Politicians speak on urban strife

Address Center City church Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Ridge, Pulitzer Prize-winning historian Arthur Schlesinger and other luminaries discussed the crisis of urban violence with community members at the Old Christ Church in Philadelphia's historic section yesterday. The evening, part of a three-day celebration of the church's 300th anniversary, began with the reading of a letter from President Clinton. But the speakers often harkened back to the ideas of former Presidents Thomas Jefferson, James Madison and Abraham Lincoln. Ridge, a Republican, invoked the parable of the Good Samaritan as a guideline for personal responsibility in one's community. "The tragedy of violence has tested the foundation of our cities, but there is a national faith that we can overcome," Ridge said. But former Connecticut Gov. Lowell Weicker, a Republican-turned-independent who was also on the panel, compared the Republican national agenda to "a lump of coal for our children." Weicker said America had lost sight of its idealistic vision of equality for all, and Americans are creating a society which promises little for the next generation. Harvard Professor and former Court of Appeals Judge Leon Higginbotham, a trustee emeritus of the University as well as a former University Law School professor, said it is imperative that parents believe in their children's ability to obtain a better life. But this has become increasingly difficult, since the condition of the American poor has declined in the past 25 years, Higginbotham said. Calling the United States a "violent society" that longs for the "nostalgia of redcoats and Indians," Weicker also railed against the handgun-related deaths of America's children. Almost 5,000 children die yearly due to handguns, he said. "That we close our eyes [to gun-related violence] doesn't make us Constitutional advocates, it makes us fools," he said. Weicker said that former President Ronald Reagan's policies in the 1980s had neglected American cities, and that current legislators were continuing Reagan's destructive legacy. "I felt a lot safer with Madison, [James] Monroe and Jefferson's writing of the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence, rather than the group of midgets who are trying to rewrite [those documents]," Weicker said. Higginbotham said Jefferson's call for revolution in the Declaration of Independence did not condone extremist violence such as April's bombing of the Federal Building in Oklahoma City. Similarly, Schlesinger pointed out the abundance of crimes committed in the name of religion. Referring to the recent assassination of Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin, Schlesinger said that radicals have often used God to justify extreme acts of violence Summarizing several speakers' feelings, Higginbotham said the strength of American society will be determined by its handling of urban crises. The greatness of past societies has been their ability to withstand such internal challenges, he added. But he said there is no guarantee that society will succeed with out the help of people of influence and money.