I first state my reasons for why I believe it makes sense to replace Columbus Day with Indigenous Peoples Day. I then provide a number of different thoughts related to withdrawing my amendment.

The case for replacing Columbus Day with Indigenous Peoples Day

First, I don’t believe Columbus is deserving of a holiday or great respect. Like so many historic figures, his legacy is a mixed one, but it’s a mixed legacy that strikes me as far more negative than positive, as others have well articulated.

Second, to the extent many of us learned anything about Columbus Day, we learned about it as a day of celebration of a mythologized version of the man and his history, one that leaves out just how awfully he and others treated Indigenous Peoples they encountered.

Third, it makes sense to have a day to celebrate Indigenous Peoples. In my experience, Indigenous Peoples are often left out of history or are given minimal attention, and when they are covered they also are mythologized or they are caricatured. Indigenous Peoples have endured so much, and it makes sense to have a day to celebrate them as they are in reality.

Finally, it makes sense to celebrate Indigenous Peoples Day instead of and in place of Columbus Day. This recognizes the injustice done to Indigenous Peoples by Columbus and others and is a way of showing respect.

Summary statement about the withdrawal of my amendment to article 10

I recently proposed an amendment to article 10, the content of which I continue to stand by. I intend to make whatever motion is required to withdraw it at Town Meeting rather than motion for it to be voted on, and I’ve already shared this intention with the Town Clerk and Moderator.

The main reasons I’m withdrawing the amendment are (1) that I don’t think it will be helpful toward getting Article 10 to pass, and (2) that it seems like my way of going about this, including how late I submitted the amendment, is getting in the way of being able to have conversations I want to be having.

I sincerely apologize for anyone’s time I wasted and any worry, wonder, and aggravation I may have caused in the process of introducing and withdrawing the amendment.

The responses I received to the amendment

I was happy to receive a number of responses to the email I sent Town Meeting Members about the amendment, and I was able to talk to some people on the phone as well.

People who wrote to me and who I talked to provided different responses, categorized below:

  • They appreciated my efforts and my approach (from supporters of article 10)
  • They felt my amendment addressed concerns they had (from people concerned about article 10)
  • They thought I was wrong about the history and wished I would withdraw my amendment (from supporters of article 10)
  • They thought my amendment would confuse people at Town Meeting (from supporters of article 10)
  • They thought my amendment was an improvement but were opposed to article 10 for other reasons (from a supporter of the major rewrite amendment)

I greatly thank everyone who took the time to write to me and talk to me. It gave me a lot to think about, and a few educated me about town meeting process as well.

Elaboration of reasons for withdrawing the amendment

I proposed the amendment with the best of intentions. I hoped to improve a punctuation inconsistency, reduce the chance of a misreading of one sentence, and address what I took to be a major reason why people might reject the article, a concern over its historical accuracy. I hoped also to model the norm of intellectual honesty as a supporter of article 10 by modifying what I took to be the controversial historical claims in it.

Due to the timing of when I started this process, I was only able to send one limited explanation of the amendment, and I wasn’t able to engage sufficiently with the campaign behind the article nor with people opposed to the article. This led to people not understanding the amendment itself, my intentions in putting it forward, and my approach to politics more broadly. I very much ought to have talked to people more and earlier and communicated more in general before entering an amendment like the one I did.

Besides the poor communication I did, I didn’t understand well the process of how amendments are voted on and how this process apparently frequently confuses Town Meeting Members.

I also didn’t anticipate the amendment that essentially rewrites the article. After seeing this and communicating with those who responded to me, I realized that I had misread why some people were objecting to the article.

Additionally, different people close to the campaign asked me to withdraw the amendment.

Speaking generally, I observe that much of the discussion around issues of race, ethnicity, and class is very polarized in our town. And I have a deep concern that this polarization is limiting our collective ability to make meaningful improvements in the lives of the disadvantaged and disparately impacted.

I don’t expect that all the people of the town would ever fully agree on anything, nor would I necessarily want that. I greatly value our pluralism. But I am optimistic, perhaps naively, that we can reduce polarization and find common cause more often. And, where we don’t find common cause, I’m optimistic that we can at least understand each others' positions better and appreciate where each other is coming from.

I endeavor to play a part in helping us to work together, especially where its about improving the lives of the disadvantaged and disparately impacted. In my few years in town, I have observed how the town manages to hold together and I’ve learned how it has achieved many very good things. It’s only sometimes, thankfully, when it seems so polarized, and that’s where I’m optimistic we can find a better way.

Back to the article and putting all of the above together, I see how my amendment is far more likely to disrupt than help, how it’s a poorly executed effort to achieve my larger goals, and how it’s more likely to put up a barrier to conversations I want to have in the years to come.

My preferred approach to political discussion

I’m very happy to observe that norms of civility are usually honored by Town Meeting Members and Belmontians in general when they are working through disagreements. Incidents of name-calling, bullying, assuming bad intentions, postulating quasi-psychological explanations for belief rather than taking others' words at face value, etc. have been relatively rare in my experience.

Beyond practicing civility, I think there are things that can help us better work through disagreements or at least understand each other better:

I aspire to do the above, and I’m hopeful that doing so will help me at least to navigate disagreement and be a better advocate for things that will help others. I fully recognize that it’s very different from politics as usual.

Two additional thoughts

  • Ahead of reading and hearing discussions of Columbus Day, I was ignorant of the large role the day has played and continues to play in the lives of many Italian-Americans as a day of celebration of Italian-American heritage. Even as I think Columbus Day ought to be replaced with Indigenous Peoples Day, I do think it makes sense to try to find a way to recognize the way in which many Italian-Americans have treated and thought of the day, not as a celebration of Columbus and his legacy but as a celebration of their heritage and a recognition ancestors' struggles in the US. Roy Epstein’s proposed amendment won’t feel right to many supporters of Article 10, but it seems like one potentially adequate compromise. I look forward to hearing the views of proponents and opponents at the May 5th Town Meeting.
  • One Town Meeting Member mentioned to me that Town Meeting has not to date sought to influence what is taught in the schools and that because of the third resolution of Article 10, the article’s passing would set a new precedent. This causes me some concern in that it might be a bad precedent to set if the particular content of school curricula at a given time is subject to the politics of the majority of Town Meeting Members at that time. I hope this is a point that Town Meeting Members knowledgeable of any precedent will speak on at the May 5th Town Meeting, and also which supporters and oppontents of the original article address.