Tag: Blue Ridge Parkway reconstruction

#OnThisDay: 14th Amendment Ratified in 1868

Today is the anniversary date for two events that warrant our attention. The 14th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution was ratified on July 28, 1868 – 157 years ago today.

And on July 28, 1932, U.S. President Herbert Hoover ordered the U.S. Army to remove the protesting World War I veterans from Washington, D.C.

To give each of those events their due attention, I will blog about the 14th Amendment today, and I will blog about the “Bonus Army” tomorrow.

The 14th Amendment

The Preamble to the U.S. Constitution

Until the recent past, we never heard much about the 14th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, and many of us would have been hard pressed to have told you what it was about without looking it up.

Now it is front and center and will be a major issue before the U.S. Supreme Court when they reconvene this fall.

The 14th Amendment is known as “The Birthright Amendment.” It came about immediately after the Civil War to extend citizenship to formerly enslaved individuals; however, the words “formerly enslaved,” “slave,” “slavery,” “Africa,” “African” or any other such qualifiers do not appear in the document.

The Trump Administration wants to abolish the 14th Amendment. Trump claims that it only applies to the people who were slaves prior to the Civil War. If successful in proving that before the U.S. Supreme Court, it will mean that the children of undocumented immigrants will no longer be awarded U.S. citizenship.

That is a major political and legal issue, so it will be incumbent upon the U.S. Supreme Court Justices to weigh all aspects of the matter carefully. Regardless of the Court’s ruling, a lot of people are going to be angry.

People who do not want citizenship to be automatically granted to a baby born on U.S. soil argue that other countries have no such law.

Background information about the 14th Amendment can still be found at https://www.archives.gov/milestone-documents/14th-amendment.

It’s not just Section 1 of the 14th Amendment that makes Trump uneasy. I imagine Section 3 makes him and some politicians nervous in light of the January 6, 2021, attempted coup.

The text of the 14th Amendment

AMENDMENT XIV

Section 1.
All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside. No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.

Section 2.
Representatives shall be apportioned among the several States according to their respective numbers, counting the whole number of persons in each State, excluding Indians not taxed. But when the right to vote at any election for the choice of electors for President and Vice-President of the United States, Representatives in Congress, the Executive and Judicial officers of a State, or the members of the Legislature thereof, is denied to any of the male inhabitants of such State, being twenty-one years of age, and citizens of the United States, or in any way abridged, except for participation in rebellion, or other crime, the basis of representation therein shall be reduced in the proportion which the number of such male citizens shall bear to the whole number of male citizens twenty-one years of age in such State.

Section 3.
No person shall be a Senator or Representative in Congress, or elector of President and Vice-President, or hold any office, civil or military, under the United States, or under any State, who, having previously taken an oath, as a member of Congress, or as an officer of the United States, or as a member of any State legislature, or as an executive or judicial officer of any State, to support the Constitution of the United States, shall have engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the same, or given aid or comfort to the enemies thereof. But Congress may by a vote of two-thirds of each House, remove such disability.

Section 4.
The validity of the public debt of the United States, authorized by law, including debts incurred for payment of pensions and bounties for services in suppressing insurrection or rebellion, shall not be questioned. But neither the United States nor any State shall assume or pay any debt or obligation incurred in aid of insurrection or rebellion against the United States, or any claim for the loss or emancipation of any slave; but all such debts, obligations and claims shall be held illegal and void.

Section 5.
The Congress shall have power to enforce, by appropriate legislation, the provisions of this article.

Hurricane Helene Update

Sign blocking travel by car, bike, or on foot on National Park Service property on Blue Ridge Parkway at Asheville, NC, June 10, 2025
Barricade on Blue Ridge Parkway beside entrance to Folk Art Center at Asheville, June 10, 2025

12 more miles of the Blue Ridge Parkway in North Carolina have reopened from Milepost 305.2 near Beacon Heights and U.S. 221 to Milepost 317.5 at U.S. 221 near the Linville Falls community!

The Linville Falls spur road, campground, picnic area, and visitor center remain closed, due to hurricane damage.

