The Old Leather Man (again)

This photo shows the Old Leather Man seated outside a house in Middlefield, Connecticut. It was taken sometime between 1869 and 1889.

{Caption: The Leather Man sits to eat in Middlefield in this undated photo. Researchers are planning to dig up the Leather Man's grave next year in an attempt to determine his identity. Source: The Republican-American newspaper of Waterbury, CT[1]}

About a year ago I wrote a post about him.[2] Since then a controversy has arisen over plans to exhume his remains, perform some scientific tests, and rebury them in a new location. Last December a writer named Phil Reisman gave a succinct account of these plans on the LoHud news blog — Exhuming the Old Leatherman. The comments section of this post contains the beginnings of a debate between those who support and who oppose the project. During the past couple of months local reporters have picked up on the story and comments lists have grown. See for example see Briarcliff’s Mysterious and Legendary Leatherman by Kathleen Reilly on the Pleasantville-Briarcliff Manor, NY, Patch network blog, The Footsteps of the Leatherman by Mike Paoletto on the Trumbull, CT, Patch network blog, and Digging up the Leather Man's story in Conn., an Associated Press report.

The Ossining Historical Society owns the cemetery but its web pages contain nothing on the subject.[4] A set of pages called Leave the Leatherman Alone are distinctly polemical but nonetheless full of interesting details, including a copy of the OHS petition to the NY supreme court system and other court documents. The petition says the OHS Museum would like to remove the body, conduct "forensic and genetic testing" for purposes of "public education on historical and genealogical matters," and rebury of remains in another part of the cemetery. The "Leave the Leatherman Alone" site currently has a polite Letter To The Ossining Historical Society as its top posting. Along with most people who have spoken out on the subject, the writer of the letter, Don Johnson, says that it would be better not to exhume the remains at all, but if they are to be relocated, there should be no tampering with them. The Leather Man wanted privacy during his life and there is no good reason to subject his body to invasive study now or ever.

Newsmen Steve Frank, Ray Bendici, and others connected with a site called Damned Connecticut have followed the controversy and prepared a series of useful blog posts about it, including an Interview with Don Johnson and some helpful photos. The photos include this one, which shows the current location of the grave and its marker. As you can see, a cemetery access road currently runs over part of the grave. The road that passes close by is a busy one which is, reportedly, to be widened at some future date. These, plus the quantity of visitors to the grave (including --- by OHS permission -- geocachers), and the fact that the current location is in a "paupers'" area, are the reasons given for moving the remains to another location in the cemetery.

{source: Damned Connecticut[4]}

A few days ago a man named Stephen Griswold alerted me to the OHS plans and the concerns that many are raising about them. He summarized the objections that have been submitted and raised some questions about OHS motives. He asked why, for example, the OHS wants to exhume and rebury these remains and not others that are to be affected by road-widening. He also said the person who runs the OHS Facebook page has been deleting comments that raise questions about the project or show opposition to it. (Note that the FB page does now have comments from April 11 and 12 which are critical of the OHS plans.)

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Some recent sources:

Leather Man, century-old hermit, to be exhumed David Pescovitz on BoingBoing Friday, Mar 4, 2011

Leatherman Series on Geocaching.com

Who was the Leather Man? Experts hope forensic tests will solve mystery by Sam Cooper, Republican-American, Waterbury, CT, November 29, 2010,
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A few of many (many) accounts in 19th- and 20th-century newspapers:

Story of the Leather Man, by Fred C. Warner, Putnam County Courier, Carmel, NY, Jan. 19, 1961

'Old Leather Man' Still Remains Enigma by Ray Barnett, The Herald Statesman, Yonkers, NY, March 5, 1937; subhead: Newspaper Clippings and Photograph Owned by Mt. Vernon Woman Prove His Existence, But Search by Historians Fail to Reveal Identity

Is It The Same Leather Man?; A Silent and Patched Wanderer who Carries an English Bible and is Never Ill, The Sun, November 12, 1883

The Old Leather Man Arrested, The Recorder, Mt. Kisco, NY, December 7, 1888. Excerpt: "Chief of Police Chapman of Middletown, Conn., new New Haven, arrested the "Old Leather Man" last Friday and put him in the insane asylum. He escaped on Sunday, however, and stated for New Haven. He was last seen going toward a cave which h has frequented, between Middletown and Higganum. Only last week he passed through New Castle Corners, on his usual trip east."

THE OLD "LEATHER MAN" DEAD, New York Times, March 25, 1889. Excerpt: "The queer old hermit who has been known throughout this State for some years as the "Leather Man," from his unique apparel. Which was made of skins, was found dead in his cave on the George Dell farm in Mount Pleasant, near Sing Sing, yesterday."

HIS LIFE A PENANCE.; THE STRANGE STORY OF THE FAMOUS VAGRANT, THE LEATHER MAN, New York Times, March 26, 1889.

Here is a copy of this NYT article.



This satellite image shows the location of Sparta Cemetery. The Old Leather Man's grave is in the south-east quadrant, invisible beneath the leafed-out trees.


View Larger Map

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Addendum:

I prepared my original Leather Man post as part of series on the old Croton Aqueduct, which runs close by Sparta Cemetery. To see these posts, click the tag "Croton Aqueduct" in the list headed "Labels" at right. I'd begun looking into the aqueduct while tracking some family history. One of my great-uncles worked for the engineering firm that contracted to build it. Also, I'd been exploring some family-history connections in the Five Points neighborhood. That had been the site of a lake that previously supplied a lot of New York's water and it was near the terminus of the Aqueduct in New York's City Hall Park. Click the tags "family history" and "Five Points" to see these posts.

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Notes:

[1] Rep-Am copyrights its pages, but the photo is 19th century and thus presuably in the public domain; at any rate I'm reproducing it under fair use provisions of copyright law with linkback to the source page.

[2] He was generally called the Old Leather Man during the 19th- and 20th-centuries. For the most part he's been called simply Leatherman since then.

[3] There's also an Ossining Historical Society page on Facebook. The OHS person who moderates that page has replied to a couple of recent comments requesting that OHS not carry out forensic testing. The first says that the information given on the headstone is inaccurate and needs to be corrected (there is no disagreement about this) and the second says "To tell you the truth, since he was buried in a paupers style grave (we still have the receipt) there may not be anything left to dig up but the earth itself." However, in response to an earlier question, the OHS person seems to be much more optimistic about examining the remains: "We are very excited to have Dr. Nicholas Bellantoni, State Archaeologist with the Connecticut State Museum of Natural History and Archaeology Center at the University of Connecticut. Stay tuned for more info."

[4] I'm reproducing this copyrighted photo under fair use provisions of copyright law with linkback to the source page.

Meander, second post

Newspapers owners and editors recognized the usefulness of the telegraph soon after the technology became available to them. Although the financial community quickly became the dominant users, newspapers, railroads, governments, and military establishments were not slower in recognizing its value. The technology's value to financiers is many-fold: financial markets rely heavily on flows of information. Speed is essential and the size of transactions is such that transmission costs are unimportant. And last but hardly least, the information needed can be captured in short messages. In varying (lesser) degrees, the telegraph's other prime users shared these incentives. For all of them costs were a major concern and all but the railroads found it a challenge to keep messages brief.[1]

From the outset news was seen as a main content of telegraph transmissions, perhaps the main content. The letters of Alfred Vail, co-developer of telegraphy in the early 1840s, show the transmission of news to have been one of his main goals for the technology. Even before the telegraph was opened for public use, he employed it to send news of a presidential nomination.[2]

Newspapers saw that they could reap great benefits if they could contain costs. They and the financial community were also challenged to prevent the technology from being abused. Neither group wanted to have their messages intercepted by competitors, neither wanted interruptions of service from wire-cutting, and neither wanted to be duped by false information. A cooperative telegraphic service, the New York Associated Press, was one early means for newspapers to deal with all these threats.

The New York Herald was one of the five founding members of the NYAP. The most innovative paper of its time, it made extensive use of the new technology.[3] This anecdote shows the high costs and some of the perils of news telegraphy in a time when the network of wires was still small.

