Marching Past & Present
What Four Parades Reveal About the Future
by Allan C. Carlson
In 1916, the Children's Bureau of the U.S. Department of Labor, the National Congress of Mothers, and the General Federation of Women's Clubs sponsored National Baby Week, March 4–11. Ten million women and six-and-a-half million preschool children took part in lectures, baby-care seminars, good-natured "Best Mother" contests, and orations celebrating motherhood as a sacred vocation. Most visually, there were "Baby Parades," occurring in 4,300 cities and towns. As one historian (Molly Ladd-Taylor) remarks, "Like military heroes, mothers with infants in arms paraded down Main Street to the applause of flag waving townspeople."
A century or so later, Americans recognize June as "Pride Month." This is a time, President Joe Biden tells us, "to recall the trials [that the] Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, and Queer community has endured and to rejoice in the triumphs of trailblazing individuals who have bravely fought . . . for full equality." Again most visibly, there are grand parades, this time featuring floats, exotic dancers, drag queens, amplified music, and contingents from the United Church of Christ, the Episcopalians, the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, and the Unitarians. These parades occur in over a hundred American cities, drawing huge crowds. Five million persons attended the 2019 New York City march alone; three million in San Francisco; two million in Chicago. Mothers with babies are not invited.
THIS ARTICLE ONLY AVAILABLE TO SUBSCRIBERS.
FOR QUICK ACCESS:
Allan C. Carlson is the John Howard Distinguished Senior Fellow at the International Organization for the Family. His most recent book is Family Cycles: Strength, Decline & Renewal in American Domestic Life, 1630-2000 (Transaction, 2016). He and his wife have four grown children and nine grandchildren. A "cradle Lutheran," he worships in a congregation of the Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod. He is a senior editor for Touchstone.
Get six issues (one year) of Touchstone PLUS full online access including pdf downloads for only $39.95. That's only $3.34 per month!
Get a one-year full-access subscription to the Touchstone online archives for only $19.95. That's only $1.66 per month!
bulk subscriptions
Order Touchstone subscriptions in bulk and save $10 per sub! Each subscription includes 6 issues of Touchstone plus full online access to touchstonemag.com—including archives, videos, and pdf downloads of recent issues for only $29.95 each! Great for churches or study groups.
Transactions will be processed on a secure server.
more on Family from the online archives
33.2—March/April 2020
Encounters with Faith & Forgiveness in Communities of Faith by Nicole M. King
32.4—July/August 2019
Today's Culture Wars Are Both Ancient & Modern by Allan C. Carlson
33.3—May/June 2020
Maternal Body: A Theology of Incarnation from the Christian East by Carrie Frederick Frost
Fertile Ground: A Pilgrimage Through Pregnancy by Laura S. Jansson by Agnes R. Howard
more from the online archives
33.4—July/August 2020
on Boethius's Consolation in a Time of Plague by Thomas Albert Howard
32.5—September/October 2019
on the Inhuman Transformation of Transgenderism by Anthony Esolen
30.6—Nov/Dec 2017
Christ, Individualism & the Meaning of Cultural Diversity by Anthony Esolen
calling all readers
Please Donate
"There are magazines worth reading but few worth saving . . . Touchstone is just such a magazine."
—Alice von Hildebrand
"Here we do not concede one square millimeter of territory to falsehood, folly, contemporary sentimentality, or fashion. We speak the truth, and let God be our judge. . . . Touchstone is the one committedly Christian conservative journal."
—Anthony Esolen, Touchstone senior editor
