By William “Duke” Smither “Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free, the wretched refuse of your teeming shore…” – from “The New Colossus,” written in 1883 by Emma Lazarus (American-born, Jewish Author, and Activist), displayed on the plaque of ‘Lady Liberty’, a gracious gift from France. […]
Category: Echoes From the Past
by William “Duke” Smither “Free people, remember this maxim: we may acquire liberty, but it is never recovered if it is once lost.” – Jean-Jacques Rousseau (Swiss-born philosopher, writer, political theorist and 18th century “Enlightenment Thinker”). Over the years, I’ve come to think that revolutions, that is, the way we commonly define them, more […]
by William “Duke” Smither “Love the life you live. Live the life you love.” – Bob Marley (a.k.a., Robert Nesta Marley, 1945–1981, Jamaican singer-songwriter, proud Rastafarian and Reggae musician extraordinaire) Gone Too Soon… Proponents of Pan-Africanism, Ethnomusicology, and Black Music in general– but Jazz, our especially expressive music with African roots, in particular— […]
“A genuine leader is not a searcher for consensus but a molder of consensus…” Martin Luther King, Jr.
By William “Duke” Smither “If the muse were mine to tempt it And my feeble voice was strong, If my tongue were trained to measures, I would sing a stirring song. I would sing a song heroic Of those noble sons of Ham, Of the gallant colored soldiers Who fought for Uncle Sam!…” (From […]
By William “Duke” Smither “Because power corrupts, society’s demands for moral authority and character increase as the importance of the position increases.” (John Adams, 2nd President of the United States) National Moral Character? Lordy, Lordy! One would have had to have been born “Rip Van Winkle II,” the fictional dude who fell asleep and […]
By William “Duke” Smither “When the government violates the people’s rights then insurrection is, for the people and for every section of the people, the most sacred of their rights and the most indispensable of their duties.” – Circa 1790: Marquis de Lafayette, a French military officer who fought in the American Revolutionary War and […]