In New York, the principal journals formed an association, many years ago, to telegraph in common, sharing the expense (this was the NYAP). Each journal was, however, at liberty to order for itself any extra intelligence, giving the others, or any of them, the option of sharing it.

Mr. Jones[4] relates that one of the earliest telegraph feats, after the extension of the telegraph lines west to Cincinnati, was brought about by the agency of the "New York Herald," and before any regular association of the press was formed in New York.

"It became known that Mr. Clay (the presidential candidate) would deliver a speech in Lexington (KY), on the Mexican war, which was then exciting much public attention. Mr. Bennett, editor and proprietor of the 'Herald,' desired us to have Mr. Clay's speech reported for the paper. We at once proceeded," says Mr. Jones, "to make arrangements to carry it into effect. We had a regular and efficient reporter already employed in Cincinnati; we also had one in Philadelphia in cooperation with us.... From Lexington to Cincinnati was eighty miles, over which an express had to be run. Horses were placed at every ten miles by the Cincinnati agent. An expert rider was engaged, and a short-hand reporter or two stationed in Lexington. When they had prepared his speech it was then dark. The express-man, on receiving it, proceeded with it for Cincinnati. The night was dark and rainy, yet he accomplished the trip in eight hours, over a rough, hilly, country road. The whole speech was received at the 'Herald' office at an early hour the next morning, although the wires were interrupted for a short time in the night, near Pittsburg, in consequence of the limb of a tree having fallen across them. An enterprising operator in the Pittsburg office, finding communication suspended, procured a horse, and rode along the line amidst the darkness and rain, found the place, and the cause of the break, which he repaired; then returned to the office, and finished sending the speech." The cost to the Herald was about £100 (or $500 in the currency of the day).
-- The electric telegraph by Dionysius Lardner and Edward Brailsford Bright (J. Walton, 1867)

In time, the New York Associated Press would evolve into a national organization called simply Associated Press. By the turn of the 20th century the AP had organized itself to achieve remarkable speed and economy in delivering news to its member newspapers. As part of this effort telegraphers of the old NYAP had developed a set of abbreviations that were something like the ones used by court reporters. A 1905 article on AP written by its head manager explains:

The [AP] telegraph operators are men of exceptional skill, and receive higher salaries than are paid by the telegraph or railway companies. To expedite their work, they use automatic sending-machines, which greatly exceed hand transmission in speed, and employ a system of abbreviations which can be sent with surprising rapidity. The receiving operators take the letters by sound and write them upon a type-writer, and since no one is able to manipulate a Morse key as swiftly as he can operate a type-writer, there is a constant effort to hasten the sending in order to keep pace with the ability of the receiver. The following example will illustrate the system of abbreviation. A message is sent thus:



And it is rendered thus by the receiving operator:

The Supreme Court of the United States to-day decided that the power of the President of the United States does not extend to the Philippines, on the ground that all past congressional legislation on the subject is unconstitutional.

In the larger cities, where many copies of the messages are required, a sheet which has been immersed in wax is used in the type-writer. When written upon, it forms a stencil, which is placed upon a rotary cyclograph operated by an electric motor, and as many as three hundred copies of the message may be reproduced in a minute. One of these is thrust into an envelop bearing the printed address of a newspaper and shot through a pneumatic tube to the desk of the waiting telegraph editor in the newspaper office. Even this almost instantaneous method of delivery is too slow, however, for news of a sensational character. A bulletin wire connects the Associated Press office with every evening newspaper in New York, and the bulletins are flashed over it by operators of the highest skill in emergencies. When the result of a great race arrives, the receiving operator shouts the news through a megaphone, and every sending operator in the room flashes it over his circuit.

-- "The Associated Press, News-Gathering as a Business" by Melville E. Stone, The Century, Volume 70 (The Century Co., 1905)

From a book published in 1897, this shows the AP telegraph room in New York. At these desks the telegraphers would both key outbound messages and receive inbound ones. When receiving they would listen to the Morse dit-dahs that were emitted from the elevated square devices, transpose the code to English, and write out the results on sheets of paper.

{source: "Great Business Operations — The Collection of News" by T.B. Connery, Cosmopolitan, Volume 23 (Schlicht and Field., 1897)}

Taken in 1923, this shows a man transcribing a telegraphic transmission using a typewriter. He's listening to the dit-dahs that have been keyed at the other end of the line and mentally transposing them into English. As he does this he types the text. As you can see, the box at his ear is a telegraph receiver with a sounding board. In front of him there's another of these "sounders". (The location is the White House; I couldn't find a photo that showed an AP operator doing this job.)

{Telegraph Room, White House, 8/1/23; source: Library of Congress}

Phillips Code was the dominant shorthand method used by AP, other news agencies, and the newspapers themselves. Western Union and the other offices where the public at large would send telegrams would transmit each word in full without abbreviation. They normally charged per word and, since the service was relatively expensive, a compressed language called telegraphese evolved as a cost saving measure. This pidgin English was necessarily ambiguous and given to creative and frequently humorous manipulation.

Stories of this practice are often apocryphal. In one well-known example a magazine editor supposedly cables Cary Grant's agent: "HOW OLD CARY GRANT" to which Cary Grant himself replies "OLD CARY GRANT FINE HOW YOU".[4] Apparently newspapers did not always use Phillips Code, because quite a few of these tales involve reporters in the field. One of the best known goes like this: "Once the transatlantic cable was established, from 1860 onwards, cablegrams were charged per word, 6/- initially, soon reduced to 1/-. A newspaper editor cabled a lazy foreign correspondent YUNEWS. The reply - UNEWS. The editor cabled UNEWS UNJOB".[5] This exchange is a bit easier to understand in another version of the story: "A London news editor worried about the silence from a foreign correspondent cabled WHY UNNEWS. The reporter wired back UNNEWS GOODNEWS, to which the editor replied UNNEWS UNJOB.[6]

The biographies of Evelyn Waugh say that he actually did help perpetrate a well-known bit of telegraphese. In 1935 he covered the Italian invasion of Ethiopia for the Daily Mail. Soon after he arrived in Addis Ababa his editor sent a wire telling him to investigate the rumored killing of an American nurse: "REQUIRE EARLIEST NAME LIFE STORY PHOTOGRAPH AMERICAN NURSE UPBLOWN" Waugh investigated and swiftly replied: 'NURSE UNUPBLOWN.'[7]

In his comic novel, Scoop, Waugh made good use of this experience. He has his inexperienced and naïve reporter receive a cable from his editor saying "NEWS EXYOU UNRECEIVED" and has the character, Boot, ineptly reply: "NOTHING MUCH HAS HAPPENED EXCEPT TO THE PRESIDENT WHO HAS BEEN IMPRISONED IN HIS OWN PALACE BY REVOLUTIONARY JUNTA HEADED BY SUPERIOR BLACK NAMED BENITO AND RUSSIAN JEW WHO BANNISTER SAYS IS UP TO NO GOOD THEY SAY HE IS DRUNK WHEN HIS CHILDREN TRY TO SEE HIM BUT GOVERNESS SAYS MOST UNUSUAL LOVELY SPRING WEATHER BUBONIC PLAGUE RAGING."[8]

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Some sources:

Frederick Theodore Frelinghuysen on wikipdia

Associated Press on wikipedia

Henry Morton Stanley on wikipedia

Electrical telegraph on wikipedia

Phillips Code on wikipedia

Alfred Vail on wikipedia
"Alfred Lewis Vail (September 25, 1807 – January 18, 1859) was a machinist and inventor. Vail was central, with Samuel F. B. Morse, in developing and commercializing the telegraph between 1837 and 1844.[1] Vail and Morse were the first two telegraph operators on Morse's first experimental line between Washington, DC, and Baltimore, and Vail took charge of building and managing several early telegraph lines between 1845 and 1848. He was also responsible for several technical innovations of Morse's system, particularly the sending key and improved recording registers and relay magnets. Vail left the telegraph industry in 1848 because he believed that the managers of Morse's lines did not fully value his contributions."

