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The World and Everything In It
12.1.25 Legal Docket on reopening old sentences, Moneybeat on affordability, and Daniel Darling on the strength of conviction
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- [00:05]
Mary Reichert
Good morning. Chief Justice John Roberts sounds a warning. Give judges too much room to reopen old sentences and you could unleash a wave of appeals.
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David Bonson
You say the situations will be rare and unusual.
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Mark Mellinger
Why in the world would that be the case? Every lawyer would bring these claims.
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Nick Eicher
That's ahead on legal docket. Also today, the Monday money beat David Bonson on the affordability crisis, the Fed's December rate cut signals and price controls in the eight and later the world history book. Seventy years ago, a woman became the unexpected face of the civil rights movement.
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Mary Reichert
It's Monday, December 1st. This is the world and everything in it from listeners supported world radio. I'm Mary Reichert.
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Nick Eicher
And I'm Nick Eicher. Good morning.
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Mary Reichert
Up next, Mark Mellinger with today's news.
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Mark Mellinger
President Trump says he thinks there's a good chance of a coming deal to end the Russia Ukraine war following peace talks between the US And Ukraine in Florida Sunday.
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David Bonson
We want to stop people from being killed.
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Mark Mellinger
Doesn't have much to do with us.
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David Bonson
But I'd like to see if we.
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Mark Mellinger
Could save a lot of souls. Secretary of State Marco Rubio called the four hour long talks productive. But he added the situation's still fragile and there's more work to be done. It's not just about the terms that ends fighting. It's about also the terms that set up Ukraine for long term prosperity. Along those lines, the plan being discussed would create a development fund to help Ukraine invest in fast growing industries. Plus the US Would help modernize Ukraine's natural gas infrastructure. US Special envoy Steve Witkoff is traveling to Russia today where he is slated to work on the peace proposal. Some more with that country's leader, Vladimir Putin. And President Trump has said he won't meet with Putin or Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy until both countries have preliminarily agreed to a peace deal. The families of those two West Virginia National Guard members shot in Washington, D.C. last week have received invitations to the White House. An Afghan national gunned down Staff Sergeant Andrew Wolf and Specialist Sarah Beckstrom just blocks from the White House. Beckstrom died while Wolf is still fighting for his life. Both were deployed to D.C. as part of the president's crime crackdown in the nation's capital, West Virginia Governor Patrick Morrissey tells Fox News everyone in the state.
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Daniel Darling
Is zeroed in on how we can send as many prayers as possible to Andrew. And a lot of people are asking questions about how such an unfathomable evil act occurred.
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Mark Mellinger
Funeral arrangements for Beckstrom are still in the works. President Trump spoke with her parents and says they're devastated. He says the White House will honor both soldiers when their families are ready, but he wants them to take their time. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is asking for a pardon to end his ongoing corruption trial. Netanyahu is facing fraud and other charges, accused of exchanging political favors with wealthy supporters. He he rejects those charges. Sunday, Netanyahu formally asked Israel's president to grant a pardon, claiming the trial has divided the country. Here's a portion of Netanyahu's address interpreted through a translator.
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Nick Eicher
I am certain, as are many others in the nation, that the immediate end.
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Mark Mellinger
Of this trial will greatly help to lower the flames and promote the broad reconciliation that our country so desperately needs, netanyahu added. His personal interest would have been to let the trial run all the way to acquittal, but says ending it is best for Israel's national interest. The office of the Israeli President called the pardon request extraordinary. Though the president has broad discretion to grant a pardon, requests are generally only reviewed once legal proceedings have ended. Lawmakers in both chambers of Congress say they are taking bipartisan action to gather a full accounting of US Military strikes on suspected drug smuggling boats in the Caribbean Sea and Pacific Ocean. Democratic Virginia Senator Tim Kaine says he's especially troubled by a recent Washington Post report that Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth verbally ordered all crew members of one strike on a boat from Venezuela killed in September, possibly leading to a follow up attack, taking out survivors of the initial strike. It's a clear violation of the DoD's own laws of war as well as international laws about the way you treat people who are in that circumstance. And so this rises to the level of a war crime.
