Letters to the Editor | June 23, 2025

I read with interest The Inquirer’s report of labor leaders Randi Weingarten and Lee Sanders (along with activist David Hogg) leaving Democratic Party leadership. This, followed by an editorial calling out the Dems for not “meeting the moment,” is instructive. But let’s not limit our concern to national leaders. Where was the local Democratic Party organization in the buildup for the “No Kings” demonstration? There are 66 ward leaders and 1,700 divisions, each with two committeepeople in our neighborhoods. Was there any organizational effort to bring people out?

Why isn’t the local Democratic Party among the leaders in the coalition calling for a mass demonstration for the restoration of democratic practices, protecting our immigrant neighbors, and expressing outrage toward the current Gestapo-like practices now even being used to arrest elected representatives who dare to question? Why wasn’t each ward (or division) challenged to bring out their neighbors? Why not have delegations from each marching behind representative banners? The Dems have a political and organizational structure that is not being used to organize the people unless it’s Election Day. This wrong practice will be its demise, with voter turnout continuing to decrease, unless it wakes up and uses its might to organize at this critical moment.

Dennis Barnebey, Philadelphia

That parents should refuse to immunize their child amazes me. But then, parents didn’t grow up when polio (infantile paralysis) was a constant threat. In the 1940s, when I was a child, everyone knew at least two or more people who had a leg or arm paralyzed from having had polio. In grammar school, Marilyn, in the class behind me, was right-handed but had to use her left hand because she had had polio, and as a result, her right hand and arm were useless.

We children contributed our candy money to the March of Dimes, putting our coins in the cardboard holder on our teachers’ desks to help with the fight to find the vaccine that would one day protect us. Back then, no matter how hot, no one swam in the lakes during August. Everyone knew that polio might be caught in warmwater lakes. Many children didn’t go to the zoo or the circus. No reason to go where there were crowds and take a chance.

I came home from college for Thanksgiving in the early 1960s and drove over to the grammar school where the adults were getting the polio vaccine. This was a farming community where everyone knew each other, and most were related by marriage or blood. I expected everyone to be in a joyful mood — a party atmosphere, so happy to now be freed from the fear. Instead, no one spoke. It was like a morgue. It was then that I realized how scared everyone had been.

Vaccines have prevented the yearly childhood illnesses I grew up with. At 5, whooping cough. Measles, chickenpox, mumps, etc., followed. Most of the class would be out sick during at least one month of every school year. Vaccines have changed all that. Why would anyone turn them down?

Laurel Hoffmann, Oreland

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