Walter Phillips

Sketches old and new by Walter Polk Phillips (J. H. Bunnell & company, 1897)

Journalism in the United States, from 1690-1872 by Frederic Hudson (Harper & Brothers, 1873)

Memoirs of Henry Villard

News over the wires

"The Associated Press, News-Gathering as a Business" by Melville E. Stone, The Century, Volume 70 (The Century Co., 1905)

"Great Business Operations — The Collection of News" by T.B. Connery, Cosmopolitan, Volume 23 (Schlicht and Field., 1897)

Early history of the electro-magnetic telegraph, from letters and journals of Alfred Vail by Alfred Vail (Hine brothers, 1914)

Sir Henry Morton Stanley

The Humours of Newspaper Enterprise, Chambers's journal Volume 72 (W. & R. Chambers, 1895)

Telegraph Lore

The electric telegraph by Dionysius Lardner and Edward Brailsford Bright (J. Walton, 1867)

Favorite Quotations by Mike Harney

Last word 'No invention more clearly showed the benefits of brevity than the telegram'

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Notes:

[1] prime users; why railroads terse

[2] Early history of the electro-magnetic telegraph, from letters and journals of Alfred Vail by Alfred Vail (Hine brothers, 1914)

1843

April 30th, "Telegraphed all day. The 2 wires worked well 22 miles." May 1st, "Telegraphed all day. In the afternoon announced the nomination of Mr. Frelinghuysen."

This seems to have been the first message, by telegraph, of a public nature.

May 2nd, Vail to his wife: "I yesterday announced the nomination of Henry Clay and Frelinghuysen to Washington."

October 14th, Washington. A. Vail to G. Vail: "Prof. M. returned on Friday—I am busily engaged here in telegraphing Election News."

[3]

The introduction of the telegraph was its great theme. Morse had no greater friend and supporter than the Herald. It felt that with the electric wire a new impulse would be given to the country and to the Press. It liberally used the wires from the first flash over them. It has spent hundreds of thousands of dollars in tolls. One of the probabilities of the future is that the Herald, as well as all others, will have all its news come by telegraph — that the mails will be as obsolete as stage-coaches.
-- Journalism in the United States, from 1690-1872 by Frederic Hudson (Harper & Brothers, 1873)

[4] This was Alexander Jones. He managed the New York Associated Press in its early years and then moved to the New York Herald where he eventually became the commercial editor.

[4] Earnest efforts have been made to track down the origins of this story. See The Legend of Cary Grant's Telegram and How Old Cary Grant? Old Cary Grant Fine, How You?.

[5] Martin White, in an email to the Telegraph (U.K.): Over to you: Telex messaging, Geiger counters and statistics

[6] World Wide Words, Issue 697, 31 July 2010

[7] Twentieth-century English by Christian Mair (Cambridge University Press, 2006)

[8] Black mischief: Scoop; The loved one; The ordeal of Gilbert Pinfold by Evelyn Waugh, edited with an introduction by Ann Pasternak Slater (Random, 2003)

glitches

I wrote recently that reporters don't get the benefit of as much editing as they used to. Day by day, the Columbia Journalism Review kindly points to shortcomings in their stories. But, though fewer in numbers than formerly, editors do still exist and do still seek to improve the writings that come to them.

Instances:

1. Gawker recently called attention to a production error that both shows some of the sloppiness revealed in CJR alerts and shows the editorial blue pencil at its best. Yesterday morning Gawker's Hamilton Nolan gave us
A Washington Post Story With All the Editor’s Notes In It in which he shows a WaPo piece picked up from the Louisville Courier Journal containing both the writer's text and the editor's ideas for strengthening it. It was, as my son points out, a CJ web editor's inattention which let the story appear prematurely. And it was a CJ copy editor's carefulness that is shown in the thoughtful interpolations (IN CAPS) throughout the text.

Not long after the Gawker piece showed up, Betsy Rothstein picked up the story in a post called Editing Disaster Alert:WaPo Botches Pap Smear Story on mediabistro's FishbowlDC blog.

Both accounts are worth reading, as is the CJR's take on the matter — A Glimpse into WaPo’s Editing Practices — by Joel Meares, which came out Tuesday morning this week.

It's kind of interesting that Betsy Rothstein and Joel Meares both do good work, but, whether by oversight or design, she does not mention the Nolan piece and Meares does not mention hers.

2. Not long ago Matt Seaton of the Guardian, wrote a blog post showing another side of the editorial contribution to newspaper writing: Abraham Lincoln's 1861 address, abridged. While preparing for publication Eric Foner's article on the 150th anniversary of Abraham Lincoln's inauguration speech Seaton searched for a copy of the speech so that he could link to it. The one he found, at University of Virginia's Miller Centre of Public Affairs, did not contain text which Foner quoted and, checking further, he found that the Miller Center text was considerably shorter than the original. (I've checked the two and found the Miller Center text to have been a third shorter.)

Because they deal with slavery, Seaton thought the omissions might have been intentional, but, on querying the Center, he received a reply saying the Bowlderization was caused by a "technical glitch." The reply states: "We recently moved much of the content on our website from an old content management system to a new one. A programming error in the script used to migrate the content failed to anticipate certain HTML tags, so the software removed them and all content in between them. This caused entire paragraphs to be deleted in several speeches." (The Miller Center response is given in an update to Seaton's article.)

There's a debate about the excisions in the comments to Seaton's post. Seaton himself is satisfied with the Miller Center explanation and withdraws his suspicion that someone deliberately removed references to slavery as a main cause of the emerging conflict between South and North. However a commenter jokes that the html code which choked the new CMS wasn't benign: "Yes I too am reassured that the University of Virginia has fully explained the 'technical glitch' involving html tags that excised parts of Lincolns address. Presumably it was the fault of the little known <remove reference to slavery>\</remove reference to slavery> tag?"

Personally, I have a problem with the explanation that the Miller Center gives. If you search the Wayback machine for instances of Lincoln's speech in the Center's web pages, you find two in 2010, four in 2009, and two in 2008. The Center says a programming error caused the deletions during "a recent move" to a new CMS. I didn't check them all, but the version of the speech that Wayback captured in October 2008 is missing the deleted text and it seems to me October 2008 doesn't qualify as "recent."

There's also evidence that the CMS used in 2008 was very different from the one used now. You can see this in the Wayback-captured html coding of the versions of the speech given on the Center's web site in both 2008 and 2011. The code does not name the CMS used in either case, but, given the differences in coding it seems very unlikely to be the same one.

This is the coded first sentence of the speech in the 2008 version:

<h4>Transcript</h4><p><p>Fellow citizens of the United States:</p>
<p>In compliance with a custom as old as the government itself, I appear before you to address you briefly, and to take, in your presence, the oath prescribed by the Constitution of the United States, to be taken by the President "before he enters on the execution of his office." </p>

This is the same sentence as it appears in the current version:

<div id="transcript"><h4>Transcript</h4><p> </p><div id="_mcePaste" style="position: absolute; left: -10000px; top: 0px; width: 1px; height: 1px; overflow-x: hidden; overflow-y: hidden;">Fellow citizens of the United States:</div><div id="_mcePaste" style="position: absolute; left: -10000px; top: 0px; width: 1px; height: 1px; overflow-x: hidden; overflow-y: hidden;">In compliance with a custom as old as the government itself, I appear before you to address you briefly, and to take in your presence the oath prescribed by the Constitution of the United States to be taken by the President "before he enters on the execution of his office."</div>

It's possible that there was yet another (pre-2008) CMS and that the programming mistake occured while moving the speech from an older CMS to the CMS that was used in 2008. And it's possible that the Miller Center didn't wish to explain that they've upgraded their CMS yet another time since the "technical glitch" occured. Possible, yes; but it doesn't seem likely to me.