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Nick Eicher
If it's True.
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Mark Mellinger
Kaine on CBS's Face the Nation the top Republican and Democrat on the Senate Armed Services Committee say they will be conducting vigorous oversight to determine the facts. Hegseth says the strikes on suspected drug boats have been lawful. President Trump says he's not sure if there was a follow up attack in the strike reported by the Washington Post, but he says Hegseth did not order a second strike and would not have approved of one. A massive blast of wintry weather caused all kinds of travel headaches Sunday for people headed back from Thanksgiving celebrations. The storm dumped several inches of snow across the Midwest, including about eight and a half at o' Hare Airport in Chicago, where hundreds of flights were canceled and delayed. That left travelers like Tara Tharp, who was hoping to fly from Atlanta to Chicago in in limbo if it's delayed. We've got some family here who's on standby to come back and pick us up. So we'll see how it goes. Thousands of people lost power in Wisconsin and in West Michigan, where they got a foot of snow in some spots. Hundreds of churches told worshippers to stay home and watch services online Black Friday sales in the US were up 4% this year over last. That was driven mostly by record online sales of $11.8 billion, up a billion from 2024, according to Adobe Analy Analytics. Nicole McDonald sells clothing, accessories and was happy with the turnout for her small business. I didn't know what to expect because everything we're hearing is how consumers are pulling back. You know, they're concerned about the economy.
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Nick Eicher
So it's really nice to see shoppers showing up and supporting small business.
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Mark Mellinger
Now the cold Water Salesforce says people were buying fewer items at checkout this year and part of the reason for the record spending was higher prices for the things people were buying. I'm Mark Mellinger. Straight ahead looking at how much discretion judges have to reopen cases long considered final in today's legal docket. And later, the Bible passage Rosa Parks looked to for strength. This is the world and everything in it.
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Nick Eicher
It's the world and everything in it for this first day of December 2025. We are so glad you've joined us today. Good morning. I'm Nick Eichert.
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Mary Reichert
And I'm Mary Reichard. Time now for legal Rocket. Before we get into the cases, I'm reminded of something Chief Justice John Roberts emphasized more than a decade ago. For three straight years, his 2010, 2011 and 2012 year end reports, Roberts focused on the same issue, the strain on the federal courts. Now, these reports are traditionally muted, deliberately understated because they're not meant to sound alarms. But 2012 was about as close as Roberts ever came that year, he put it bluntly. The judiciary, he wrote, has consistently done more with less. He was talking about shrinking resources and growing demands, a legal system under pressure.
- [08:13]
Nick Eicher
Well, that background came to the fore this month because during oral argument in one of the cases we're covering today, the chief justice raised that old concern again, this time out loud. One of the lawyers was arguing for easier use of sentence reduction motions and assured the court that the number of them would be few. Roberts pushed back as if he were concerned about a return to the bad old days. Listen to him here, pointedly not buying it. Counsel, you say the situations in which.
- [08:46]
David Bonson
These would arise will be rare and unusual.
- [08:49]
Nick Eicher
Why in the world Would that be the case? You've got somebody sitting in jail and they got 20 more years to look.
- [08:54]
David Bonson
At and you go in and say.
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Nick Eicher
Gosh, I think there's like a 1% chance, you know, you might be able to get out. The prisoner is going to say, oh.
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Daniel Darling
Okay, it's only 1%.
- [09:03]
Nick Eicher
Let's forget about it. You know, every lawyer would bring these claims, and some judges are going to.
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David Bonson
Grant them and some are not going to grant them.
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Nick Eicher
I'm not sure.
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David Bonson
This factor is not something that Congress took into account.
