In Canada, Thanksgiving is celebrated at harvest-time, on
October 12th, rather than a week before the first month of winter in
the Northern Hemisphere. For the States south of Canada, whether their
respective peoples are cold or warm on the third Thursday in November, the
holiday’s date is etched in stone, given the illustrious aura of the U.S.
president who had enshrined the date in the midst of a horrendous war between
the USA and CSA in the 1860s. Few people would dare even entertain the natural
assimilation of Columbus Day and Thanksgiving Day on October 12th.
So, well after harvest in most of the States and bunched in with Christmas and
New Years—effectively ridding the latter of any left-over enthusiasm—people in
the States in the northern climes are consigned to stuff themselves like Turkey
birds while the surviving natural turkeys shiver outside. Human nature itself
may be hardwired against change, and the massive scale of modern political
association may exacerbate the paralysis.
Early October in 2014, the Seattle City Council voted
unanimously to replace Columbus Day with “Indigenous People’s Day” as a city
holiday, even though Columbus Day would still be celebrated locally as the
federally-recognized holiday. Seattle councilman Bruce Harrell explained that
he had co-sponsored the resolution because he believed that the city would not
be successful in its programs and outreach to Indians until “we fully recognize
the evils of our past.”[1]
One local resident took offense at an Indigenous People’s Day “coming at the
expense of what essentially is Italian Heritage Day.”[2]
However, because Columbus was part of a Spanish expedition, Columbus Day is not
“essentially” an “Italian Heritage Day.” Rather, the holiday remembers back to
the time of Spanish power. It follows that the resistance to the change in
Seattle was overblown.
The “indigenous People’s Day” label is itself problematic,
as American Indians “only” came to the continent about 15,000 years ago—not long
at all for a species that has been around for 1.8 million years. The thorny
issues could be obviated simply by moving Thanksgiving from the crowded
year-end field of holidays to October 12th at harvest-time in many
of the States. That this change would seemingly ruin the “holiday season” as it
has always been and undo the order penned by the iconic Abraham Lincoln pinning
Thanksgiving to the third Thursday in November suggests that the chances of moving
the holiday are slim to nil even though having Thanksgiving so late (and so
close to Christmas and New Year’s) is arguably suboptimal.
Compounding the problem with effecting change in the U.S.,
the increasing political consolidation at the federal level stymies a societal
change through legislative means because more political energy must be amassed.
The “one size fits all” assumption does not help. Even though Seattle can
safely contemplate two holidays on one day, the sheer possibility of
Thanksgiving being in October in some States and in November in others would
likely trigger fears of disunion.
In the E.U., the
subsidiarity principle urges that legislation be done at the lowest practicable
level of political organization; in the U.S., the Tenth Amendment seeks to
forestall political consolidation at the expense of federalism. As Seattle attests,
Congress need not have such a choking power-monopoly on holidays, and Americans
need not be so afraid and thus over-reactive as proposals see the light of day.
[1]
Phuong Le, “Columbus
Day in Seattle Replaced with a New Holiday,” Associated Press, October 6,
2014.
[2]
Ibid.