Here are five paragraphs in the version that currently appears:

I do not forget the position, assumed by some, that constitutional questions are to be decided by the Supreme Court; nor do I deny that such decisions must be binding, in any case, upon the parties to a suit, as to the object of that suit, while they are also entitled to very high respect and consideration in all parallel cases by all other departments of the government. And while it is obviously possible that such decision may be erroneous in any given case, still the evil effect following it, being limited to that particular case, with the chance that it may be overruled and never become a precedent for other cases, can better be borne than could the evils of a different practice. At the same time, the candid citizen must confess that if the policy of the government, upon vital questions affecting the whole people, is to be irrevocably fixed by decisions of the Supreme Court, the instant they are made, in ordinary litigation between parties in personal actions, the people will have ceased to be their own rulers, having to that extent practically resigned their government into the hands of that eminent tribunal. Nor is there in this view any assault upon the court or the judges. It is a duty from which they may not shrink to decide cases properly brought before them, and it is no fault of theirs if others seek to turn their decisions to political purposes.

One section of our country believes slavery is right, and ought to be extended, while the other believes it is wrong, and ought not to be extended. This is the only substantial dispute. The fugitive-slave clause of the Constitution, and the law for the suppression of the foreign slave-trade, are each as well enforced, perhaps, as any law can ever be in a community where the moral sense of the people imperfectly supports the law itself. The great body of the people abide by the dry legal obligation in both cases, and a few break over in each. This, I think, cannot be perfectly cured; and it would be worse in both cases after the separation of the sections than before. The foreign slave-trade, now imperfectly suppressed, would be ultimately revived, without restriction, in one section, while fugitive slaves, now only partially surrendered, would not be surrendered at all by the other.

Physically speaking, we cannot separate. We cannot remove our respective sections from each other, nor build an impassable wall between them. A husband and wife may be divorced, and go out of the presence and beyond the reach of each other; but the different parts of our country cannot do this. They cannot but remain face to face, and intercourse, either amicable or hostile, must continue between them. Is it possible, then, to make that intercourse more advantageous or more satisfactory after separation than before? Can aliens make treaties easier than friends can make laws? Can treaties be more faithfully enforced between aliens than laws can among friends? Suppose you go to war, you cannot fight always; and when, after much loss on both sides, and no gain on either, you cease fighting, the identical old questions as to terms of intercourse are again upon you.

This country, with its institutions, belongs to the people who inhabit it. Whenever they shall grow weary of the existing government, they can exercise their constitutional right of amending it, or their revolutionary right to dismember or overthrow it. I cannot be ignorant of the fact that many worthy and patriotic citizens are desirous of having the National Constitution amended. While I make no recommendation of amendments, I fully recognize the rightful authority of the people over the whole subject, to be exercised in either of the modes prescribed in the instrument itself; and I should, under existing circumstances, favor rather than oppose a fair opportunity being afforded the people to act upon it.

I will venture to add that to me the convention mode seems preferable, in that it allows amendments to originate with the people themselves, instead of only permitting them to take or reject propositions originated by others not especially chosen for the purpose, and which might not be precisely such as they would wish to either accept or refuse. I understand a proposed amendment to the Constitution—which amendment, however, I have not seen—has passed Congress, to the effect that the Federal Government shall never interfere with the domestic institutions of the States, including that of persons held to service. To avoid misconstruction of what I have said, I depart from my purpose not to speak of particular amendments so far as to say that, holding such a provision to now be implied constitutional law, I have no objection to its being made express and irrevocable.

They are reduced to only two in the version on the Wayback machine from October 16, 2008:

I do not forget the position assumed by some, that constitutional questions are to be decided by the Supreme Court; nor do I deny that such decisions must be binding in any case, upon the parties to a suit, as to the object of that suit, while they are also entitled to very high respect and consideration, in all paralel cases, by all other departments of the government. And while it is obviously possible that such decision may be erroneous in any given case, still the evil effect following it, being limited to that particular case, with the chance that it may be over-ruled, and never become a precedent for other cases, can better be borne than could the evils of a different practice. At the same time the candid citizen must confess that if the policy of the government, upon vital questions, affecting the whole people, is to be irrevocably fixed by decisions of the Supreme Court, the instant they are made, in ordinary litigation between parties, in personal actions, the people will have ceased, to be their own rulers, having, to that extent, practically resigned their government, into the hands of that eminent tribunal. Nor is there, in this view, any assault upon the court, or the judges. It is a duty, from which they may not shrink, to decide cases properly brought before them; and it is no fault of theirs, if others seek to turn their decisions to political purposes.

I will venture to add that, to me, the convention mode seems preferable, in that it allows amendments to originate with the people themselves, instead of only permitting them to take, or reject, propositions, originated by others, not especially chosen for the purpose, and which might not be precisely such, as they would wish to either accept or refuse. I understand a proposed amendment to the Constitution---which amendment, however, I have not seen, has passed Congress, to the effect that the federal government, shall never interfere with the domestic institutions of the States, including that of persons held to service. To avoid misconstruction of what I have said, I depart from my purpose not to speak of particular amendments, so far as to say that, holding such a provision to now be implied constitutional law, I have no objection to its being made express, and irrevocable.

slick stuff

I imagine journalists have always felt a bit torn between two desires that are mostly in competition with one another. They want to be respected for the quality of their writing and want also to gain as many readers as possible. The quest for quality tends toward depth, nuance, and balance. The quest for numbers of readers tends toward simplification, exaggeration, and surprise. As the size of newsrooms dwindles one expects this personal, internal struggle to increase as each journalist tries to show how very good she or he is both at delivering excellence and at capturing vast quantities of eyeballs. This conflict of personal ambitions can, and I think frequently does, lead both to honest mistakes and to guilty transgressions. The case I outlined yesterday seems apt. A reporter jumped at the chance to put on display a stalwart union member in blue collar Janesville, Wisconsin — a man, he wrote, who turned against his kind and became a supporter of Governor Walker and the Gov.'s union-bashing policies. The reporter assumed his prize exhibition to be a card-carrying UAW-ite and neither he nor his editor took the trouble to check whether this assumption was correct. It was not. I'd like to be able to say he and his paper are now forced to regret the negligence, but, as my blog post indicates, this doesn't (at least yet) seem to be so.

It's easy to find examples which show journalist eagerness getting the better of journalist caution. The events leading to the dismissal of Kurt Bardella are an instance. Jack Shafer's piece in Slate gives all I expect you'll need to know about this. A congressional staffer in the office of Rep. Darrell Issa, Bardella took advantage of reporters' pitiful eagerness for scraps of news. Playing a game of suck-up that (apparently) is all too common in Washington, the reporters let themselves be led by the nose. Unwilling to set a news item in its proper context, they wrote up what was handed to them as if it were their own work. Shafer points to the moral: "Faux scandals such as the one unfolding in Issa's office stand to remind us that every reader needs to be his own press critic, constantly asking himself if the publication he's reading — or the channel he is watching — is in the tank for its sources. If a story reads a lot like a press release, say, it's the first to report that Rep. Cheese is going run for speaker of the House, it probably is a gussied-up press release." (Ryan Lizza, in the New Yorker, adds to the story: News Desk: Issa and His Aide.)

I've a second example of a similar nature. Seeking to make the most of a fairly routine press release, PopSci's Clay Dillow comes to the sensational conclusion that New 'Nanolube' Could Cut Engine Friction by More Than Half. Trouble is, he misreads the press release on which he bases his story. As one commenter helpfully (and very politely) points out: "I'm not sure the amount of friction reduction is as significant as this article implies, hence this article may be titled incorrectly... I think we need some better numbers and more descriptive language before we jump to conclusions about how much these nanopolymers are going to double our gas mileage and make our engines last forever." It doesn't take much internet sleuthing to find out that the commenter is right. The press release says quite distinctly that the nanoparticle technique was able increase the performance of the best available lubricants by half again (55%). Thus if a lubricant were able to reduce friction by 10% then the lubricant plus nano-additive would reduce it by a bit more than 15%. There is nothing in the nano-research that showed the technique "could cut engine friction by more than half."

