That quote ought to be at least as well known , and as widely disseminated, as Lord Acton's famous dictum about power.

It's an equally succinct statement of an even more salient feature of politics.

Dinesh D'Souza seems to have missed the point somewhat.

Now we see where you get your un-American ability to remember things that happened more than three years ago!

I'd heard of Lewis Hanke, though I couldn't have told you much about him. I think I knew about him in connection with Las Casas, the 16th century antislavery activist (antislavery in the case of Native Americans--not until late in his life did he start opposing it for Africans, but still, he was as leftist as they came in the 1500's.)

Another quote that deserves wide circulation (I saw it first in Chomsky, but he was quoting Francis Jennings.) It's on page 215 in his history of the French and Indian War "Empire of Fortune" and goes as follows--

"In law, the instigator of a crime is as guilty as the performer, sometimes more so. In history, however, the man in the ruffled shirt and gold-laced waistcoat somehow levitates above the blood he has ordered to be spilled by dirty-handed underlings."

It's overstated. We have no problem condemning the people at the top if they are our enemies. But this quote goes a long way in explaining how American foreign policy works.

This is all very disappointing.

I thought Jon's enlightened disposition was something for which he deserved full credit.

But now I see that he inherited it through his genes.

Your Grandfather would have LOVED the net.

Those two links to you provided -- that of your grandfather’s speech and D’Souza are certainly some of the best things I have read in quite a while. Both great thinkers in their own right and they say things that can make you a bit uncomfortable which is a good thing in my view. I think there is always a tendency to stay with that which makes you feel comfortable yet being comfortable is perhaps not the best way to arrive at the truth though one can often wonder if there even is such a thing as the truth when it comes to the human condition. Thank you.

Is it possible to see other than through the lens of the culture you were raised in? I think so though it takes a Herculean effort to overcome that barrier because culture is such a powerful force. One thing is certain and that is once you enter the world of anthropology you can never be quite sure of what is normal and what is not.

If your grandfather were fully up-to-date, he might have titled his book All Humankind is One.

But seriously - a historical and cross-cultural perspective seems to be essential if one is going to continue to participate in the never-ending struggle for human liberation without getting burnt out over what seems like slow progress and even regression [such as we have had in the Estados Unidos during the regime of caudillo Cheney]. And it helps to be reminded of those of previous centuries - your grandfather and grandmother, and those he wrote about, and so on - may the Creative Forces of the Universe (if any) be with us all.

All Humankind is One

In fairness to my grandfather (though I suspect he'd probably have used "Mankind" anyway at the time he wrote the book) he was quoting Las Casas.

After a slight delay, I, one of Lewis Hanke's two sons, enter to make comments. Dad gave me a copy of his and Gunnar Mendoza's huge three volume two column critical edition with long introduction of Bartolome Arzans de Orsua y Vela's monumental Historia de la Villa Imperial de Potosi, published by Brown University in 1965. I read the entire first volume in my dogged system of some Spanish most days but finally topped out. Interesting but not always. Opening volume one I now find a sheet of paper on which through page 403 I occasionally jotted down mention of picaresque passages, such as "first battle with Indians at Potosi," "Gonzalo Pizzaro's uprising," "la muerte lastimosa de la Senora dona Leonor Fernandez de Cordoba valiendose la maldita Claudia de un infiel criada," "dead Friar Juan de Riveros rebukes grave robber," und so weiter. My father was an industrious man of parts and you are quite right, Jon, he could not have done it without my mother's sharp brain and pencil.