By Sharon Slettehaugh

The Rooster house: A Ukrainian Family Memoir by Victoria Belim.

Everyone finished the book and most liked it. The descriptions did a good job of setting the scene and conveyed how real the experience was for the author. The author grew up in the Soviet Union, emigrated at age 15, then returned to Ukraine to try to understand her culture of origin and family history. It also struck the group as an effort by the author to understand her father’s recent suicide. Belim learned that some of her relatives were displaced by the Chernobyl disaster and how the authorities downplayed what had happened. Throughout the book, she describes her relationship with a difficult uncle who remained a committed Soviet, her mother who was distant, and a grandmother with whom she was close.

A thread running through the book is Belim’s effort to understand what happened to her Uncle Nikodim, her father’s brother. No one in the family would talk about him and he simply seemed to have disappeared in the 1930s while fighting for a free Ukraine. After many dead ends, Belim finally learns, after digging through archives, that he was executed by the KGB. People living in Ukraine still seemed to be under the fear of Soviet reprisals and so even now, would not mention him or what had happened.

It was suggested that this would be a good book for young people, mainly high schoolers, especially since Ukraine is so much in the news now.

By Mary Palmer

Anita Hill's Believing: Our Thirty-Year Journey to End Gender Violence is a powerful manifesto that examines the systemic nature of gender-based violence in America. Drawing on her own testimony against Clarence Thomas and decades of advocacy, Hill argues that this violence, encompassing everything from harassment to physical assault, is not merely comprised of individual acts, but rather is a deeply embedded cultural problem. Hill exposes the devices that perpetuate denial and institutional failures, highlighting how issues like racism and other biases intersect to complicate victims' paths to justice. But Hill also offers a hopeful vision. She calls for a shift in how society views and addresses gender violence, advocating for systemic change and emphasizing the importance of believing survivors as a crucial step toward creating a truly equitable and safe world.

Our group discussed how legislative hearings haven’t changed much since Anita Hill’s experience with an all-white, male committee. Then-Senator Joe Biden led the committee when Anita Hill testified against Clarence Thomas and only recently offered Hill a half-hearted apology for how she was treated. Black and Native women are treated unfairly when they are attacked. Intimate violence is handled as a private issue instead of a public one. The second most common complaint against police officers is sexual violence. Sixty percent of women complain of sexual harassment in the workplace. Female medical students and residents have been accosted or assaulted at work. Violations of individual rights are a precursor to democratic erosion.

For more information:

• The movie Anita, on Peacock
• The movie Confirmation, on Max

Our next meeting:

We are on our summer break, so our next meeting is on September 10th at 10:00 a.m. at the Highland Park Library, 1974 Ford Parkway, St. Paul. At this meeting, we will discuss our summer book, The Kingdom, the Power, and the Glory, by Tim Alberta. We will also be choosing books for our next season, so if you can, send your book suggestions to Mary Palmer before September and she will put them in a chart. You can also bring your book ideas to our September meeting.

The Minneapolis League of Women Voters is meeting twice a month on Zoom to discuss how to implement the Unite & Rise initiative locally. If you are interested in joining these meetings, contact lwvstpaul@lwvmn.org for more information.

St Kate’s has put out a call for volunteers to help staff a Juneteenth play, Kumbayah, at St Kate’s on June 27, 2025. Help seat the audience, work with the students, and/or help staff a resource table.

There are two shows:11:00 AM for schools only and 2:00 PM for general public. Click here for more information. Email lwvstpaul@lwvmn.org if you are interested.

Thanks to all of you who came out to LWVSP's 105^th Annual Meeting. We had a lively discussion about how we are going to make a difference going forward. Click here to download the Annual Meeting materials packet.

The Annual Meeting was preceded by compelling remarks by Minnesota Supreme Court Justice Anne McKeig, who spoke about the importance of -- and threats to -- the judiciary in U.S. government and policy.

Justice McKeig receives flowers and an album from Membership Chair Molly Flowers.