In his eagerness for a good story Dillow not only misreads his source, but also fails to notify the reader that the research he reports was first published not this month or last, but more than a year ago, in December 2009. The press release he glommed onto is about an award given to the primary researcher, not — primarily — the research outcome. As the flaks at the researcher's university tell us: "Dr. Liu’s discovery has earned the Society of Tribologists and Lubrication Engineers’ Captain Alfred E. Hunt Memorial Award. This prestigious award is given annually to the STLE member who authors the best paper dealing with the field of lubrication or an allied field."

Shafer's right to say we should our own press critics. You should, he says, "be no more gullible in your news consumption than you are when buying a used car."

straight facts

It's not always easy for journalists to get their facts straight. Even back when papers could afford the salaries of editors and re-write men, they still would sometimes get names wrong, dates wrong, affiliations wrong. Now that money has fled it's much harder for them to get things right. Still, when the New York Times features a front page piece by a reporter named Sulzberger, you expect some extra attention to detail. You expect it the more when highly-contentious politics are involved. Just as much, you expect that when a key "fact" given in the top two paragraphs is shown to be false, the Great Gray Lady will give prominence to the correction so that it will be picked up by the thousands of outlets that have already shown their readers the erroneous information.

Not so.

Here's how the article originally began. I've highlighted the phrase that the Times later corrected.

JANESVILLE, Wis. -- Rich Hahan worked at the General Motors plant here until it closed about two years ago. He moved to Detroit to take another G.M. job while his wife and children stayed here, but then the automaker cut more jobs. So Mr. Hahan, 50, found himself back in Janesville, collecting unemployment for a time, and watching as the city's industrial base seemed to crumble away. Among the top five employers here are the county, the schools and the city. And that was enough to make Mr. Hahan, a union man from a union town, a supporter of Gov. Scott Walker's sweeping proposal to cut the benefits and collective-bargaining rights of public workers in Wisconsin, a plan that has set off a firestorm of debate and protests at the state Capitol. He says he still believes in unions, but thinks those in the public sector lead to wasteful spending because of what he sees as lavish benefits and endless negotiations. "Something needs to be done," he said, "and quickly."

Here's the Times' whoopsie note, published four days later at the bottom of page 2:

Correction: February 26, 2011

A front-page article on Tuesday about reaction among private-sector workers in Wisconsin to Gov. Scott Walker’s effort to cut benefits and collective-bargaining rights for unionized public employees referred incorrectly to the work history of one person quoted, and also misspelled his surname. While the man, Rich Hahn (not Hahan) described himself to a reporter as a "union guy," he now says that he has worked at unionized factories, but was not himself a union member. (The Times contacted Mr. Hahn again to review his background after a United Auto Workers official said the union had no record of his membership.)

As you might expect, the original article achieved much greater reach than the corrected version that's now online. A Google search for the original, uncorrected, text gives close to 3,000 hits while a search for the corrected text gives 119 at the moment.

All this is the more interesting because Wisconsin's Gov. Walker referred to the erroneous text in his notorious phone conversation with the faux David Koch. In it Walker says he wants wide distribution of the Sulzberger piece, particularly among people who have doubts about his union bashing campaign.

A reporter on the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel Daniel Bice did a nice, succinct blog post on this subject yesterday. It has also drawn a highly-readable tirade from Keith Olbermann.

I haven't found any news hounds who've uncovered how it was that Sulzberger came to be speaking with Rich Hahn in Janesville. It's pretty certain that he and Monica Davey did not just show up and begin interviewing people at random. They might have had a local handler with them and that handler might have had a connection with Wisconsin Republicans, but it's just as likely they used other local sources. The local chamber of commerce is one possibility. It's a fact that the Times article has been rebroadcast via a collection of web sites that all have the domain name "CITYNAMEbusinessvotes.com" and all these sites are affiliated with local chambers of commerce across the U.S. (for example the Ashland OH, C-of-C).

From the article itself it seems pretty clear that neither Sulzberger nor Davey asked for a backgrounding from the Times' premier labor reporter, Steven Greenhouse. As Jason Linkins points out, "just a year ago, Greenhouse wrote a long and excellent investigation of Janesville's GM plant for Granta (Janesville, Wisconsin). In it, Greenhouse looked at the plant closure, the unions, and all the factors at play."

Having been given some front-page real estate for his story, you'd think Sulzberger would be happy to publicize it but you'd be wrong. As Jonathan Schwarz points out, Sulzberger wrote a 733-word article about the Walker prank call and in it, he says A.G.S. unaccountably fails to mention something: "Number of mentions of Walker loving a certain Sulzberger-written New York Times article?" he asks. And "Zero," he answers.

Sweden vs US

Ursula Le Guin's Earthsea cycle is a favorite work by a favorite author. I vividly recall the moment when, in the fourth novel of the series, Ged comes to understand the value of not doing. He who has 'til then spent his life making things happen, quietens, becomes reflective, learns to observe and not intervene.

This appreciation of mine explains the attraction of a column by David Brooks in the New York Times this week. Entitled The Limits of Policy, it's about doing less rather than not doing, but the theme is similar.

Brooks uses two phenomena, as he calls them, to tell us (paraphrasing a bit) not that governmental policy choices are meaningless, but we should be realistic about them. "The influence of politics and policy is usually swamped by the influence of culture, ethnicity, psychology and a dozen other factors."

The first phenomena concerns Swedes in Sweden compared with Swedes in the United States. Brooks uses some stats in an attempt to show (1) that two polities with different philosophies of government can have very similar outcomes and (2) that significant changes in public policy may not change social welfare outcomes over lengthy periods of time. It's a short piece and its main points easily grasped. He lays out his evidence well and states his conclusions succinctly.

He says the philosophies of the governments of Sweden and the U.S. differ greatly, yet the well-being of Swedes in their homeland doesn't differ much from that of Swedes whose families emigrated to America. A half-century of welfare-state policies in Sweden hasn't bought about big improvements in the lives of Swedes in Sweden when compared to Swedish-Americans, and Swedish-Americans today are no worse off than Swedes in Sweden.

Brooks indicates where he got his data and my superficial check doesn't show that he's abused his sources. As you'd expect he's selected stats that support his thesis and ignored ones that don't. He says 6.7% of Swedes live in poverty and exactly the same proportion of Swedish-Americans live in poverty. And he says in 1950 Swedes lived about 2.6 years longer than Americans and these days they live 2.7 years longer, which doesn't seem like much of a difference to him given what he sees as the huge expense of the Swedish social-system over that time.

A first question that comes to mind regarding this is how much the Swedish welfare-state model differs from the American. Most of us would say the Swedish system is comprehensive and extremely expensive. Yet if you consider the total welfare expenditure in the U.S., at least by one comprehensive measure, we in the U.S. are currently allocating about 35% our Gross Domestic Product to this purpose. I can't find the precise stat, but I believe the allocation in Sweden is about the same. The difference in policy seems to lie not so much in the amounts the two countries each spend on social welfare as in the sources of funds they use. In the U.S., much does not come from direct government cash outlays but from indirect sources (there's a list of some of these here) whereas in Sweden costs are much more likely to come from highly visible public expenditure.

A second question is whether the indicators Brooks uses do actually show what he intends. When he says that the same percentage of Swedes and Swedish-Americans live in poverty, he's relying on data from a study that aims to convince Swedes that their high-tax system is not worth the money they're spending on it (Is Sweden a False Utopia? by Nima Sanandaji and Robert Gidehag). It's a highly polemical piece in which the authors wildly extrapolate from a few social indicators. Example: "Rather than being the cause of Sweden’s social strengths, the high-tax welfare state might have been enabled by the hard-won Swedish stock of social capital. It was well before the welfare state, when hard work paid off, that a culture with strong protestant working ethics developed."

The data showing comparative poverty rates in this article come from a study by two Dutch economists. It may not surprise that Sanandaji and Gidehag have cherry-picked data out of this study. The study does say that by one constant measure, 6.7% of Swedes live in poverty. It doesn't give data on Swedish-Americans. That stat comes from another source which the authors don't trouble themselves to cite (possibly a Census report).