- [09:15]
Nick Eicher
Every lawyer would bring these claims. You'll hear echoes of that concern in all three cases today. Different facts, different statutes, but the same underlying question. How far can judges go in reopening sentences without also opening the legal floodgates on the federal courts?
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Daniel Darling
Right.
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Mary Reichert
Case one is Fernandez versus us. This one comes out of a brutal drug cartel double homicide in the Bronx 25 years ago. Two couriers were sent to collect a six and a half million dollar payment for almost 600 pounds of cocaine. Instead, they were ambushed and shot to death in the lobby of an apartment building.
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Nick Eicher
Prosecutors say the drug kingpin hired a hitman to kill one of the couriers and avoid paying his debt. But Patrick Darge brought along his cousin Joe Fernandez as backup. According to the government, Darge shot the first courier, then turned to shoot the second. When his gun jammed, Darrie fled, Fernandez stepped in and he fired multiple times to finish the hit. Both men escaped in a getaway car.
- [10:22]
Mary Reichert
Fernandez chose to go to trial. The others cooperated with the government. A jury convicted Fernandez and the judge imposed two consecutive life sentences. That's where the floodgates concern surfaces. Fernandez already went through direct appeal and habeas the post conviction process to challenge his case, and he lost both times.
- [10:43]
Nick Eicher
But now he's trying a different route. Compassionate release. Asking a judge to reduce his sentence because he says the evidence was shaky, the disparities were extreme, and he is innocent.
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Mary Reichert
Compassionate release was designed for extraordinary and compelling reasons, usually terminal illness, advanced age, or family emergencies. It was not meant to relitigate guilt. But Fernandez argues that unusual or unfair sentencing circumstances should also count.
- [11:15]
Nick Eicher
So now the Supreme Court must decide what qualifies as an extraordinary and compelling reason. His lawyer, Benjamin Gruenstein, told the justices that the statute's plain meaning allows it.
- [11:27]
Mark Mellinger
Under the plain meaning of the statute, if a court finds an error that significantly increased the length of the defendant's sentence, that fact can contribute to a finding of extraordinary and compelling reasons to reduce the sentence. And even when a court finds no Error, it may nonetheless decide that the circumstances surrounding the defendant's sentence were so unusual and unfair as to be extraordinary and compelling. That's what happened here.
- [11:56]
Mary Reichert
But the government argues this would derail the system. Deputy Solicitor General Eric Fagan put it this way.
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Mark Mellinger
I think what you've just heard is.
- [12:04]
David Bonson
A proposal to make it instead an open ended loophole.
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Mark Mellinger
To challenge the validity of sentences continuously.
- [12:13]
Nick Eicher
Through a potentially endless series of collateral.
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Mark Mellinger
Attacks on the criminal judgment.
- [12:18]
Mary Reichert
Justice Samuel Alito looked to the original intent of the Sentencing Reform act of 1984.
- [12:23]
Nick Eicher
Would you agree that one of the principal goals or a major goal of the Sentencing Reform act was fidelity? Sentencing Reform act got rid of parole. It didn't like the situation where someone would be sentenced to 30 years in prison. This was standard at the time maximum. A life sentence was considered to be 30 years. But then after, after 10 years, the person would be, would be paroled. It got rid of all that. Would you agree that that was a major goal of the major objective of the Sentencing Reform Act?
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Mark Mellinger
Absolutely.
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Nick Eicher
Gruenstein conceded that, but said compassionate release is a kind of safety valve for unusual cases. Editorial comment here that is undefined. And most everyone will see his or her own case as unusual. Justice Neil Gorsuch warned that judges ought to respect jury verdicts. I don't doubt 35, 53 factors are very broad and give the district judge rightly lots of discretion in sentencing when there's not a mandatory minimum. But I wouldn't have thought that one of the circumstances, personal circumstances that a judge could take into account has really nothing to do with the defendant. It has to do with the judge's own discourse, perhaps reasonably so, about the jury's verdict. And I had thought in our legal system the jury's verdict on the facts is not something a court can impeach unless it's clearly erroneous.
