On January 7, 1940, the Finnish 9th Division completely destroyed the much-larger Soviet forces on the Raate-Suomussalmi Road, in a crucial battle during Finland’s Winter War.
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Winter War
Author: Redactor
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Anthony Lewis
There will always be authorities who try to make their own lives more comfortable by suppressing critical comment. . . . But I am convinced that the fundamental American commitment to free speech, disturbing speech, is no longer in doubt.
Anthony Lewis, Freedom for the Thought That We Hate; A Biography of the First Amendment (New York: Basic Books, 2007)
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Maria Montessori
On January 6, 1907, Maria Montessori opened her first school and daycare center for working class children in Rome, Italy.
In 1912 on this date, New Mexico became the 47th state of America’s United States, and in 1941, President Franklin Delano Roosevelt delivered his “Four Freedoms” State of the Union speech, emphasizing vague “freedoms” that enabled government to usurp definable freedoms.
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Max Stirner
If one awakens in men the idea of freedom then the free men will incessantly go on to free themselves; if, on the contrary, one only educates them, then they will at all times accommodate themselves to circumstances in the most highly educated and elegant manner and degenerate into subservient cringing souls. What are our gifted and educated subjects for the most part? Scornful, smiling slave-owners and themselves slaves.
Max Stirner, “The False Principles of Our Education,” Rheinische Zeitung (1842)
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Ford Labor
On January 5, 1914, the Ford Motor Company announced an eight-hour workday and a minimum wage of $5 for a day’s labor.
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John Taylor
A government of laws and not of men, is a definition of liberty; a government of men and not of laws, of despotism.
John Taylor of Caroline, as quoted in Walter E. Volkomer, ed., The Liberal Tradition in American Thought (G. P. Putnam Sons, 1969)
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Anthony Lewis
Today, every president is the target of criticism and mockery. It is inconceivable that even the most caustic critic would be imprisoned for his or her words.
Anthony Lewis, Freedom for the Thought That We Hate; A Biography of the First Amendment (New York: Basic Books, 2007)
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King Charles
On Jan. 4, 1642, King Charles I of England sent soldiers to arrest members of Parliament, beginning England’s slide into civil war.
On Jan. 4, 1649, the English “Rump Parliament,” having purged those members willing to restore Charles I to the throne, voted to put Charles I on trial for high treason. Before the month was over, he was executed.
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Rep. Craig
On January 3, 1933, Minnie D. Craig became the first woman elected as Speaker of the North Dakota House of Representatives, the first female to hold a Speaker position anywhere in the United States.
On the same date in 1977, Apple Computer was incorporated.
January 3rd birthdays include that of Cicero (106 BC), Roman philosopher and theorist of republicanism, and J. R. R. Tolkien (1892 AD), English philologist and author of The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings. Both were deeply concerned about the problem of absolute power.
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Jonah Goldberg
Yes, the U.N. does some good things. But the assumption that, if the United Nations didn’t exist, those good things wouldn’t get done is ridiculous. It’s like saying that if government didn’t pick up your garbage, garbage would never get collected. Meanwhile, the U.N. does all manner of terrible things, that wouldn’t be done if it didn’t exist.
Jonah Goldberg, “The Goldberg File: The U. N. vs. Israel,” December 30, 2016 (National Review newsletter)