Looking at the data provided by the Dutch economists leads me to suspect that it's wrong to compare poverty level of everyone in Sweden with the more homogeneous group of Americans of Swedish extraction. The current Swedish population is only about 85% ethnically Swedish. I don't know the ethnic makeup of Swedish-Americans but believe it's, as I say, more homogeneous.* Moreover, those who self-identify as Swedish-Americans, many of whose ancestors arrived in the U.S. before 1920, may not have a great deal in common with the current population of Sweden. Their Swedishness may be quite different from what's actually Swedish today.

Brooks uses life expectancy as a measure of health care — Swedes lived 2.6 years longer than Americans in 1950 and 2.7 years longer today. Life expectancy may be a useful indicator, but it's a pretty crude one. For an accurate health comparison of Swedes and Americans in 1950 versus Swedes and Americans today, it would be much more satisfying to see a table like this for 1950 (this one just shows today):

Country	Life expectancy	Infant mortality rate	Physicians per 1000 people	Nurses per 1000 people	Per cap. expenditure on health (USD)	Healthcare costs as a percent of GDP	% of government revenue spent on health	% of health costs paid by gov't
Sweden	81.0	2.5	3.6	10.8	3,323	9.1	13.6	81.7
USA	78.1	6.7	2.4	10.6	7,290	16.0	18.5	45.4

{-- source: Health care system article on wikipedia}

Brooks' second phenomenon compares ethnic groups within the U.S. He says both ethnicity and geographic location "make a gigantic difference in how you will live."

His source for this observation is a study recently published by the Social Science Research Council: A Century Apart: New Measures of Well-being for U.S. Racial and Ethnic Groups. This report uses something called the American Human Development Index to generate data on the well-being of cross-sections of the U.S. population. It makes comparisons for racial and ethnic groups by geographic location (state). The authors call attention to disparities in life expectancy, educational enrollment, educational degree attainment, and median personal earnings among groups in different locales.

Brooks uses these stats to make a point about "social capital." He defines social capital as "historical experiences, cultural attitudes, child-rearing practices, family formation patterns, expectations about the future, work ethics and the quality of social bonds." And he says that a large number of "soft factors," such as different psychological, cultural and social factors combine in myriad ways to produce different viewpoints." His point: "As a result of these different viewpoints, the average behavior is different between different ethnic and geographic groups, leading to different life outcomes." This sounds like a nuanced version of my quote from Nima Sanandaji and Robert Gidehag. They say, in effect, Swedes are long-lived, healthy, prosperous, and well educated because of their "the hard-won Swedish stock of social capital." Swedes, they say, are fortunate to possess "a culture with strong protestant working ethics" and to have grown up in an environment in which hard work paid off. They say it is due to this stock of social capital that Sweden scores high on the Human Development Index not because of its costly and wasteful welfare-state politics.

But Brooks doesn't go in this direction. Instead he simply cautions that governments should not ignore the complex cultural determinants at work within the nation's heterogeneous population. He gives these recommendations:

The first rule of policy-making should be, don’t promulgate a policy that will destroy social bonds. If you take tribes of people, exile them from their homelands and ship them to strange, arid lands, you’re going to produce bad outcomes for generations. Second, try to establish basic security. If the government can establish a basic level of economic and physical security, people may create a culture of achievement — if you’re lucky. Third, try to use policy to strengthen relationships. The best policies, like good preschool and military service, fortify emotional bonds.

This sounds a lot like what Moynihan was trying to tell us back in the 1960s. Moynihan drew a lot of flak back then and it will be intersting to see whether Brooks does today.

He ends the piece: "Finally, we should all probably calm down about politics. Most of the proposals we argue about so ferociously will have only marginal effects on how we live, especially compared with the ethnic, regional and social differences that we so studiously ignore." I'm sure many agree that calmness should rule, but that government policies will have only "marginal effects" he hasn't demonstrated and probably can't. Despite my affection for Le Guin's not doing, I believe we elect officials to make policies for the betterment of the nation. Yes, as Brooks warns, they can overdo it, but act they must and, when they act, what they do does not have only marginal effect.

With respect to his first phenomenon, it's probably closer to the truth to say that American and Swedish policies look very different, but have much the same efficiencies, costs and effects, with the Swedish ones having a demonstrably superior edge by almost every measure. Perhaps the best indicator of this is the simple fact that Sweden is 7th and the U.S. 13th in overall rankings measured by the International Human Development Index, yet other indicators abound. For example, the annual growth rate of Sweden's Gross Domestic Product, per capita, is higher than that of the U.S., the after-tax median monthly disposable Swedish salary is also higher, the government expenditure on health as a percentage of total government expenditure is lower, and the cost of living is very nearly the same.***

With respect to his second phenomenon, disparities among ethnic groups and regions across the country shouldn't be taken as signs that government policy can't address in exactly the same way all needs of all people in all places. I don't think there are many who think it can. But targeted policies can and do address the needs of specific groups in specific places, and general policies can and do effect overall improvements despite ethic and regional differences.

Brooks is right to say these things are not easy and policy mistakes occur often enough, but that's no reason to convince ourselves that policy makers have only marginal effect when they prepare laws and regulations.

{source: NYT}

--------------

See also:

Ranking of countries by Human Development Index

COMPARATIVE ECONOMIC STATISTICS: NATIONAL INCOME AND THE STANDARD OF LIVING from Baylor Univ.

Daniel Patrick Moynihan article on wikipedia

The Moynihan Report

The modern U.S. welfare state article on wikipedia

Welfare in the U.S. article on wikipedia

Montesquieu's Meteorological Climate Theory article on wikipedia



--------------

Notes:

* Comparing all Swedes to all Americans leads to data that you'd expect to see: By one constant measure (the official EU poverty estimation), 23.5% of Americans live in poverty compared to 10.4% of Swedes. Using another constant measure (the one used in the U.S.), the amounts are 8.7% for the U.S. and 6.7% for Sweden.

---

** Human Development Index Indicators from the 2009 Report of the UN Development Program

        Sweden   United States 
   
International migrants as a percentage of total population

1960  4.0  5.8
2005  12.3  13.0
   
Life expectancy at birth (years)

2007  80.8  79.1
   
Annual growth rate of GDP per capita (%)

1990-2007  2.3  2.0
   
Government expenditure on health per capita (PPP US$)

2006  2,533  3,074
   
Government expenditure on health as a percentage of 
total government expenditure

      13.4  19.1
   
Percentage of adults with low educational attainment 
levels (% aged 25 and above)

      20.7  14.8
   
Percentage of adults with medium educational attainment 
levels (% aged 25 and above)

      51.1  49.0
   
Percentage of adults with high educational attainment 
levels (% aged 25 and above)

      27.0  36.2 

---

***Cost of Living in Sweden

Consumer Price Index (Excl.Rent): 95.49
Rent Index: 28.92
Groceries Index: 89.58
Restaurants Index: 91.42
Consumer Price Plus Rent Index: 65.81
Local Purchasing Power: 118.47

Restaurants
Meal, Inexpensive Restaurant 14.36 $
Meal for 2, Mid-range Restaurant 54.59 $
Combo Meal at McDonalds or Similar 8.65 $
Domestic Beer (0.5 liter draught) 5.74 $
Imported Beer (0.33 liter bottle) 6.08 $
Coke/Pepsi (0.33 liter bottle) 2.13 $
Water (0.33 liter bottle) 2.14 $

Markets
Milk (regular), 1 liter 1.03 $
Loaf of Fresh Bread 2.00 $
Eggs (12) 1.79 $
Fresh Cheese (1kg) 13.18 $
Water (1.5 liter bottle) 2.02 $
Bottle of Wine (Mid-Range) 8.63 $
Domestic Beer (0.5 liter bottle) 2.69 $
Imported Beer (0.33 liter bottle) 3.02 $
Pack of Cigarettes (Marlboro) 6.79 $

Transportation
One-way Ticket (local transport) 2.89 $
Monthly Pass 80.96 $
Taxi (5km within center) 29.63 $
Gasoline (1 liter) 1.62 $