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Mark Mellinger
That's correct.
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Mary Reichert
Not only that, but Justice Elena Kagan spotted a crack in the government's reasoning under the law to challenge a federal conviction. That's what she refers to when she mentions section 2255.
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Daniel Darling
We've never said that an actual innocence claim could be raised under section 2255. So sort of the premise of your argument, which is it could have been raised in 2255, sorry, you lost your chance. But the premise of the argument is it could have.
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David Bonson
And here we don't really know that it could have.
- [14:20]
Daniel Darling
The court has never said whether it could have.
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David Bonson
So the rule doesn't really seem to.
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Daniel Darling
Fit the case, if you understand what I mean.
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Mary Reichert
A decision in this case will clarify the boundaries of compassionate release and inform judges just how far they can go in taking another look at cases considered final.
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Nick Eicher
Now the second case raises that concern from a different angle. Here the question is whether a change in federal law can be used by defendants sentenced under the old rules. In particular a law that reduced mandatory gun penalties for new offenders. And that brings us to the facts in Rutherford v. United States.
- [14:58]
Mary Reichert
Here are the facts. Daniel Rutherford twice robbed a chiropractic clinic in Philadelphia. He pretended to be a patient, pulled a gun and then stole cash and jewelry. He never fired the gun. But still, under the federal gun statute, simply possessing a gun during a crime of violence carries mandatory prison time.
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Nick Eicher
A jury convicted Rutherford of multiple crimes totaling more than 42 years. That includes a 25 year mandatory minimum for the second gun count automatically stacked onto the first that garnered just seven years. Two separate robberies with gun count stacked up on top of each other.
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Mary Reichert
Now it happens that Congress later passed the First Step act that changed the rules for first time offenders. They don't receive stacked mandatory gun terms. Rutherford points to that new law to help him out. But the Congress didn't make that change retroactive.
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Nick Eicher
Justice Brett Kavanaugh saw this as a separation of powers problem. Congress specified no retroactivity. Yet the Sentencing Commission says we're now going to give a second look for district judges to revisit those sentences even though Congress did want them made retroactive. Obviously the commission was very divided on this question. Commission to center said this is a.
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Mark Mellinger
Seismic structural change to our criminal justice system that countermands Congress's judgments. And that's my concern on this case.
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Mary Reichert
Rutherford's lawyer, David Frederick was ready.
- [16:26]
Mark Mellinger
There is a certainly a huge difference.
- [16:28]
David Bonson
Between a categorical application of the rule.
- [16:31]
Mark Mellinger
And a more limited case by case totality of the circumstances inquiry where you look at the effect of the stacking of the gun charges on the length of incarceration.
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Mary Reichert
His point is that judges won't be reopening every sentence handed down. And it's not flouting Congress. It's just responding to new ideas about what punishment ought to be. That's the point of the First Step Act.
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Nick Eicher
But the larger principle raised concerns. If Congress didn't want retroactivity here and the court reads retroactive activity into it, where does it end? What's to keep every non retroactive reform from becoming retroactive anyway? Justice Neil Gorsuch captured the frustration. This is a conundrum for us. I think you want us to look at a change in law and assume Congress wanted us to do that. Well, right. And commission saying, yeah, go ahead and do that, but don't do it when it with respect to our work. And that seems rather disrespectful of Congress and rather solicitous to its own. Our final case is not about compassionate release. It's about supervised release. That's the system of oversight by a court after a federal inmate finishes up a prison term. Nearly every federal prisoner does receive a term of supervised release. It's not extended punishment in intent. It's more to support re entry into society.
- [17:59]
Mary Reichert
Here are the facts of this one. Isabel Rico pleaded guilty to conspiracy to distribute methamphetamine and heroin. She came to the end of her prison term and began supervised release. But she soon violated conditions of release, had her supervision revoked, and received a new three and a half year term. Then she vanished for five years, living as a fugitive and committing even more crimes.
