Bay City, Michigan 48706
Front Page 03/28/2024 20:40 About us
Home Sports Community Arts/Theater Business Economy - Local The Scene
History Health/Fitness Contests
Issue 1207 April 10, 2011
(Prior Story)   Columns ArTicle 9400   (Next Story)

THE RIGHT THING: City Embrace of Oppressed Children Example to Nation

James G. Birney's Influence Set Bay City on Humanitarian Path

October 4, 2014       Leave a Comment
By: Dave Rogers

Printer Friendly Story View

Wellspring Lutheran Services, (Pictured Above) which now houses these 24 children here, deserves national recognition and should be emulated by decent people everywhere.
 

Bay City remains a bastion of human kindness, exemplified by the decision to embrace helpless children of Central America who have been scorned elsewhere.

Thankfully most of the protesters against the children, brandishing guns and harsh words, were not local residents.

As the teeth-gnashing hyenas of radical bent howled for the blood and hides of these children, Bay City Manager Rick Finn and Wellspring Lutheran Services stood fast in their defense. It was a memorable moment in the city's history.

The action by the city commission supporting the children is in the tradition of one of the founders of this community, James Gillespie Birney, who set an example that has prevailed to this day.

The resolution sponsored by commissioners Chad Sibley and Kerice Basmadjian stated in part:

"Whereas, many of these children are seeking to reunify with their parents or other relatives who themselves came to the United States seeking opportunity; and

"Whereas, these brave children who endured many hardships to possibly start a new life here in the United States, a nation built by hard work, solid morals, and cultural diversity;

"Now There Be It Resolved that Bay City welcomes these unaccompanied immigrant children, and will encourage anyone to assist in the humanitarian relief effort . . . "

Community groups in Bay City came together to welcome the children, with some making blankets and raising funds for school supplies and hygiene products.

Never underestimate the influence of The Bay City Times that editorially urged their acceptance here. It was simply the right thing to do.

Birney was 50-years-old when he and his family moved to what was then Lower Saginaw in 1842. He started a church and a school, circulated the first book -- Uncle Tom's Cabin -- and traveled the state on horseback preaching abolition of slavery.

Birney's plat of Bay City provided two lots every other block on Washington Avenue reserved for churches, a major encouragement for religion in the community.

Bay City became a place where religion and humanity prevailed while many parts of the nation often lynched those who spoke, like Birney, in favor of citizens of color.

The political struggle Birney had helped organize through the Liberty and Free Soil parties, led to the Republicans under Abraham Lincoln. As the national struggle for and against slavery spiraled out of control in both South and North, Bay City was welcoming to abolitionists like Rev. Calvin C.C. Chillson and Birney's oldest son, James Jr, a state senator and lieutenant governor.

The Underground Railroad even led through Bay City, historians now assert.

The impact of abolitionist James G. Birney and his family on the Saginaw area, the nation, and the world is still unrealized.

The Birney family was dedicated to racial equality under Thomas Jefferson's immortal phrase in the Declaration of Independence "all men are created equal."

This nation still labors to escape the same curse that is at the root of most of the wars, deaths, genocide and injustice in the world throughout human history.

That curse is the doctrine of racial superiority asserted by evil rulers of nations like Caesar, Atilla, Kaiser Wilhelm, Hitler, Pol Pot, and other autocrats, potentates, popes and plutocrats to the beginning of civilization.

We struggle to define and confront that evil today despite the incredible sacrifices of millions of saints, paragons of humanity and right-minded patriots.

We are constantly reminded of the carnage caused by the idea of Aryan Supremacy that drove the genocide in Europe from 1870 through World War II.

Right now in the United States that concept drives continued evil in Ferguson, Missouri, and elsewhere in the "land of the free and the home of the brave" where police and civilian bullies alike feel empowered to shoot and kill fellow humans.

Are we really in the midst of a race war creeping into many communities across the nation, or is the basis of these hateful crimes and injustice more a contempt of the "haves" for the "have nots"?

"If the people have no bread, let them eat cake," Marie Antoinette famously quipped before she lost her head to "Mademoiselle Guillotine." The unfortunate tenor of that so selfish and arrogant idea should have died with her. But it remains alive as a virus in political thought even now.

In the Middle East the same conflicts that have raged for thousands of years continue to plague mankind under the names of -- Jesus, Mohammed, Allah -- who would never have condoned injustice or violence perpetrated in their names.

Peace on earth and goodwill toward men is a hollow promise in most regions of the globe -- Syria, Iraq, Iran, Russia and the Ukraine, Africa -- and, sadly, many parts of the U.S.

The Birneys were among the most exemplary individuals, in the tradition of later world paragons such as Mother Theresa, Ghandi, Rev. Martin Luther King Jr., and Yitzhak Rabin.

Reformed slaveholders from Kentucky and Alabama, Birney and his sons William Birney and David Bell Birney, and grandson James G. Birney IV, risked their aristocratic status, their worldly goods, and their lives to do the unthinkable -- stand up for the most oppressed class, black people, in the racist environment of the Civil War era.

Their selfless lives are honored by the actions of the successor residents of the City of Bay City, Michigan.

Wellspring Lutheran Services, which now houses these 24 children here, deserves national recognition and should be emulated by decent people everywhere.

###

Printer Friendly Story View
Prior Article

February 10, 2020
by: Rachel Reh
Family Winter Fun Fest is BACC Hot Spot for 2/10/2020
Next Article

February 2, 2020
by: Kathy Rupert-Mathews
MOVIE REVIEW: "Just Mercy" ... You Will Shed Tears, or at Least You Should
Agree? or Disagree?


Dave Rogers

Dave Rogers is a former editorial writer for the Bay City Times and a widely read,
respected journalist/writer in and around Bay City.
(Contact Dave Via Email at carraroe@aol.com)

More from Dave Rogers

Send This Story to a Friend!       Letter to the editor       Link to this Story
Printer-Friendly Story View


--- Advertisments ---
     


0200 Nd: 03-24-2024 d 4 cpr 1






12/31/2020 P3v3-0200-Ad.cfm

SPONSORED LINKS



12/31/2020 drop ads P3v3-0200-Ad.cfm


Designed at OJ Advertising, Inc. (V3) (v3) Software by Mid-Michigan Computer Consultants
Bay City, Michigan USA
All Photographs and Content Copyright © 1998 - 2024 by OJA/MMCC. They may be used by permission only.
P3V3-0200 (1) 0   ID:Default   UserID:Default   Type:reader   R:x   PubID:mbC   NewspaperID:1207
  pid:1560   pd:11-18-2012   nd:2024-03-24   ax:2024-03-28   Site:5   ArticleID:9400   MaxA: 999999   MaxAA: 999999
claudebot