Utilities (Monthly)
Basic (Electricity, Gas, Water, Garbage) 180.94 $
Mobile Phone 100 Minutes Call 10.19 $
Internet (2 Mbps ADSL flat) 26.78 $

Rent Per Month
Apartment (1 bedroom) in City Centre 614.23 $
Apartment (1 bedroom) Outside of Centre 443.15 $
Apartment (2 bedrooms) in City Centre 802.45 $
Apartment (2 bedrooms) Outside of Centre 675.81 $

Buy Apartment Price
Price per Square Meter to Buy Apartment in City Centre 3,842.45 $
Price per Square Meter to Buy Apartment Outside of Centre 2,622.69 $

Salaries And Financing
Median Monthly Disposable Salary (After Tax) 3,352.48 $
Mortgage Interest Rate in Percentanges (%), Yearly For USD / EUR 5.25

Last update : May, 2010

Country data (source CIA, 2008 est)
GDP Per Capita ($) : 38,500.00
GDP Growth Rate: 0.70%
Population Growth Rate: 0.16%

-----------------

Cost of Living in United States

Consumer Price Index (Excl.Rent): 78.43
Rent Index: 46.37
Groceries Index: 83.91
Restaurants Index: 66.09
Consumer Price Plus Rent Index: 64.13
Local Purchasing Power: 116.09

Restaurants
Meal, Inexpensive Restaurant 11.48 $
Meal for 2, Mid-range Restaurant 38.51 $
Combo Meal at McDonalds or Similar 5.96 $
Domestic Beer (0.5 liter draught) 3.62 $
Imported Beer (0.33 liter bottle) 4.69 $
Coke/Pepsi (0.33 liter bottle) 1.48 $
Water (0.33 liter bottle) 1.31 $

Markets
Milk (regular), 1 liter 1.32 $
Loaf of Fresh Bread 2.25 $
Eggs (12) 2.15 $
Fresh Cheese (1kg) 8.54 $
Water (1.5 liter bottle) 1.58 $
Bottle of Wine (Mid-Range) 11.18 $
Domestic Beer (0.5 liter bottle) 2.05 $
Imported Beer (0.33 liter bottle) 3.03 $
Pack of Cigarettes (Marlboro) 5.78 $

Transportation
One-way Ticket (local transport) 2.06 $
Monthly Pass 56.03 $
Taxi (5km within center) 12.56 $
Gasoline (1 liter) 0.75 $

Utilities (Monthly)
Basic (Electricity, Gas, Water, Garbage) 168.25 $
Mobile Phone 100 Minutes Call 36.06 $
Internet (2 Mbps ADSL flat) 36.84 $

Rent Per Month
Apartment (1 bedroom) in City Centre 970.11 $
Apartment (1 bedroom) Outside of Centre 746.93 $
Apartment (2 bedrooms) in City Centre 1,323.75 $
Apartment (2 bedrooms) Outside of Centre 1,024.35 $

Buy Apartment Price
Price per Square Meter to Buy Apartment in City Centre 2,441.87 $
Price per Square Meter to Buy Apartment Outside of Centre 1,203.51 $

Salaries And Financing
Median Monthly Disposable Salary (After Tax) 3,201.52 $
Mortgage Interest Rate in Percentanges (%), Yearly For USD / EUR 5.35

Last update : May, 2010


Country data (source CIA, 2008 est)
GDP Per Capita ($) : 47,000.00
GDP Growth Rate: 1.30%
Population Growth Rate: 0.98%

SB 1070

The new immigration law in Arizona isn't front-page news any more but the topic still has some traction. Most news articles and opinion pieces oppose the measure and it might seem safe to conclude that the law was a marginal bit of legislative extremism. When today I saw a headline saying opinion polls show broad support for tough Arizona immigration law I began to wonder, first, what questions the pollsters asked and, second, what the law actually says.

Unfortunately, it seems to be in the nature of reporters, bloggers, op-ed writers, and the like to isolate what's interesting in an issue and not tax the reader's patience by explaining at length ("first simplify, then exaggerate" is the extreme of this tendency). For this reason I didn't expect to find links to the poll methodologies and actual questionnaires nor to the text of the law. So far as the law text goes, my expectation was accurate. It's not hard to find the text, but you won't find the link in news sources. The polls were a little easier to track down. Only one source (CBS news) linked to both methodology and questionnaire, but others gave links to one or the other, or, at the least, the name of the organization that actually carried out the polling.

I've read about four polls.

A. Here's the first I located.

Nationally, 60% Favor Letting Local Police Stop and Verify Immigration Status

The relevant questions in this survey are these:

1. Do you favor or oppose legislation that authorizes local police to stop and verify the immigration status of anyone they suspect of being an illegal immigrant?

60% Favor
31% Oppose
10% Not sure

2. How concerned are you that efforts to identify and deport illegal immigrants will also end up violating the civil rights of some U.S. citizens?

29% Very concerned
29% Somewhat concerned
31% Not very concerned
8% Not at all concerned
3% Not sure

NOTE: Margin of Sampling Error, +/- 3 percentage points with a 95% level of confidence

-- source: National Survey of 1,000 Likely Voters Conducted April 22-23, 2010 By Rasmussen Reports

B. The second poll I located was sponsored by the New York Times and CBS News. Here's the NYT headline and a graphic:

Poll Shows Most in U.S. Want Overhaul of Immigration Laws



Here's the CBS News headline and their graphic:

Poll: Majority Backs Arizona Immigration Bill



Here are the relevant questions in this survey:

q67 As you may know, the state of Arizona recently passed a law that 
gives the police the power to question anyone they suspect is in the 
country illegally, requires people to produce documents verifying 
their status if asked, and allows officers to detain anyone who 
cannot do so. Do you think this law goes too far in dealing with the 
issue of illegal immigration, doesn't go far enough, 
or is it about right?

Numbers are percentages

                 Total Rep Dem Ind
Too far             36  21  49  34
Not far enough       9   9   9  10
About right         51  67  38  51
DK/NA                4   3   4   5

q68 How likely do you think it is that the new law in Arizona will
lead to police officers detaining people of certain racial or ethnic
groups more frequently than other racial or ethnic groups? Do you 
think that is very likely to happen, somewhat likely, not too likely 
or not at all likely to happen?

Very likely          50  32  63  51
Somewhat likely      32  46  29  25
Not too likely       11  17   5  13
Not at all likely     4   3   2   7
DK/NA                 3   2   1   4

q69 How likely do you think it is that the new law in Arizona will 
deter immigrants from reporting crime or cooperating with authorities 
out of fear of being deported? 
Do you think that is very likely to happen, somewhat likely, not too 
likely or not at all likely to happen?

Very likely           55  44  62  57
Somewhat likely       25  32  25  21
Not too likely        10  15   9   9
Not at all likely      5   6   3   7
DK/NA                  5   3   1   6

q70 How likely do you think it is that the new law in Arizona will 
burden the resources of state and local police departments? Do you 
think that is very likely to happen, somewhat likely, not too likely 
or not at all likely to happen?

Very likely           34  24  47  29
Somewhat likely       44  49  39  44
Not too likely        13  18   8  14
Not at all likely      6   7   4   8
DK/NA                  3   2   2   5

q71 How likely do you think it is that the new law in Arizona will 
lead to a reduction in the number of illegal immigrants currently in 
Arizona? Do you think that is very likely to happen, somewhat likely, 
not too likely or not at all likely to happen?

Very likely           29  38  25  26
Somewhat likely       43  43  42  43
Not too likely        16  15  20  15
Not at all likely      7   3   8   9
DK/NA                  5   1   5   7

q72 How likely do you think it is that the new law in Arizona will 
deter people from other countries from illegally crossing the border 
into Arizona? Do you think that is very likely to happen, somewhat 
likely, not too likely or not at all likely to happen?

