The phrase "Fourth of July oratory" has long been used to deride robust expressions of patriotism on Independence Day. "Has the oratory that is peculiar to the Fourth of July," asked senator Stanley Matthews on the floor of the Senate in 1879, "come to be ... a scorn and a reproach? Is it enough to smother opposition and put down argument to say that that is merely the sentimentality of a Fourth of July oratory?"
Four years later, James Russell Lowell, a poet who served as ambassador to the Court of St. James', told an Independence Day audience, "Now the Fourth of July has several times been alluded to, and I believe it is generally thought on that anniversary the spirit of a certain bird known to heraldic ornithologists -- and I believe to them alone -- as the spread eagle, enters into every American's breast, and compels him, whether he will or no, to pour forth a flood of national self-laudation." (He added that it took place only one day a year.)
Mark Twain was one of those who spoofed the Fourth, especially its commercialization by fireworks manufacturers. The master of the tall tale told an Independence Day audience that one of his uncles out West "opened his mouth to hurrah, and a rocket went down his throat ... blew up and scattered him all over the 45 states, and -- really, now, this is true -- I know about it myself -- 24 hours after that it was raining buttons, recognizable as his, on the Atlantic Seaboard."
Tall-tale telling is an old American art form, but elitist nose-wrinkling by those too easily discomfited by displays of love of country can trigger a go-too-far. When the orator Rufus Choate derided "the glittering and sounding generalities of natural right" that made up the Declaration of Independence, Ralph Waldo Emerson made Choate's phrase pithier and then demolished it: "`Glittering generalities!' They are blazing ubiquities." (A ubiquity has the capacity of being present everywhere all the time. It's a great word, but not as familiar as "omnipresent"; I wouldn't use it in a Fourth of July speech.)
Some controversialists worry about recusal: When should judges recuse themselves from deciding cases, based on a conflict of interest or desire to avoid criticism, and when do they have an obligation to sit in judgment, as they are trained and paid to do?
In the quiet haven of grammatical, etymological and semantic scholarship that is this space, I worry about whether the verb recuse is still transitive -- that is, if it transmits an action from subject to object and requires that object to achieve its meaning. For example, accuse is transitive; I [subject] accuse [transitive verb] you [object]. But if you just say "I accuse," the sentence just hangs there, looking forlornly for an object to receive the action; you can't get away with that unless you're Emile Zola charging ubiquitously. You can, however, say, "I accuse myself" -- turning the action inward and using a selfish reflexive pronoun as the object.
So when a judge uses the transitive verb `recuse,' shouldn't he (or she, as the case may be, and nobody says "as the case may be" anymore) use a reflexive pronoun as the object? Shouldn't it be "I recuse myself" or "She recused herself?"
That's not what Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia wrote in an explanation of why he decided not to disqualify himself in some case about sitting ducks. He wrote instead, "I do not think it would be proper for me to recuse." No object. As the learned counsel say: Hunh?
"It is probably correct that recuse is a transitive verb," he half-concedes as he argues his case in Scalia versus Safire (with me presiding in this, my courtroom, and not recusing myself), "but it seems to me common and proper usage, with some transitive verbs, simply to omit the object that is clearly implied from the context. `Accept,' for example, is a transitive verb; but when a friend invites you home to dinner, surely it is proper to say `I accept,' rather than, `I accept the invitation.' So also with `recuse.' Whom or what else would a judge recuse, other than himself?"
Hold on -- what's with this "probably correct" business? (I enjoy interrupting; it rattles the poor guy down at the bar in front of the bench.)
"I said that it is probably correct that recuse is a transitive verb because I suspect that some verbs (perhaps recuse among them) have evolved from purely transitive to transitive/intransitive by reason of the fact that the reflexive object (as in `I recuse myself,' `he recuses himself') was so obvious that it was regularly omitted."
What precedent can you cite for that? Or to use the vernacular, gimme a f'rinstance.
"`Preen' is perhaps an example. Webster's Second shows it as transitive and intransitive; Noah Webster's 1828 edition showed it as transitive only. It rings almost redundant in the modern ear to say `He was preening himself before the mirror.' So, either because the reflexive object of the infinitive to recuse is implied; or because recuse has already acquired an intransitive meaning: proper for me to recuse is perfectly OK."
Pretty loosey-goosey for a strict constructionist, it seems to me, though I have to admire a Supreme who clings to the majestically prescriptive Merriam-Webster's Second Unabridged, which was succeeded but not replaced by the scandalously descriptive Third Unabridged in 1961. Sure enough, in the entry for preen in my copy of the Third, the lines about the intransitive usages have increased, including Virginia Woolf's "She preened, approving her adolescence."
Whatever happened to "original intent?" With the purist jurist evolving into Swingin' Nino, who is left on the ramparts to refuse recuse without a reflexive object?
Remanded to the public for more usage.
A series of strong earthquakes in Hualien County not only caused severe damage in Taiwan, but also revealed that China’s power has permeated everywhere. A Taiwanese woman posted on the Internet that she found clips of the earthquake — which were recorded by the security camera in her home — on the Chinese social media platform Xiaohongshu. It is spine-chilling that the problem might be because the security camera was manufactured in China. China has widely collected information, infringed upon public privacy and raised information security threats through various social media platforms, as well as telecommunication and security equipment. Several former TikTok employees revealed
For the incoming Administration of President-elect William Lai (賴清德), successfully deterring a Chinese Communist Party (CCP) attack or invasion of democratic Taiwan over his four-year term would be a clear victory. But it could also be a curse, because during those four years the CCP’s People’s Liberation Army (PLA) will grow far stronger. As such, increased vigilance in Washington and Taipei will be needed to ensure that already multiplying CCP threat trends don’t overwhelm Taiwan, the United States, and their democratic allies. One CCP attempt to overwhelm was announced on April 19, 2024, namely that the PLA had erred in combining major missions
The Constitutional Court on Tuesday last week held a debate over the constitutionality of the death penalty. The issue of the retention or abolition of the death penalty often involves the conceptual aspects of social values and even religious philosophies. As it is written in The Federalist Papers by Alexander Hamilton, James Madison and John Jay, the government’s policy is often a choice between the lesser of two evils or the greater of two goods, and it is impossible to be perfect. Today’s controversy over the retention or abolition of the death penalty can be viewed in the same way. UNACCEPTABLE Viewing the
At the same time as more than 30 military aircraft were detected near Taiwan — one of the highest daily incursions this year — with some flying as close as 37 nautical miles (69kms) from the northern city of Keelung, China announced a limited and selected relaxation of restrictions on Taiwanese agricultural exports and tourism, upon receiving a Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) delegation led by KMT legislative caucus whip Fu Kun-chi (傅崑萁). This demonstrates the two-faced gimmick of China’s “united front” strategy. Despite the strongest earthquake to hit the nation in 25 years striking Hualien on April 3, which caused