There were at least 57 landslides across almost 200 miles of the Blue Ridge Parkway in North Carolina. Recovery has been broken down into three phases. The 12-mile opening last week is one of 12 projects included in Phase 1. When that phase is completed this fall, some 48 miles of the Parkway will have been restored.

Phase 2 includes the repair of 21 landslides in eight areas which are mostly located between Milepost 318.2 and Milepost 323.4, south of Linville Falls. It is hoped that Phase 2 will be completed by the fall of 2026.

Phase 3 is in the planning stage. During that phase, repairs will be made to 23 sites between Milepost 336.7 and 351.9, which lies between Little Switzerland and Mount Mitchell. There is no published timeline for the work to begin or be completed in Phase 3.

I have driven the entire 252 miles of the Blue Ridge Parkway in North Carolina many times and its 207 miles in Virginia at least once, but I doubt I will live to see it fully rebuilt.

If you are planning a trip to the Blue Ridge Parkway, you can find current information at https://www.nps.gov/blri/planyourvisit/helene-impacts-and-recovery.htm. Just be aware that most of it in North Carolina is still closed.

As of Friday, of the 1,457 roads that were closed in western North Carolina last September due to Hurricane Helene, all but 34 are now completely open, which is the same as the prior week’s report. The NC DOT reports 42 roads have partial access.

I-40 at the Tennessee line is still lust opened with a total of two lanes and a 35-m.p.h. speed limit. A report I heard on TV last week said it will take years to fully reconstruct the interstate highway.

Until my next blog post

Keep reading everything you want to read – and some things you don’t want to read but need to read.

Remember the people of Ukraine and western North Carolina and the children in Gaza who are starving to death through no fault of their own.

Janet

#OnThisDay: James Monroe’s Birthday, 1758

When I have an #OnThisDay topic to blog about, I try to tie it in with a current event. Sometimes that’s easier than other times.

When I created my 2025 editorial calendar for my blog months ago, I wondered what I could do with Jame Monroe’s birthday for my April 28, 2025, blog post. How could I make James Monroe’s 267th birthday interesting?

Then, the Trump Administration came along and US-international relations were disrupted like eggs in a turned over basket rolling in all directions and breaking.

Monroe Doctrine! US and Western Hemisphere relations! Bingo!

But what about James Monroe’s Birthday and early years?

Born in Virginia, he had to withdraw from the Campbelltown Academy at the age of 16 when his parent died. He was needed to manage the family farm and take care of his three younger brothers. One of his maternal uncles stepped in as sort of a surrogate father. He was a member of the Virginia House of Burgesses, so he took Monroe to Williamsburg and enrolled him in the College of William and Mary in June 1774.

About 18 months later, Monroe dropped out of college to join the Continental Army. He suffered a severed artery in the Battle of Trenton and nearly died.

After the Revolutionary War, he resumed his law studies under Thomas Jefferson until 1783.

Monroe served in the US Senate, but he left the Senate in 1794 to be George Washington’s Ambassador to France. He later served as Ambassador to Britain.

He was elected Governor of Virginia in 1799. As President Jefferson’s special envoy, he helped negotiate the Louisiana Purchase. He served as President James Madison’s Secretary of State beginning in 1811. During the War of 1812, he served as both Secretary of State and Secretary of War.

He was what one might call an “over achiever.” And I haven’t even mentioned that he was elected US President in 1816 and was reelected for a second term in 1820.

And what about the Monroe Doctrine?

Are they still teaching school children about the Monroe Doctrine. I hope so, but it’s hard for me to keep up since I don’t have a close family member in grade school now.

In his annual speech before the US Congress in 1823, Monroe outlined his plans for a new American foreign policy.

Why did the Monroe Doctrine came about?

The US and Britain were both concerned that Spain was going to gain more control in Latin America, and the US was concerned about Russia’s territorial ambitions along the northwest coast of North America.

George Canning, British Foreign Minister, wanted a joint US-Britain agreement, but US Secretary of State John Quincy Adams argued against that and won. Hence, the Monroe Doctrine was officially just a US policy.