Very likely           29  30  23  33
Somewhat likely       40  43  44  36
Not too likely        18  19  18  17
Not at all likely      8   6   9   9
DK/NA                  5   2   6   5

q73 How likely do you think it is that the new law in Arizona will 
reduce crime in that state? Do you think that is very likely to 
happen, somewhat likely, not too likely or not at all likely to 
happen?

Very likely           19  24  18  16
Somewhat likely       35  41  32  34
Not too likely        25  21  28  26
Not at all likely     15  11  18  15
DK/NA                  6   3   4   9

Sample sizes:
Total Respondents 1079
Total Republicans 320 Total Democrats 380 Total Independents 379

-- source: ILLEGAL IMMIGRATION AND THE NEW ARIZONA STATE LAW (pdf)

This poll has been criticised for "slant" but I haven't seen a criticism of all the "how likely do think it is" questions. I know I'd have to say "don't know" to most, maybe all of them and wonder why the DK/NA totals are so small. From the huge ideological splits shown in peoples' response to these expectation-type questions, I suspect people are being guided by what they're reading and hearing in opinion-based sources. This is fair enough, but suggests to me that, since — if I'm right — they're just reflecting the views of others, the responses don't have much value.

C. The third is a Gallup poll: More Americans Favor Than Oppose Arizona Immigration Law. It asked whether people favored or opposed the law and then whether they thought they knew much about it.





D. The last is an online poll conducted by an online polling organizaton: Polls & Research Archive Search Advanced Search Americans Support Arizona Immigration Bill April 29, 2010. Here's what it asked.

As you may know, the Arizona Senate recently passed an immigration bill. Would you support enacting each one of these regulations included in the Arizona immigration bill in your own state?

	Support	Oppose	Not sure
Making it a crime to transport someone who is an illegal immigrant	76%	18%	6%
Requiring state and local police to determine the status of a person if there is "reasonable suspicion" that they are illegal immigrants	71%	22%	7%
Arresting people who are unable to provide documentation to prove they are in the U.S. legally	71%	23%	6%
Making it a crime to hire day labourers off the street	53%	39%	8%

As to the Arizona law itself, only one legal blog entry provided a link to its text. You can find it here:
SENATE BILL 1070 (pdf)
State of Arizona
Senate
Forty-ninth Legislature
Second Regular Session
2010

You might expect to find dozens of pages of legal garbage in fine print, but it's actually short and in ordinary English.

There are some amendments that are summarized here: Proposed Amendments to Arizona Immigration Law SB 1070. They seek to remove potential conflict between provisions of the law and rights guaranteed by the federal goverment.

If you read the law, you can see how large numbers of Americans might answer pollsters' questions by saying they believe police officers, having made "lawful contact" with a person, should make reasonable attempt, when practicable, to verify the immigration status of that person in cases the officers suspect the person is "unlawfully present in the United States." It's also not surprising that most of these same Americans would say they worry that the police might abuse this authority and single out people of a certain appearance and thus violate their civil rights.

Two quotes in a news report put what I'm saying in other words: (1) "The majority of Americans are not anti-immigrant, pro-illegals, or in favor of a police state. Instead, they want government to uphold the rule of law, and they want America to continue to be a country that stands by its long heritage of welcoming those, as the inscription on the Statute of Liberty reads, who are 'yearning to breathe free.' The real story is that." (2) "The deeper questions are whether people are OK with citizens and legal residents being stopped by police and asked to prove their status, and how far police can go to creating the reasonable suspicion." The first quote comes from Lara Brown, a political scientist at Villanova University. The second one is from Ben Johnson, director of the American Immigration Council.

-- news source: Opinion polls show broad support for tough Arizona immigration law

These points of view emerge from yet another poll. USA Today is reporting on a fifth poll which it sponsored with Gallup. I haven't found a report of this one on the Gallup site nor found a copy of the questionnaire. The article says almost 70% of Americans want to stop illegal immigrants from entering the country; yet even more "are somewhat or very concerned that tougher immigration laws would lead to harassment of Hispanics." About 80% say that illegal immigrants are a big drag on the economy, burdening schools, driving down wages, and the like; yet almost the same number "are concerned that stricter laws would mean illegal immigrants and their families who have lived productively in the United States for years would be forced to leave."

So the headline I saw about broad national support for Arizona's restrictive legislation isn't — shouldn't be — entirely dis-heartening. However, in digging further into the subject, I did find something that frightened me. The report on the Rasmussen survey gave some background information on attitudes toward illegal immigration and closed with a paragraph saying that Arizona voters strongly support Joe Arpaio and his Wild West approach to his job as — in his words — "America's Toughest Sheriff." It says "on a personal basis, Arpaio is viewed favorably by 68% of Arizona voters." If you haven't been reading about this guy, I recommend you do so.

The Rasmussen analyst also gives some useful background on the Arizona law:

The new survey results are consistent with findings conducted over many years. Three-out-of-four voters believe that the federal government is not doing enough to secure the nation’s borders. In fact, 56% believe that the policies of the federal government encourage illegal immigration. Among voters who are angry about immigration, 83% are angry at the federal government. Only 12% direct their anger at the immigrants

The biggest point of disconnect between voters and the conventional wisdom in Washington, D.C. has to do with priorities. Almost always in Washington, the debate begins with a focus on how to address the status of illegal immigrants. To voters, that is a secondary concern. Controlling the borders is the top concern. That hasn’t changed since the 2006 immigration legislation collapsed when the U.S. Senate surrendered to public opinion. During that debate, a New York Times/CBS poll found that 69% believed illegal immigrants should be prosecuted and deported.

Other surveys have found that 73% of voters want cops to check the immigration status of all offenders during traffic stops. Sixty-seven percent (67%) also say that if law enforcement officers know of places where immigrants gather to find work, they should sometimes conduct surprise raids to identify and deport those who are here illegally.

Sixty-eight percent (68%) of voters nationwide say that those who knowingly hire illegal immigrants should be punished. By a 48% to 36% margin, voters say the same about landlords who rent to illegal immigrants. Additionally, 77% of voters nationwide oppose drivers’ licenses for undocumented immigrants. That topic tripped up Hillary Clinton in a debate during the race for the Democratic presidential nomination.

Joe Arpaio, the sheriff of Maricopa County in Arizona, created a national controversy by aggressively enforcing national immigration laws. While his efforts prompted a U.S. Justice Department civil rights investigation, the sheriff remains popular in his home state. Most Arizona voters not only support his policies, but 58% say he has been good for the state’s image. On a personal basis, Arpaio is viewed favorably by 68% of Arizona voters.

-------------------

{Chain-gang prisoners associated with one of Joe Arpaio's programs; source: AP}

{source: citizensrequired.com}

Some additional sources:

Meet Sheriff Joe Arpaio

Poll: Most in U.S. want better border control; But many fear Latinos may be harassed under tough laws

Arizona Immigration Law SB 1070

Factual Legal Question about Arizona Immigration Law

Arizona immigration law revised: backtracking or fine-tuning?

Sense and nonsense on Arizona law

Google FastFlip Search

Eyjafjallajokull

As previously mentioned, the Icelandic eruption made its biggest splash on my birthday just a week ago. The news continues to pile up about this event (the volcano, not my birthday). This I surely need not tell you.

As the news piles up, so, too, the images, and some of them are breathtaking. As is often the case, Alan Taylor's Big Picture, on Boston.com, assembles many of the best. Their second set, which came out a few days ago, includes this one.



If you've been struggling over how to pronounce the name of the thing, there's a new video which aims to help: It's a simple tune, with ukulele accompaniment, by Icelander Eliza Geirsdottir Newman, and is called simply Eyjafjallajokull.



Complementing the Big Picture photos, a microblogger called IvanZero has compiled quite a few volcano images, including these:


inothernews:


On fire (by Jaana-Marja)


Fire and Ice - Eyjafjallajökull Eruption (by orvaratli)


Electrified Ash - Eyjafjallajökull - Iceland (by orvaratli)


Eyjafjallajökull (by hallgrg)


Eruption in Eyjafjallajökull (by Gunnar Gestur)


Eyjafjallajökull eruption (by hallgrg)