Is There Such A Thing As Truth?

June 27, 2019

This seems like such a silly question. Why would one bother to ask it?

I authored a blog addressing this question 10 months ago motivated by the well-deserved ridicule of former Mayor of New York Rudy Giuliani's almost comic assertion on Meet the Press as to whom to believe on the Russian investigation: “Truth isn’t truth,” Giuliani blurted.

Or, as Nietzsche wrote, “There are no facts, only interpretations.”

It reminds me of a talk I gave decades ago. Its subject was a seemingly unarguable statement which should need no inquiry: “Does Character Count?”

When I was first asked to address this in a talk at Miami University, I asked, “Are you serious? The answer is obvious.” The person I was talking to disagreed. She said it wasn’t obvious and she wanted her students to know why I felt it did count.

Today, in the Trump Presidency, this question—“Does Character Count?”—demands an affirmative explanation, given its flagrant absence in so many of Trump's actions and statements.

However, the question I return to here is this: "Is there such a thing as truth?"

More than I ever can recall, I see the very existence of such a thing as "truth" being questioned. Entire books are being published addressing it.

I will begin by citing this from Steven Pinker in his book Enlightenment Now: The Case for Reason, Science, Humanism and Progress.

“Reason is non-negotiable. As soon as you show up to discuss the question of what we should live for, as long as you insist that your answers, whatever they are, are reasonable or justifiable or true and that, therefore, other people ought to believe them, too, then you have committed yourself to reason, and to holding your beliefs accountable to objective standards."

"Holding our beliefs accountable to objective standards”—that says it all.

Our critical mandate is to hold ourselves accountable for assessing what we believe is truth in light of the latest emerging evidence.

Viewed in this manner, there are different categories of truth.

There are facts that we can be certain will not change in their truthfulness. Examples would be:

· Two plus two equals four.

· All human beings will eventually die.

· Lincoln was the 16^th President of the United States.

· The Cincinnati Reds play baseball in Cincinnati.

Then there are truths which we assert based on the evidence in hand, recognizing the possibility that new evidence could change that view. For centuries most people felt the earth was flat. New evidence showed it was round. A personal example of this is lodged in an essay I wrote during my junior year (1959) at Yale on Reconstruction.

I shake my head today as I read how I criticized, even castigated, newly-elected African-American congressmen for their naiveté and ignorance. I concluded that it had been a mistake to allow these men to occupy political office. I failed to recognize and appreciate what historians have come to correctly see as the courageous effort of newly-freed African-Americans to assume a leadership role in political life despite continued discrimination. For me, this will always be a humbling reminder to keep my mind open to the possibility of a different interpretation compared to the one I hold now—informed by new facts and appreciation of the context and environment in which people lived.

There is a potential danger in this recognition of the vagaries and unintended consequences of historical events.

As historian Richard Hofstadter pointed out almost 50 years ago, “The great fear that animates the most feverishly committed historians is that the continual rediscovery of the complexity of social interests, the variety of roles and motives of political leaders, the unintended consequences of political actions, and the valid interests that have so often been sacrificed in the pursuit of other equally valid interests, may give us not only a keener sense of the structural complexity of our society in the past, but also a sense of the moral complexity of social action that will lead us toward political immobility.”

A sense of history, the eminent scholar Richard F. Neustadt warned, can be “an enemy of vision” or, I would add, “an enemy of making a considered judgment.”

We must be willing to render a judgment when we have compiled a body of compelling evidence and the importance of the issue requires us to. But we must always be open to what Pinker describes as “reason" to reconsider our judgment in light of new evidence.

What is most dangerous in the Trump administration is a lack of respect for truth. A willingness to continue to propound positions which the available body of evidence says are wrong. Like Trump’s claiming more people attended his inauguration than any other, despite the photographic evidence showing the crowd for Obama’s inauguration was larger. Or Trump’s supporting the allegation that Obama was born outside the United States, long after his birth certificate and other evidence indicated this was untrue.

All this takes me back, chillingly, to what Goebbels said during the Nazi era. In so many words, "If you keep telling people a lie, again and again, many will come to believe it."

