Remember the Chicago Riots?  If you are under 40, you hadn’t even been born.  When I hear younger  people say they’re worried about this country breaking out in Civil War, it’s probably because they don’t realize what tough times we survived 40 years ago.

The riots, following Martin Luther King’s assassination,  resulted in 20 people dead and 500 injured. There were 125 fires, 210 buildings destroyed, and 2,000 people arrested  in Chicago alone, before the violence extended to Washington DC,  New York City and 60 cities, altogether.  If you were around then, you  felt as if  the country was falling apart.  Many young men moved to Canada and never returned.  It was a terrifying time—Robert Kennedy was assassinated, and the Vietnam War was tearing this nation apart.  In the early 70’s,  there were protests  and race riots in every city and state, and college campus.

So now,  the political climate  seems to many  like everything is worse than it’s ever been.  Name calling, vulgarity, protests, riots.   The crisis at the border.  Affordable care.  Racial profiling, Tariff’s. North Korea.  #MeToo.  But for those of us who remember the late 60’s  and the violent domestic explosions in the early 70’s  it’s deja vu. 

Think of all the people you encounter during the day.  Most of them are civil and polite.  Yes, political disagreements  are more divisive than ever now,  but I would bet that sane, courteous, thoughtful,  people  still comprise what used to be called the “silent majority.”  It’s nothing new to fear speaking out about controversial issues.

Since that time, we have lived through assassinations, wars in the middle east, recessions,  more race riots, and the worst attack our country has ever been through on 9/11 . So here we are again at the crisis point. But. I believe that  we  share  more values and common ground uniting us than tearing us apart.   I don’t think we will have a civil war.  This nation will remain strong and we will survive.

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