction. We do not exercise jurisdiction over them. It is only those persons who come completely within our jurisdiction, who are subject to our laws, that we think of making citizens; and there can be no objection to the proposition that such persons should be citizens.

It seems to me, sir, that to introduce the words suggested by the Senator from Wisconsin would not make the proposition any clearer than it is, and that it by no means embraces, or by any fair construction — by any construction, I may say —could embrace the wild Indians of the plains or any with whom we have treaty relations, for the very fact that we have treaty relations with them shows that they are not subject to our  jurisdiction. We cannot make a treaty with ourselves; it would be absurd. I think that the proposition is clear and safe as it is.

As is clear, this is only in discussing Indians, who (especially if you read the entirety of the debates) it is obvious were regarded as a special exception to the Citizenship Clause. Indeed, consider this portion: "If they are there and within the jurisdiction of Colorado, and subject to the laws of Colorado, they ought to be citizens; and that is all that is proposed." This is clearly showing that an Indian who is not living under tribal sovereignty and is under the laws of Colorado would qualify under the Fourteenth Amendment to have their children be citizens. It should also be noted that his explanations for why Indians under tribal sovereignty do not count does not apply to your regular illegal immigrants that are living in the United States: Treaties are not made with them, you can sue them, and if one murders or robs another illegal immigrant they can be prosecuted. It should be further noted that this is all backed up even more by Senator Cowan's quote above, in which he suggests they exclude people other than just Indians from the Citizenship Clause, showing a distinction between Indians (under tribal sovereignty) versus foreigners living in the United States itself.

So attempting to quote anything Trumbull says here, or even to bring up the general question of the fact Indians weren't given automatic birth citizenship under the Fourteenth Amendment (this didn't occur until the much later Indian Citizenship Act of 1924), is to completely ignore what was actually stated in the debates. Children born to foreigners living in the United States (excluding ambassadors or foreign sovereigns) become citizens. Children born to Indians living under tribal sovereignty are the only other exception (aside from occupying armies, but that is not at stake here).

There are still arguments one could use to claim that the Fourteenth Amendment does not guarantee birthright citizenship to illegal immigrants. One could argue that the intentions of the drafters do not matter, only what the text says, though given that illegal immigrants are subject to the laws of the country (otherwise why would they be illegal?), that seems like an uphill battle. One could try to argue that there was no such thing as an illegal alien at the time it was passed (laws restricting immigration, surprisingly as it may sound, were not passed until later), so their statements cannot be used to apply to them. I do not personally find such arguments persuasive, but they can be attempted. For a larger defense that the Citizenship Clause gives citizenship to children of illegal immigrants, one may read an article by James Ho here, which goes into additional detail concerning legal precedent. Ironically, James Ho was later appointed as a federal judge by President Trump.  I should also note the article "Originalism and Birthright Citizenship" by Michael Ramsey. This runs from page 405 to 473 in Volume 109 of the Georgetown Law Journal, and was not yet published at the time I originally made this blog post. Much of this actually focuses on the question of what qualifies as "in the United States" (not directly relevant to this blog post) but it still offers much good information in regards to the "subject to the jurisdiction thereof" which is discussed on pages pages 436-461. See particularly pages 447-451 where the debates are discussed.

But any attempt to appeal to the aforementioned quotes of Howard or Trumbull, or to bring up the question of the fact Indians born under tribal sovereignty were excluded from the birthright citizenship, is doomed to fail because when examined in context, it is obvious that the quotes mean the exact opposite of what those using them want. Those quotes prove beyond any reasonable doubt that the Fourteenth Amendment was intended to give birthright citizenship to anyone born within the United States, excluding Indians living under tribal sovereignty (which is, as stated in the debates, a quasi-foreign nation) or ambassadors/foreign sovereigns. It is highly frustrating to see people who say that original intention is what matters above all else, and then ignore what the clear original intentions of the Citizenship Clause even were.

Again, this is all perhaps several months too late to be relevant. But it is something I wanted to put up somewhere.