The respect for truth—for the objective determination of what is true based on all available evidence—is a foundation for all interpersonal relationships as well as the life of any organization. One of the indelible values I took from my four years at Yale was the imperative of pursing truth. What impressed me so deeply in joining P&G over 55 years ago was finding the same commitment to pursue the truth to the best of our ability, no matter where it led.

Today in this nation, in this world, we must honor, we must insist on the pursuit of truth Its denial must be resisted like the plague.

Some Surprising and Interesting Vagaries in the Life of President John Tyler

June 20, 2019

How many people have ever heard of John Tyler? How many could place him correctly in the order of the Presidents of the United States? Very, very few, I’m sure.

He was our ninth President and the first of eight “accidental” presidents, having assumed the Presidency as a result of the death of General William Henry Harrison after only 30 days in office.

As Jared Cohen writes in his excellent book, “Accidental Presidents: Eight Men Who Changed America,” Tyler was brought on to the Whig party's ticket with the expectation (unfulfilled) that he would help the party win the state of Virginia where Tyler was from.

Immediately after the inauguration, Tyler returned to his home in Virginia, fully expecting to play out a quiet four years. That was not to be.

I never thought I would read about Tyler let alone write about him. Yet his Presidency provides some interesting and unexpected revelations:

At first, there was heated debate whether he should be called the “President” or rather “Vice President and Acting President.” Daniel Webster and others who were aspiring to assume the next Presidency argued for the weakened position. Tyler stood his ground. They had not expected much strength of character from Tyler. They were fooled.

To the dismay of the Whig party, Tyler turned out to be more of a Jacksonian Democrat than a Whig, especially in his opposition to the National Bank. He vetoed two bills passed by large majorities to establish the bank. The reaction in Congress to these vetoes makes the congressional mayhem that we see today seem almost tame by comparison.

As described by Cohen and the newspaper accounts he cites, “The House floor degenerated into a street fight with most of the members rushing to the scene of action and crowding around the combatants, some jumping from desk to desk over the heads of other members. People were thrown on their backs against desks. The House Clerk seized the Sergeant-At-Arms mace and ran about the House with a ponderous instrument on his shoulder like a Roman battle axe screaming, order, gentlemen order.”

In protest, five of Tyler’s Cabinet members resigned. Their objective was to get Tyler to resign, but he had no intention of doing so. Later, he wrote, “My resignation would amount to a declaration to the world that our system of government had failed.”

The rancor went on. In 1842, for the first time in history, impeachment proceedings were launched. They did not reach a guilty verdict.

As I’ve seen in other leaders, Tyler proved to be his own worst enemy. He assumed, incorrectly, that the harsh critiques were a Washington phenomenon and did not permeate the masses. He was out of touch; he never really spent time with the people. He didn’t know the voters and made no attempts to correct the negative image painted by the anti-Tyler press.

By now, the Whigs had become so focused on denigrating Tyler, they missed the path that would ultimately result in their falling on their sword. It was over the annexation of Texas.

Hoping to duck the debate between southern anti-abolitionists and northern abolitionists, which was dividing both the Whigs and the Democrats, the leading candidates for the 1844 Presidency from both parties opposed the annexation of Texas. They were Henry Clay (Whig) and Martin Van Buren (Democrat). However, Tyler saw Texas as not only a political way to split the parties, hoping to assume a third party victory (a long shot from the start), but he saw this as the right thing for the nation.

The Republic of Texas, now independent from Mexico, was very concerned that an attack from Mexico would follow annexation. Without any authority from the President, the envoy from Texas to the U.S. assured the Texan government that the U.S. would put forces in place to resist any Mexican attack.

Both Clay and Van Buren lost their leading position as candidates by opposing the annexation of Texas. A dark horse, James Polk from Tennessee ran as a Democrat, supporting the annexation of Texas, and decisively won the election. Texas quickly became part of the United States.

The annexation of Texas undoubtedly would have occurred at some point even without Tyler’s maneuvering, but it happened sooner because he pursued it to combat both the Whigs and Democrats who disavowed him. He hoped, mistakenly as it turned out, that it would be the foundation for a winning third party movement.

There are a number of events in this story that I find to be humbling reminders.

Daniel Webster’s unbounded attacks on Tyler, for his own interest, ended up serving him poorly.