- [18:22]
Nick Eicher
Eventually, she was again arrested. The probation office argued the court retained jurisdiction because when Rico absconded, the clock on supervised release paused. She wasn't able to run out the clock, but she says that's not what the statute says. Her term expired while she was gone, so the court no longer had authority over her.
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Mary Reichert
The government warned that rule will just encourage absconders to run out the clock. But Justice Gorsuch served up a hypothetical to counter the government's logic that failing to show up is the same as any other violation of supervised release.
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Nick Eicher
I don't know. I mean, failing to show up is pretty obvious way to detect a violation, more so than a lot of other criminal enterprises that might be going on. Well, I dutifully show up, but I'm running a, you know, Murder Mayhem Inc. Over here. You just don't find it, you know, that's hard to find. You got to go find that somebody doesn't show up. I noticed, in other words, some violations are hard to detect. Others are easier if the clock is not paused. When someone runs, that fugitive actually benefits. That violation is so easy to detect that the supervision period keeps ticking. And once it expires, the court loses power to act. That just doesn't make a lot of sense.
- [19:45]
Mary Reichert
The law says nothing about tolling for fugitives. So should a court reed tolling into it or should a court stay true to the plain language despite an unsavory outcome? So three criminal cases today asking the same core question. When judges open the door to reconsidering a sentence, does that door open just a crack or crack open all the way? And that's this week's legal docket.
- [20:27]
Daniel Darling
Additional support comes from Ambassadors Impact Network, helping entrepreneurs with a purpose find the support they need to thrive with faith aligned financing options.
- [20:37]
Nick Eicher
More@ambassadorsimpact.com and from Water's Edge, Save more, do More, give more.
- [20:46]
Mark Mellinger
Helping Christians support ministry by giving through.
- [20:49]
Nick Eicher
A donor advised fund.
- [20:51]
Daniel Darling
Watersedge.com daf.
- [21:06]
Mary Reichert
Coming up next on THE WORLD and everything in it, the Monday Money Beat.
- [21:13]
Nick Eicher
Time now to talk business, markets and the economy with financial analyst and advisor David Bonson. David heads up the wealth management firm the Bonson Group and he is here now. Good morning to you, David.
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David Bonson
Well, good morning, Nick. Good to be with you.
- [21:26]
Nick Eicher
Well, David, I'd like to start with something that showed up on the front pages of both the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal over the weekend. This question of affordability. And I know it's primarily political, but there's an economic piece here. The Times is fact checking whether President Trump is right when he talks about affordability pressures. And the Journal took the story in a completely different direction. It had a blunt headline on its econ page. The headline was this, Everyone is talking about the affordability crisis. It can't be solved. So there's quite a lot wrapped up here. David, what do you make of the broader affordability issue? It feels like this is going to dominate politics in the midterm elections, but do you think we are anywhere close to having an honest convers about it?
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David Bonson
Well, we're definitely not getting close to having an honest conversation about affordability. But part of that is because I don't think people know even what questions to be asking that could help lead to an honest conversation. You know, it's funny the you had said it's sort of a political thing, but it has an economic connotation too. And, and I think we'll be in a better position when we sort of reverse that where we think, I guess this has a political connotation, but it's primarily an economic question. Right. That's really the truth is that this is an economic issue that is related to the supply and demand equilibrium, the production of goods and services, the demand that goes therewith the supply of money that exists in the economy, how they juxtapose with one another, affecting prices. That's the story of how prices are set. That's all a bunch of economic variables. But it becomes highly politicized and that is pretty much irreversible. Both parties have done it to the other party when they're in charge, to the point where we've now decided that what eggs cost at the grocery store must be the either fault or credit of the President. It's rather insane if you think about it. But the problem is it's just true enough that people can run with it. Where there are presidential actions, there are political actions that impact prices. But there's never been anything a politician can do to impact prices than to get out of the way of prices and allow production to come meet demand. In other words, what Ronald Reagan became very famous for in his economic portfolio was something in the late 70s and early 80s we referred to as supply side economics. It pushed prices lower, it pushed real wages higher. And by real wages I mean net of inflation, actual incomes. And it does so by producing more goods and services. It closes the output gap, there's more things being produced and therefore there's an increase in both jobs, but the wages that go with it. I don't think right now that we can have an honest conversation, Nick, because no one's going to talk about what the primary driver of higher prices is as felt by people, which is housing. And since housing is what people spend most of their incomes on, whether they're renters or own of a home, that's the biggest issue. And we will feel better about prices when housing is more affordable.