At the meeting, we presented the Sunrise Award and the Faye Lyksett Award, respectively, to two members who have performed outstanding service to LWVSP.

    
Melissa Finnegan (photo on left) receives the 2025 Sunrise Award from 2024 recipient Pamela Mercier; Joann Ellis (photo at right) receives the Faye Lyksett Award from 2022 recipient Heidi Kloempkin.

Board President Beatrice Owen leads the Annual Member Meeting proceedings.

We also put out a call for volunteers. If you are reading this and want to get involved, send a note to lwvstpaul@lwvmn.org . Tell us where you want to contribute: phone duty, parades, communications, naturalization ceremonies, State Fair, Voter Services, Program Committee, Membership Committee, or the new Unite & Rise initiative.

By Cheryl Bailey

Three St. Paul League members staffed a table, engaged with opera patrons, and celebrated the life of Susan B. Anthony. Our presence at this performance was a great collaboration with Raison d’Etre Opera.

Support the League and support the arts! Raison d’Etre Opera specializes in singers over age 55, challenging and enlightening public perception of older people through musical presentations performed by seasoned artists for audiences of all ages.

By Cheryl Bailey

On May 18, 2025, Dr. Walter Greason of Macalester College presented a session entitled "Five Years Later–Anti-Racism and Global Protest Against Police Violence." Dr. Greason is the DeWitt Professor of History at Macalester College. It was a hybrid program with in-person attendance and a Zoom webcast.

Highlights

• Racial uprisings are not rare in the U.S., but more have been perpetrated by whites, and kept nearly invisible to the public and in standard history teaching.
• We must be knowledgeable about and vigilant against the future (and current) use of AI in surveillance. ALL our devices, including cars and household appliances, can watch and report our interests and searches.
• Historical research in Urban Studies was popularized at the University of Chicago, with eventual emphasis on the coasts, going to high population areas. Dr. Greason favors the rural and less populated towns as a starting point to avoid missing critical historical perspectives.
• Progress is not linear, despite what some historians might imply.

League member Janiece Kirton interviewed Walter Greason, Ph.D., about the last five years the world has spent learning, reflecting, and reacting to the murder of George Floyd in Minneapolis. Officer Derrick Chauvin knelt on his neck for more than nine minutes, and citizens surrounding the officer, including EMTs, begged him to let off as Floyd repeated that he could not breathe. The MPD reported the next day that Floyd died “while resisting arrest from a medical incident during police interaction.” The world knew differently, thanks to the videography of 17-year-old Darnella Frazier, who won a special journalist award by the Pulitzer Prize Board. Despite the COVID pandemic, millions of citizens around the world marched, arm in arm, and demanded justice for George Floyd.

During the global unrest that followed, Dr. Greason recalled a class he once taught on all the race riots and uprisings in American History. There are so many incidents of white citizens attacking blacks, burning black neighborhoods, homes, and businesses, and lynching, that his students couldn’t stand the intensity of the horrors. Some left classes early, and some even vomited at the atrocities. Whites made postcards out of lynching scenes, and kept body parts of their victims. We learned again that history taught can omit trends and events, and Dr. Greason learned he must divide the course into more tolerable segments.

His scholarship on AI, which he stressed is clearly a part of our everyday lives, with the caveat that the surveillance state already exists, and has the potential to be weaponized against multiple communities. Macalester College makes it a priority to protect students and faculty from this, and he urges students and viewers to turn cameras off, be mindful of all “smart” appliances, and to assume that companies and governments are interested in all our data.

Dr. Greason studies consent agreements, such as the one made by the Justice Department and the Minneapolis Police Department. Dr. Greason feels one reason Minnesota is in a good position relative to other states is the strong legal leadership of Attorney General Keith Ellison. He has lived all over the U.S., and feels somewhat optimistic that Minnesota’s leaders try to advocate for the rule of law and racial justice. Is there still work to be done? Of course. But Dr. Greason appreciates organizations like the League which persevere in the cause of liberty and justice for all.

(NB, this Zoom session was not recorded, so unfortunately there will not be a YouTube video).