Stories of many individuals, seemingly large and important at the time, are now totally forgotten, reminding us of the transient nature of our lives and the hope that there will be value in it in the values and confidence we pass on to others.

The importance of character: which Tyler displayed, as people tried to take away his power, and as he stood up courageously to disagree with his party on the issue (the National Bank) they felt most important.

The role of pure chance: Tyler was almost killed in the explosion of a gun on the ship, “Princeton,” on a short cruise to display the nation’s growing naval power. His Secretary of State, Abel Ushur, was killed; so were dozens of others, including the father of Julia Gardner, whom he was pursuing. It is said the only reason he was not close to where his Secretary of State was killed was that he was lingering behind to try to woo Julia in the ship's salon. Tyler went on to marry Julia. His first wife had died a few years earlier. Julia was in her mid-20s; thirty years his junior, the youngest First Lady in history. They went on to have seven children. Tyler had already had seven children with his first wife, making a total of fourteen, the largest number of children a President fathered in history.

These are just a few of the unknown vagaries of the life of the ninth President of the United States.

Living In The Moment

June 19, 2019

Several years ago, I had a very meaningful lunch with a close friend, a P&G leader. She had had a very challenging year. Her husband had recently had a stroke and her 2-year-old baby girl had been sick as well. Blessedly, both her husband and little girl have fully recovered. What made this a most memorable encounter was what my friend told me had changed in her life from before her husband's stroke to after it. Before she said, they were constantly thinking "more, more, more." More work, more activity, more is better. Now, they are thinking differently. They are living in the moment; taking each moment as it comes. Treasuring it for what it is.

I told my P&G friend I could resonate to that, particularly as I reflected on my going through chemotherapy for five months leading up to my bladder operation in May 2005. Interestingly, I found I was then not only or even so much treasuring my own moments as the moments I saw other people experiencing. For example, I vividly recall looking at people walking by as my wife, Francie, and I looked out the window of a restaurant on Lexington Avenue in New York. Seeing a couple walking hand-in-hand, I felt very, very good for them. I found myself hoping they were treasuring that moment as I was treasuring mine with Francie.

I then had to ask myself a tough question: eight years after that operation, was I still experiencing life in that same way? The answer was disappointing: "somewhat but not nearly what it was".

There is still a lot of that "more, more, more" in my life, too much, probably in part, just to demonstrate to myself that I am still fully alive and capable and that I still matter. Yet, I continue to realize that I must pull back and live in the moment. To do otherwise is arrogant. It risks not doing what I do as well as I should and failing to enjoy each moment for all it offers.

This is a challenge I continue to face. At my age, I realize even more that each moment is a gift and I must appreciate it in its fullness and its own right.

My good friend, Howard Wells, shared a passage from Herzen which calls for living in the moment as eloquently as anything I have ever read:

"How rich is the human heart in the capacity for happiness, for joy, if only people know how to give themselves up to it without being distracted by trifles. As a rule the present is spoilt by external worries, empty cares, irritable fussiness, all the rubbish which is brought upon us in the midday of life by the vanity of vanities, and the stupid ordering of our everyday life. We waste our best minutes, we let them slip through our fingers as though we had an endless store of them. We are usually thinking of tomorrow, of next year, when we ought with both hands to be clasping the brimming cup which life itself, unbidden, with her customary lavishness, holds out to us, and to drink and drink of it until the cup passes into other hands. Nature does not care to waste time offering it and pressing us."

Trump Administration Delays Issuance of Harriet Tubman Note by Six Years for So-Called Technical Reasons: C'Mon

June 15, 2019

No, this is not the end of the earth. But it is all-too sharply indicative of the Trump's Administration crude lack of appreciation of African-American leadership and the shabby willingness to bury the truth of the matter in facile, unbelievable explanations.

Harriet Tubman has been a personal inspiration to me and countless others for decades. The story of her going back to Maryland almost 20 times to help enslaved men and women to escape, being aided financially by a white business man, Thomas Garrett was a driving, lifting example for me as I worked with others to create the National Underground Railroad Freedom Center in Cincinnati. I hope I live to see her life properly recognized for the lesson of courage it will always teach.