- [25:00]
Nick Eicher
Well, David, let's pivot to the Fed. Here we are in December and the possibility of a rate cut is starting to look less possibility and more likelihood. I went over to the CME FedWatch tool to check the probabilities. The market now is putting an 86% chance on a quarter point cut. It was 67% a month ago, 71% last week. So you see how it's been climbing steadily and very much so over the past week. How do you read this? And more to the point, how does the Fed rationalize a cut when the composite inflation number still hasn't come back to that 2% target that they're always talking about?
- [25:45]
David Bonson
Well, I think that the issue, first of all as to why the futures have now gotten up to 86% probability. It's from John Williams comments. So for listeners who don't know, there's a group of voting members that are all presidents of the regional Federal Reserve bank that make up the Federal Open Market Committee, the fomc, and they vote. And the chairman of this, which is Jay Powell, generally the chairman has an awful lot of clout with the way things vote. But the New York Fed is a permanent member of the fomc. The other places kind of rotate and we know that New York is obviously a kind of epic, epicenter of our banking and financial system. And for John Williams, the president of the New York Federal Reserve to come out and say I think we need to cut in December, many people, and I think they're right about this, took that to mean Jay Powell was saying it. Your question though, Nick, as to how they could rationalize it when the headline inflation number is not yet at 2%, is that the Fed lives with the tension of what they want the price level to be with their full employment mandate. And as long as you have two dual objectives that are constantly in tension, if not outright contradiction with one another, then you have a permanent permission structure to pick one over the other. And they talk about the kind of weight of priority and which one is a bigger risk. And Powell has done a reasonable job at laying this out. Sometimes they're pretty duplicitous, I think, in the way they talk about stuff. But Powell has come right out and said we might have to pick one of our objectives over another. That right now we think the body of evidence for weakening employment and weakening economic conditions is a larger concern than where the price level is. Now, to the extent that there's people like me who are big advocates of sound money and do not want to see inflation, what I would say is if you were trying to get to 2% inflation and you believe that tariffs are adding half a point or three quarters of a point and tariffs have nothing to do with monetary policy, then I think the Fed is perfectly right to say we need to go focus on what we can control, which is tightening credit conditions that are going to hurt wages and employment versus the inflation level. That if they are really being driven by tariffs or outside of the of the Fed's inputs anyways.
- [28:20]
Nick Eicher
Well, David, I'd like to touch on something I found really interesting. There is this proposal in New York that would restrict retailers from using AI and personal data to tailor prices to individual consumers, basically banning what they call algorithmic price gouging. And I think I know how you're going to answer this, but I'll ask it this way anyway. Do you see this as genuine consumer protection or do you see this as old fashion price control thinking updated for the AI age?
