March 24
Many Masks in the Marketplace 
Meetings # 3,161 - Peter N. Pero, local author and educator, says:  “In recent years, American business has reinvented itself in strange new ways. Learn how fast food, bookstores, apparel, advertising, and banking are reconfiguring their products and messages in order to attract new customers and capital.”
March 3
Vachel Lindsay:  Poet, Tramp and
Favorite Son of Illinois 
Meeting # 3,158 - Lecture and reading by journalist/poet/folksinger Job Conger of Springfield, Illinois, author and publisher of Vachel Lindsay, Strange Gold, a concise biography and compendium of his poems and Lindsay lore.

Springfield, IL, is the birthplace and long-time home of American poet Vachel Lindsay (1879 - 1931, who became famous in the early part of the 20th Century for his unique style of poetry.  He is considered the father of modern singing poetry, as he referred to it, in which verses are meant to be sung or chanted. His extensive correspondence with the poet Yeats details his intentions to revive the musical qualities in poetry as had been practiced by the ancient Greeks.

Because of his identity as a performance artist and his use of American Midwest themes, Lindsay became known in the 1910s as the "Prairie Troubador." For the final twenty years of his life, Lindsay was one of the best-known poets in America. His reputation was high enough to enable him to befriend, encourage, and mentor other poets, such as Langston Hughes and Sara Teasdale.
ABRAHAM LINCOLN WALKS AT MIDNIGHT
(In Springfield, Illinois)

It is portentous, and a thing of state
That here at midnight, in our little town
A mourning figure walks, and will not rest,
Near the old court-house pacing up and down,

Or by his homestead, or in shadowed yards
He lingers where his children used to play,
Or through the market, on the well-worn stones
He stalks until the dawn-stars burn away.

A bronzed, lank man! His suit of ancient black,
A famous high top-hat and plain worn shawl
Make him the quaint great figure that men love,
The prairie-lawyer, master of us all.

He cannot sleep upon his hillside now.
He is among us:--as in times before!
And we who toss and lie awake for long
Breathe deep, and start, to see him pass the door.

'His head is bowed. He thinks on men and kings.
Yea, when the sick world cries, how can he sleep?
Too many peasants fight, they know not why,
Too many homesteads in black terror weep.

The sins of all the war-lords burn his heart.
He sees the dreadnoughts scouring every main.
He carries on his shawl-wrapped shoulders now
The bitterness, the folly and the pain.

He cannot rest until a spirit-dawn
Shall come;--the shining hope of Europe free:
The league of sober folk, the Workers' Earth,
Bringing long peace to Cornland, Alp and Sea.

It breaks his heart that kings must murder still,
That all his hours of travail here for men
Seen yet in vain. And who will bring white peace
That he may sleep upon his hill again?
Vachel Lindsay House was the birthplace and home of poet Vachel Lindsay. The Greek Revival house was constructed in 1879 and is located in Springfield, Illinois. It was declared a National Historic Landmark in 1971.
March 10
A Gazillion Important Labor History Anniversaries
to Celebrate
Illinois Labor History Society
Meetings # 3,159 - Larry Spivack, President, speaks on the multitude of events which made the organized labor movement in the United States
March 17
Move To Amend the Constitution to Overturn Citizens United
Meetings # 3,160 - Sharon Sanders sharsand@aol.com
March 31
LEAP
Law Enforcement Against Prohibition 
Meetings # 3,161 - LEAP is made up of current and former members of the law enforcement and criminal justice communities who are speaking out about the failures of our existing drug policies. Those policies have failed, and continue to fail, to effectively address the problems of drug abuse, especially the problems of juvenile drug use, the problems of addiction, and the problems of crime caused by the existence of a criminal black market in drugs.

LEAP maintains that "By continuing to fight the so-called “War on Drugs,” the US government has worsened these problems of society instead of alleviating them. A system of regulation and control of these substances (by the government, replacing the current system of control by the black market) would be a less harmful, less costly, more ethical, and more effective public policy."

The speaker will be James E. Gierach, a former Assistant State's Attorney of Cook County, municipal attorney, Village prosecutor, and general practitioner. He was the youngest delegate elected to write Illinois' Constitution in 1970, a former candidate for Cook County State's Attorney and Illinois governor, raising drug policy and prison issues. One newspaper called him, "Illinois' premier conscientious objector to the war on drugs."  Info:  http://www.leap.cc/author/JamesE/

"We have repeatedly held that leveling the playing field is not a legitimate government function," said Chief Justice John Roberts, who was joined by Antonin Scalia, Anthony Kennedy, Clarence Thomas, and Samuel Alito in the majority opinion. In the dissent, Justice Elena Kagan argued that the law was "necessary to break the stranglehold of special interests on our system of government."