See a Design of the Harriet Tubman $20 Bill That Mnuchin Delayed

A previously unreleased conceptual design of a new $20 note that was produced by the Bureau of Engraving and Printing and obtained by The New York Times depicts Harriet Tubman in a dark coat with a wide collar and a white scarf. This preliminary design was completed in late 2016.

Image

By Alan Rappeport

June 14, 2019

WASHINGTON — Extensive work was well underway on a new $20 bill bearing the image of Harriet Tubman when Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin announced last month that the design of the note would be delayed for technical reasons by six years and might not include the former slave and abolitionist.

Many Americans were deeply disappointed with the delay of the bill, which was to be the first to bear the face of an African-American. The change would push completion of the imagery past President Trump’s time in office, even if he wins a second term, stirring speculation that Mr. Trump had intervened to keep his favorite president, Andrew Jackson, a fellow populist, on the front of the note.

But Mr. Mnuchin, testifying before Congress, said new security features under development made the 2020 design deadline set by the Obama administration impossible to meet, so he punted Tubman’s fate to a future Treasury secretary.

In fact, work on the new $20 note began before Mr. Trump took office, and the basic design already on paper most likely could have satisfied the goal of unveiling a note bearing Tubman’s likeness on next year’s centennial of the 19th Amendment, which granted women the right to vote. An image of a new $20 bill, produced by the Bureau of Engraving and Printing and obtained by The New York Times from a former Treasury Department official, depicts Tubman in a dark coat with a wide collar and a white scarf.

That preliminary design was completed in late 2016.

A spokeswoman for the bureau, Lydia Washington, confirmed that preliminary designs of the new note were created as part of research that was done after Jacob J. Lew, President Barack Obama’s final Treasury secretary, proposed the idea of a Tubman bill.

The development of the note did not stop there. A current employee of the bureau, who asked not to be named because of the sensitivity of the matter, personally viewed a metal engraving plate and a digital image of a Tubman $20 bill while it was being reviewed by engravers and Secret Service officials as recently as May 2018. This person said that the design appeared to be far along in the process.

Within the bureau, this person said, there was a sense of excitement and pride about the new $20 note.

But the Treasury Department, which oversees the engraving bureau, decided that a new $20 bill would not be made public next year. Current and former department officials say Mr. Mnuchin chose the delay to avoid the possibility that Mr. Trump would cancel the plan outright and create even more controversy.

In an interview last week, Mr. Mnuchin denied that the reasons for the delay were anything but technical.

“Let me assure you, this speculation that we’ve slowed down the process is just not the case,” Mr. Mnuchin said, speaking on the sidelines of the G-20 finance ministers meeting in Japan.

Steven Mnuchin, the Treasury secretary, announced last month that plans to unveil the bill bearing the face of Tubman would be delayed by six years.CreditErin Schaff/The New York Times

The Treasury secretary reiterated that security features drive the change of the currency and rejected the notion that political interference was at play. He declined to say if he believed his predecessor had tried to politicize the currency.

“There is a group of experts that’s interagency, including the Secret Service and others and B.E.P., that are all career officials that are focused on this,” he said, referring to the Bureau of Engraving and Printing. “They’re working as fast as they can.”

Monica Crowley, a spokeswoman for Mr. Mnuchin, added that the release into circulation of the new $20 note remained on schedule with the bureau’s original timeline of 2030. She did not, however, say that the bill would feature Tubman.

“The scheduled release (printing) of the $20 bill is on a timetable consistent with the previous administration,” she said in a statement.

In a separate statement released on Friday afternoon, Len Olijar, the director of the Bureau of Engraving and Printing, said the bureau “was never going to unveil a note design in 2020,” adding that doing so this far in advance of going into circulation would aid counterfeiters. He described the image obtained by The Times as a “facsimile” that contained no security features, and he echoed Mr. Mnuchin’s argument that it was too early to develop an integrated concept or design until security features are finalized.

“No bureau or department official has ‘scrapped anything,’” said Mr. Olijar, in what appeared to be a reference to Tubman. “Everything remains on the table.”

But building the security features of a new note before designing its images struck some as curious. Larry E. Rolufs, a former director of the Bureau of Engraving and Printing, said that because the security features of a new note are embedded in the imagery, they normally would be created simultaneously.

