August 26, 2025
Hey Y’All,
This is short notice, but the Kiwanis are sponsoring a film this evening (Tuesday) called ‘Join or Die’ at the Myrna Loy Theater at 7pm. Doors open at 5pm and there will be pre-movie conversations. The subtitle is “A film about why you should join a club…and why the fate of America spends on it.” So, if you get a chance to take in this film tonight. I think you will be pleased.
I received an invitation to attend the Kiwanis Club luncheon yesterday (Monday) to discuss Hometown Helena with the group. John Finn, Director of the L&C Library, called Sunday to say their speaker had cancelled and asked if I was available? I was happy to accept. I think the conversation with the Kiwanis went well. It was bit of a stroll down memory lane, with some Hometown history, and an update on our current situation at Helena College. Dean Sandy Bauman was there so I got to thank her for being the hostess with the mostest. Also, some other Hometown friends are Kiwanis, including Sheriff Dutton, Peter and Barb (Harris) Sullivan, Commissioner Rolfe and others. It was fun to reminisce and invite other Kiwanis to join us any Thursday.
The Helena Kiwanis Club has been in existence here since 1921. Their particular emphasis area is the youth of our community. Toward that end they sponsor the Key Clubs at the high schools, and the Circle K Clubs at our post-secondary institutions, in addition to other activities designed to support young people here in Helena. The Kiwanis, Rotary, Lions, League of Women Voters, and many other organizations are in a unique and important American tradition. In that vein, I shared the following passage and quote with the Kiwanis yesterday:
The list of genuine, all-American volunteer citizens' groups is endless. As Alexis de Tocqueville wrote in his mid-19th century treatise 'Democracy in America,' one of the most exceptional qualities of this country was her vast proliferation of purely voluntary civic and altruistic associations:
"Americans of all ages, conditions, and all dispositions constantly unite together. Not only do they have commercial and industrial associations to which all belong but also a thousand other kinds, religious, moral, serious, futile, very general and very specialized, large and small. Americans group together to hold fetes, found seminaries, build inns, construct churches, establish hospitals, prisons, schools by the same method."
De Tocqueville insisted that this vast array of purely voluntary associations was peculiar to American democracy and drew its possibilities from equality of all citizens under rule of self-made law. Of course, at the time de Tocqueville was writing -- the mid-1800s -- all American citizens were not, in fact, equal under the rule of law or in the vote. But as de Tocqueville also wisely surmised, another dimension of American exceptionalism was the manner built into her Constitution to "right itself," to fix former errors through the Constitutional amendment process, which in truth, granted the majority its right to change those things it later decided made good sense.
Meanwhile, we have another great Hometown Helena coming up this week. Callie Aschim, from the Helena Area Chamber of Commerce, has helped us put together a New Helena Leaders panel. Here’s a chance to meet and hear from some of the women and men who are taking the reins of leadership in our community.
We hope to see you Thursday morning at Helena College. Or, if you prefer please Zoom into the meeting from your own home or office, courtesy of Aja Rail and the good people at Pinion.
Jim Smith
406-949-1002
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