No race or ethnicity is truly “indigenous” to North America, Save Jerseyans. Whether your family arrived at Ellis Island 113 years ago or traversed the Bering Strait 13,000 years ago, we all technically came here from somewhere else. Ours is a land of immigrants.
Yet with October comes another annual opportunity to battle over whether Columbus Day should remain on the holiday calendar or be replaced with Indigenous People’s Day, a recently-created and politically-inspired event with a cultural heritage and history that’s about an inch deep.
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The City of Newark hasn’t celebrated Columbus since 2017 (a fact that would horrify the fictional actors of the new Many Saints of Newark movie on HBO). Paterson did the same this summer, but when Randolph tried to stip the names from most of its holidays at the end of last school year, a public uproar forced the local Board of Education to reverse course.
Let’s face it: Columbus Day is at least a real holiday. The first Columbus Day came about through an executive action by then-President Benjamin Harrison in 1892. The prior year, an angry mob had seized and lynched 11 Italian immigrants down in New Orleans. Even if you don’t believe “problematic” historical figures deserve to be remembered notwithstanding their notable accomplishments for our civilization (e.g. discovering the place where we all now live), Columbus is a genuinely titantic historical figure. Moreover, there are 16 million Italian Americans in the country today, some of whom view their ancestor’s contributions to the American story with tremendous pride.
Indigenous People’s Day is comparatively absurd on multiple levels. For example, the earl(ier) Americans weren’t a united or culturally unified group by any means. The Cherokee Nation and the Lenape were distinct peoples as were the host of other tribes and nations living at various ends of the massive North American continent; they didn’t even speak the same language (interesting fact: the Lenape actually spoke two languages, Unami and Munsee).
Celebrating Indigenous People’s Day is therefore no less goofy than declaring a “White American’s Day.” Just don’t tell your woke friends! It’s an accurate observation but it might make their heads explode.
What’s more, why not set Indigenous People’s Day on a different day? We know the reason, of course, without going through the familiar exercise. The Left’s goal is cancelling whatever it views problematic for its narrative. Still, the sane among us have to appreciate how divisive it is to attempt to celebrate the heritage of one group of countrymen at the expense of another’s established traditions.
If you want to create a ‘Trail of Tears” Day? Or if a group of Lenape descendents want a holiday commemorating a famous tribal ancestor of historical importance? Okay. Go for it, but that isn’t this.
The fight continues, and some legislators are willing to speak up. Senator Joe Pennacchio (R-25) and Senator Anthony M. Bucco (R-25) are sponsoring a resolution this year (SR-50) which urges the preservation of Columbus Day as both a federal and New Jersey state holiday.
“We’re talking about a holiday that Italian-Americans value very much, and it is important to preserve it for future generations,” said Pennacchio. “There are extremists who seek to revise history, to tear up the past and rewrite it to fit a new narrative. The fact is that the second Christopher Columbus stepped on to our shores, it was an existential moment in human history. It marked the end of the old world and the beginning of the new.
“Our resolution would defend Columbus Day from future attempts to bleach it out of the nation’s fabric,” Pennacchio continued. “This bill was first introduced in 2017. My colleagues march in Columbus Day parades, they pursue the Italian American vote, but they have been unwilling to defend this holiday. I don’t see any reason why this resolution has not received enthusiastic support from the Legislature.”
Bucco, for his part, was involved in the effort to stop Randolph from purging Columbus Day (the town is inside of his Morris County district). He also spoke before the board along with a lot of other pissed off parents.
“As a proud Italian-American, I know how cherished Columbus Day is by those of us who have family roots back to Italy,” said Bucco. “The Columbus holiday and the granite busts are as much or more tributes to the contribution of Italian immigrants to American society as to Christopher Columbus the man. When Italians emigrated here, they faced a gauntlet of challenges. They were forced to endure prejudice and hatred, and to work twice as hard to prove themselves in the workplace and the community.”
“Their attempt to address diversity backfired, and instead created division,” Bucco continued. “By trying to make everything vanilla, you lose that sense of diversity. Nobody benefits by destroying a legacy. Progress is made only when we all advance together. I am humbled to continue the work of my father, the late Senator Bucco, who sponsored the bill designating every October as Italian-American Heritage Month and fought to fund Italian American heritage cultural and educations programs for the state’s school children.”
“We all need to realize there are prejudices in our society – prejudices against everybody,” added Pennacchio. “We have to be cautious not to polarize our nation by targeting one group to elevate another. Instead of trying to erase and re-write history, we should focus on challenging ourselves to create a better history for ourselves and our future generations.”
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