“It can be done at the same time,” said Mr. Rolufs, who led the bureau from 1995 to 1997. “You want to work them together.”

The process of developing American currency is painstaking, done by engravers who spend a decade training as apprentices. People familiar with the process say that engravers spend months working literally upside down and backward carving the portraits of historical figures into the steel plates that eventually help create cash. Often, multiple engravers will attempt different versions of the portraits, usually based on paintings or photographs, and ultimately, the Treasury secretary chooses which one will appear on a note.

Mr. Rolufs said that because of the complexity of creating new currency, circulating a new note design by next year was ambitious. He also acknowledged that making major changes to the money is an invitation for backlash.

“For the secretary to change the design of the notes takes political courage,” he said. “The American people don’t like their currency messed with.”

As a presidential candidate, Mr. Trump called the decision to replace Jackson, who was a slave owner, with Tubman “pure political correctness.” An overhaul of the Treasury Department’s website after Mr. Trump took office removed any trace of the Obama administration’s plans to change the currency, signaling that the plan might be halted.

Packs of newly printed $20 bills being processed for bundling at the engraving bureau last year in Washington.CreditEva Hambach/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images

Image

Packs of newly printed $20 bills being processed for bundling at the engraving bureau last year in Washington.CreditEva Hambach/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images

Within Mr. Trump’s Treasury Department, some officials complained that Mr. Lew had politicized the currency with the plan and that the process of selecting Tubman, which included an online poll among other forms of feedback, was not rigorous or reflective of the country’s desires.

The uncertainty has renewed interest in the matter. This week, Gov. Larry Hogan of Maryland, where Tubman was born, wrote a letter to Mr. Mnuchin urging him to find a way to speed up the process.

“I hope that you’ll reconsider your decision and instead join our efforts to promptly memorialize Tubman’s life and many achievements,” wrote Mr. Hogan, a Republican.

On Friday, Democrats called on Mr. Mnuchin to provide more answers about plans for the $20 note and suggested that the Treasury secretary had misled Congress.

“The Trump administration’s indefinite postponement of this redesign is offensive to women and girls, and communities of color, who have been excitedly waiting to see this woman and civil rights icon honored in this special way,” said Senator Jeanne Shaheen, Democrat of New Hampshire.

Representative Ayanna Pressley, Democrat of Massachusetts, who raised the issue with Mr. Mnuchin at a hearing in May, accused him of doing Mr. Trump’s bidding.

“Secretary Mnuchin has allowed Trump’s racism and misogyny to prevent him from carrying out the will of the people,” she said.

At the Bureau of Engraving and Printing, which offers tours and an exhibit on the history of the currency, some visitors said they preferred tradition, while others were seeking change.

“For me, it’s not important enough to spend the money to change it,” said Jeff Dunyon, who was visiting Washington from Utah this week. “There are other ways to honor her.”

Others believed that adding Tubman to the front of the $20 bill and moving Jackson to the back was an important symbolic move, and, for them, the possibility that it might never happen has been painful.

Charnay Gima, a tourist from Hawaii, had just finished a tour when she pulled aside a guide to ask what became of the plan to make Tubman the face of the $20 bill. The plan was scrapped, she was told, for political reasons.

“It’s kind of sad,” said Ms. Gima, who is black. “I was really looking forward to it because it was finally someone of color on the bill who paved the way for other people.”

Mikayla Bouchard contributed reporting.

A version of this article appears in print on June 15, 2019, on Page B1 of the New York edition with the headline: Unreal Sight of a Nearly Real $20 Bill. Order Reprints | Today’s Paper | Subscribe

Related Coverage

Harriet Tubman $20 Bill Is Delayed Until Trump Leaves Office, Mnuchin Says

May 22, 2019

Image

Harriet Tubman Ousts Andrew Jackson in Change for a $20

April 20, 2016

Image

What Might It Take to Get Harriet Tubman on the $20 Bill?

May 24, 2019

Image

VIDEO

Mnuchin Is Questioned on Delay of Harriet Tubman $20 Bill

May 23, 2019

Image

Give The Times for graduation. Starting at $25.

Give The Times for graduation. St