Next event: Annual Meeting Monday, June 9th at the Minnesota Humanities Center.

Starting in the fall, we will be holding in-person programs at the George Latimer Central Library in St. Paul on Sunday afternoons at 1:30 p.m. in the Otto Bremer Room. Street parking is free downtown (on Sundays), the building is historic and opens at 1pm, and it’s a wonderful chance to see friends and learn together.

Current dates are: September 21st, October 19th, and November 16th. Topics TBD.

by Pamela Mercier

       

The newly established ad hoc Advocacy Task Force met on May 8. This group currently consists of members from three different leagues - St Paul, Roseville Area, and White Bear Lake Area.

Our goal is to develop effective LWV actions that defend democracy against recent actions proposed and taken by Congress and the Executive branch of the Federal government.

In alignment with policy positions stated by LWVUS and LWVMN, we are creating resources to be shared through LWVMN with all local leagues. Defending Medicaid funding from possible cuts is one of our highest current priorities. The images here are posters that have been created by members of the task force and are available for download at the Take Action page of the State League website. You can download, print, and distribute them as you see fit.

By Pamela Mercier

The Voter Services Committee (VSC) conducted three voter registration events in May 2025.

The first took place at Como High School. Mr. Eric Erickson, a Como High School social studies teacher, and five students worked with Chris Schnieders, Voter Services Co-Chair, and two additional League volunteers encouraged seniors to register to vote during their lunch time.

We engaged with students and offered them our business cards. On the cards, they can access the QR code for voter registration at the Minnesota Office of the Secretary of State's website. This procedure, guided by students and our volunteers, enabled about 160 students to begin the registration process.

On May 24, the VSC provided voter registration opportunities at one of the Clean Slate events facilitated by the Minnesota Attorney General's Office. Attendees were beginning the process of seeking/receiving pardons and/or obtaining record expungements. 

The VSC was there to encourage voter registration. We interacted with about 25 participants. Some of them began the voter registration process on their phones and others filled out paper registration forms. The new Minnesota statute enables persons with felony convictions who are no longer incarcerated to register to vote even if they still have parole obligations and additional conditions to be met after their release.

On May 30, the VSC presented at the Cap and Gown event for seniors at Washington Technology Magnet High School. This is our third year engaging with seniors to help them register to vote. This has been a very successful occasion for the League since many students take this chance to sign up to vote. 

Dominic Erdozain’s One Nation Under Guns argues that America’s gun culture misrepresents the Second Amendment. He writes that the Founding Fathers did not intend to guarantee an individual right to bear arms. He states that the modern distortion of this history, along with a combination of nationalism and racism, poses a threat to democracy. The book traces the evolution of attitudes toward firearms and explains the myths about gun ownership and the Second Amendment. These ideas have shaped the nation’s approach to gun control and contributed to its high rates of gun violence. Erdozain calls for a reevaluation of history to understand the true intent behind the Second Amendment and to create a more responsible approach to gun policy.

Our group talked about how in the past, white supremacy played a crucial role in promoting guns, by using them to enforce slavery. Black people were not allowed to own guns. Later on, Barry Goldwater and President Reagan promoted the Western "cowboy" myth. In 1968, the Gun Control Act was signed into law by President Johnson. The Supreme Court has weighed in a few times on the right to own and carry guns. U.S. cities are currently ten to twenty times more dangerous than cities in Europe. Only one percent of the U.S. population are members of the NRA.

The group felt that we need common sense gun laws. Only regulated militias should have guns. We need to find a different way of speaking about guns and regulations. We can undo the Second Amendment. We don’t sell cigarettes to children anymore, so it is possible to not sell guns for use by children. Parents are being held responsible for the actions of their children with guns.

For more information, see Historian Dominic Erdozain discusses new book, U.S. gun culture, Second Amendment at book event - The Brown Daily Herald.

The Morning Book Club's next book is Believing: Our Thirty-Year Journey to End Gender Violence by Anita Hill. We will meet on June 11th, at 10:00 am at the Highland Park Library, 1974 Ford Parkway.