- [28:54]
David Bonson
Well, you are right. You do know how I'm going to answer and it's outrageous. And this did not start in New York, it started in California. The notion that we, you know, they tried to pass a law in California that some of these online real estate websites couldn't use AI and other Data to try to set what different rent levels were, were. And it isn't even price fixing, it's price reporting. It was just an aggregation of data. And certain parts of California regulatory apparatus wanted to ban and regulate, restrict that any attempt to use technology or to outlaw the use of technology in how prices are found. You know, this is an economic principle that I teach high school kids. It's an unbelievably important faith based principle. So I don't mind sharing it here. For world listeners, prices are not imposed, they are discovered. This is one of the most important pieces of all of economics. So when you think, oh, the state is coming in and helping to impose a price, to set a price, to tell you how a price can and cannot be set, that's not what prices are at that point, they're distorting prices. Prices are organically set between buyers and sellers and they reflect sometimes trillions of pieces of input and data and interpretation of data going on very quickly. And we all make different decisions on subjective taste and preferences and information and all that kind of stuff. It's what we call price discovery and it's how economic calculation is done and it's how our standard of living gets better because we respond to prices. So as a permanent principle, whether you're talking about AI or whether you're talking about something from the 18th century, any attempt for the state to impose prices impedes natural organic price discovery. It not only is an imposition upon freedom, it's an imposition upon prosperity.
- [30:55]
Nick Eicher
Well, David, your dividend cafe this week was very personal, very much in keeping with the Thanksgiving weekend we just came through. You write in it about gratitude. You write about the team that you have around you. You reflect on a very big milestone, big number. Thirty years since your father passed away. This was the man you credit with shaping your first principles approach to work and investing. And David, as your firm, the Bonson Group has grown, that's become a much bigger enterprise with a lot more people involved. How do you keep those first principles in the DNA of your organization? And I ask that because I think anyone building or leading anything, whether you're starting a business or you're running a school, a ministry, I think there's benefit from hearing how you think about that.
- [31:49]
David Bonson
Well, I love the way you ask the question, Nick, because DNA doesn't change. And that's the important part, is that you have to have it in your DNA where if you're constantly having to try to bring it back in, you're subject to losing it, to forfeiting it. But by having a DNA, right, you're just underlying programming and this real foundational thing. The Bible talks about a lot in terms of the kind of solid ground foundation from which decisions are made and the way you think about critical things. It's very important to me that our business have an actual DNA, that everything that flows out of what we do, we can make mistakes, we can kind of violate some of our own principles. But no, the principles have to be there foundationally. And I believe this for any entrepreneurial endeavor. And as you point out, I only have the blessing of believing it because it was so thoroughly taught to me by my late father. So whether people are in education, whether they're in an entrepreneurial endeavor, whether they're in a pastoral ministry, whether in government or organizations, you know, there needs to be a belief system and a set of principles by which people make decisions. And there is one. No matter what. The question is whether or not that belief system is faithful and rooted to timeless, eternal principles and to transcendent truths. That's what is important in my company. It's important in the way I was brought up. And I would hope for all of us, it would be important in the way we conduct ourselves in our various vocational endeavors.
- [33:29]
Nick Eicher
Well, we're thankful for you, David. And I know these, these anniversaries of losing a father are. They hit hard. 30 years is a long time, but probably feels like just yesterday, right? Yeah. David Bonson is founder, managing partner and chief investment officer of the Bonson Group. He writes at Dividend Cafe and at World Opinions. David, thank you again so much and I hope you have a great week.
- [33:54]
David Bonson
Thanks so much, Nick.
- [33:58]
Nick Eicher
Sam, Good morning. This is the world and everything in it from listener supported World Radio. I'm Nick Icker.
- [34:35]
Mary Reichert
And I'm Mary Reichert. Up next on the World History Book, a commentary from World Opinions contributor Daniel Darling on a woman's small act of defiance that put the civil rights movement in the fast lane.
