Harvard was established on paper in 1636, but what prompted efforts to actually create the College was religious leader Anne Hutchinson’s trial. Hutchinson was tried, convicted, and banished for her unorthodox stance on the road to salvation, a hot-button issue that roiled present-day Cambridge, Mass. in the 1630s. For the established Puritan clergy, her expulsion … Read more
America’s record rates of income inequality may be to blame for the nation’s largest ongoing public health crisis. According to the Alternate Healthy Eating Index in 2010, a metric that assigns foods values based on their relative nutritional merit, the nutrition gap between the wealthiest Americans and the poorest doubled between 2000 and 2010 alone. While … Read more
“I woke up late that day and … saw the riot police beating people up. It was really tense and scary … I was really dubious about voting after seeing it all.” Yago is one of many people living in and around Barcelona who describe scenes of tension and sometimes outright clashing in Catalonia, a … Read more
On one remarkable night in December, red, white, and blue confetti rained down on supporters of Senator-elect Doug Jones. The Birmingham Sheraton Hotel was filled with Democratic exuberance long absent from Alabama. Jones’ breathless victory couldn’t help but stand in stark contrast to the sobering images of unused “glass-ceiling” confetti from Hillary Clinton’s election night … Read more
Over the past year, torrents of tweets, rhetoric of “fire and fury,” and debates over “button” sizes have kept the world’s attention on the threats of nuclear weapons. After all, much of today’s adult population lived through the Cold War, an era when prospects of nuclear war veered dangerously close to reality. But despite the … Read more
With nationwide progress on the abolition of the death penalty, and with California’s clear lead on a host of progressive issues, one would have expected that California’s Proposition 62 to abolish the death penalty in 2016 would have sailed through. And yet, for the second time in a decade, California voters rejected such a proposition, … Read more
This is the campus we love, but we do not always feel safe here. As we walk through campus, past familiar buildings, along oft-walked paths, Professor Jorge Dominguez’ callous words echo through our minds – “This would be a nice place for a rape”. After hearing reports and stories of his consistent sexual harassment and … Read more
Qeeroo means “youth” in Oromo, the language of Ethiopia’s largest ethnic group. It is also the preferred name of the young Oromo who have led anti-government protests calling for greater ethnic equality since November 2015. The protests have spread throughout Oromia and Amhara, home to the Oromo and Amhara ethnicities that constitute 34 and 27 … Read more
In state politics, the most enviable marker of power is the so-called “triplex.” To achieve a triplex, a political party must sweep the state’s three most influential offices. The first two are the governor and attorney general positions, the former due to extensive executive powers and the latter due to their power to sue the … Read more
David Miliband is President of the International Rescue Committee (IRC). He leads the agency’s humanitarian relief programs in more than 40 countries and refugee resettlement assistance in 28 U.S. cities. Prior to leading the IRC, Miliband was a Member of Parliament in the United Kingdom, serving from 2007 to 2010 as the 74th Secretary of State … Read more