The four main points of the Monroe Doctrine, which made the US the protectorate of the Western Hemisphere:

  1. The US would not interfere in the internal affairs or wars between European countries;
  2. The US would recognize and not interfere with existing European colonies in the Western Hemisphere;
  3. There would be no further colonization in the Western Hemisphere; and
  4. The US would consider further European colonization, military intervention, or other interference in the Western Hemisphere as a potentially hostile act.

Jump forward 200 years

In 1962, US President John F. Kennedy invoked the Monroe Doctrine during the Cuban Missile Crisis. Kennedy ordered a naval and air quarantine of Cuba after the Soviet Union started building missile-launching sites there.

President Ronald Reagan used the Monroe Doctrine as policy principle in the 1980s to justify US intervention in El Salvador and Nicaragua.

President George H.W. Bush invoked the Monroe Doctrine to justify a US invasion of Panama to oust Manuel Noriega.

After the Cold War and as the 21st century approached, US involvement in Latin America decreased, but there was a growing resentment in some countries over the US thinking it could call the shots.

Then comes the illicit drug trade.

Then comes a flood of immigrants trying to enter the United States legally and illegal.

Then comes Donald Trump.

The more things change, the more they stay the same. 202 years later!

US President Trump in 2025 took it upon himself to rename the Gulf of Mexico “the Gulf of America,” but only Republicans are calling it that.

In 2025, the US President has cozied up with the President/Dictator of El Salvador to the point that we’re helping to finance the most notorious prison in the world. Trump is threatening to steal the Panama Canal from Panama even though the two-fold Torrijos-Carter Treaties in 1977 transferred the canal to Panama as of December 31, 1999. Trump repeatedly says President Jimmy Carter sold the canal for one dollar, but the Torrijos-Carter Treaties were not a financial transaction. The Panama Canal Treaty gave Panama control of the canal over a 20-year period. The Treaty of Permanent Neutrality guaranteed the Panama Canal will remain open to international shipping.

President Trump claims he can make Canada the 51st state. Too bad for Puerto Rico. It’s been waiting to become the 51st state for decades.

President Trump threatens to steal Greenland from Denmark “any way we have to.”

Come to think of it… Trump claims he can make Canada, Greenland, Denmark, and Europe jump at his command, but he said he has no power to make El Salvador return to the US a man his Homeland Security people mistakenly kidnapped and shipped to the CECOT Prison. Who knew El Salvador was more powerful than the US? Well, we know now.

US Secretary of State Marco Rubio promised Guyana that we’ll protect it if Venezuela invades it.

Just wait until Trump learns the names of some other Central and South American countries. He’ll want to take them, too, or maybe bow the knee to them like he has El Salvador.

Geography is not Trump’s strong point. Has he figured out what or where the Republic of the Congo is yet?

Incidentally, what has become of James Monroe’s house? OR… Don’t look a gift horse in the mouth

In February, 2025, the owners of Oak Hill in Loudoun County, Virginia, offered to give the estate to the State of Virginia so the home and 1,200 acres could be turned into a State Park. It turns out that the State doesn’t want it!

The property owners were reportedly offered $55 million for the house and estate, but they were willing to take a fraction of that amount if the State of Virginia would make it a State Park.

The last I read about it the State hasn’t budged.

Hurricane Helene Update

As of Friday, 58 roads in North Carolina were still closed due to Hurricane Helene. That count included five US highways, three state highways, and 50 state roads. That’s an incredible improvement over the 105 roads that were still closed a week earlier. Good weather has surely helped.

Although technically “open” now, I-40 in Haywood County at the Tennessee line is still open for just one lane in both directions with a 35 mile-per-hour speed limit.

There are still no estimates of when all the Blue Ridge Parkway in North Carolina will reopen. I encourage you to watch the 18-minute early April video at https://www.nps.gov/blri/planyourvisit/helene-impacts-and-recovery.htm. Scroll down below “Common Questions” to get to the video. This is a wonderful recent update on the progress being made and the monumental task that lies ahead to get 157 more miles of the parkway open. Below the video is a map showing where the parkway is open and where it is still closed.

Until my next blog post tomorrow

Keep reading good books.

Remember the people of Ukraine, Myanmar, and western North Carolina.

Janet