- [34:50]
Daniel Darling
Rosa Louise McCauley was born in 1913 in the segregated South. She was raised by her mother and grandmother. The descendant of slaves, she began working on a plantation in Alabama at the age of six. Raised in the African Methodist Episcopal Church, Parks grew up memorizing scripture, singing hymns and attending church weekly, frequently teaching Sunday school the rest of her life. In 1932, she married her husband, Raymond Parks, a barber and civil rights activist. At the turn of the 20th century, Jim Crow laws were passed in many Southern states. Montgomery, Alabama passed an ordinance that segregated the city buses by race the first several Rows were white only, and if they filled up, black passengers in the middle and back rows were required to give up their seats for white passengers. Like other black riders, Rosa Parks had endured this humiliation for many years. In 1943, she had a confrontation with bus driver James Blay. To make way for a white passenger, Parks was forced to get off a city bus. Twelve years later, on December 1, 1955, Parks hopped aboard a similar bus, sitting in a middle section. When Blake confronted her and asked her to move, she refused and was arrested. Though she was heavily involved in the civil rights movement, Parks said she didn't intentionally provoke a confrontation on this ride. Nevertheless, her refusal sparked a nationwide response. Here is some audio from a 1956 interview on KPFA in Berkeley, California.
- [36:21]
Nick Eicher
The word had gotten around over Montgomery of my arrest because of this incident, and people just began to decide that they wouldn't ride the bus. On the day of my trial, which.
- [36:37]
Daniel Darling
Was Monday, December 5th, more than 40,000 Montgomery residents refused to ride city buses. Her quiet act of resistance also helped launch the career of civil rights activist Martin Luther King, Jr. In June of 1956, the Supreme Court ordered Montgomery to stop enforcing bus segregation. The Browder vs Gayle decision began chipping away at the state Segregation Its Plessy vs Ferguson opinion had created. Her act, grounded in the Christian doctrine of the image of God, reminded America that it had yet to live up to the promises in the founding charters that all men are created equal. But it did not come without cost. Her family was forced to move out of Alabama for fear of safety. She spent the rest of her days in Detroit, Michigan.
- [37:22]
Mark Mellinger
Each time a person strikes out against.
- [37:23]
David Bonson
Injustice, she sends forth a tiny ripple.
- [37:27]
Mark Mellinger
Of hope which, crossing millions of others, can sweep down the walls of oppression.
- [37:33]
Daniel Darling
In 1996, President Bill Clinton awarded Parks the Presidential Medal of Freedom Freedom, and Congress awarded her the Congressional Gold Medal. When she died in 2005, she was the first woman to lie in state. In the United States Capitol, President George Bush signed a bill that authorized the creation of a statue memorializing her in the Capitol.
- [37:52]
Mark Mellinger
By refusing to give in, Rosa Parks showed that one candle can light the darkness. Like so many institutionalized evils, once the ugliness of these laws was held up to the light, they could not stand.
- [38:04]
Daniel Darling
Seventy years after that fateful bus ride, we have much to learn from Rosa Parks life. She is an example of someone whose Christian faith was not kept contained to the walls of the church she loved, but motivated her to work to change social policy on behalf of the most vulnerable. Christians are often shamed for being political. But as Parks demonstrated, the gospel is both personal and social. How can we claim to love our neighbors as ourselves if we shrink back from the opportunity to shape the world in which our neighbors live? While Romans 13 urges us to be good citizens and obey the laws of government, there are times when to be faithful to Christ means we must resist unjust laws. Rosa Parks, whose favorite Psalm was Psalm 23, drew strength from her faith in Christ. She said, I was fortunate God provided me with the strength I needed at the the precise time when conditions were ripe for change. I am thankful to him every day that he gave me the strength not to move. May future generations say of us that we found similar strength to not move. I'm Daniel Darling.
- [39:42]
Mary Reichert
Tomorrow, Samaritan's Purse cuts ties with an event Evangelical Accreditation Agency over a new standard. We have a report and the end of the US Penny that and more tomorrow. I'm Mary Reinkert.
- [39:55]
Nick Eicher
And I'm Nick Eicher. The world and everything in it comes to you from World Radio. World's mission is biblically objective journalism that informs, educates and inspires. The Bible says great indeed we confess is the mystery of godliness. And he was manifested in the flesh. Vindicated by the Spirit seen by angels proclaimed among the nations believed on in the world taken up in glory. First Timothy 3:16. Go now in grace and peace.