Closed Until Further Notice
In keeping with the treatment of the constitution -- and liberty -- by the Bush Administration over the past few years, the National Park Service tried a variety of ways to lock up the Liberty Bell and Independence Hall. And, to literally show it's disdain for the judiciary, it went so far as to close Old City Hall, where the first Supreme Court was located. See, e.g., Free at Last.
Last month, the Park Service eventually backed down and announced that it would use a simple post-and-chain cordon for security. Ronnie Polaneczky of the Daily News, Plan restores dignity to national icons, reviewed the revised plans:
The Park Service got it right.
What a wonderful shock that is, considering its post-9/11 history of security overkill at America's birthplace of freedom. . . .
But the proposal not only scraps the [7-foot-high fence] obtrusive fence and reduces the size of the security perimeter of Independence Square, it substitutes simple bag-checks for the airport-like magnetometer scanning currently required of visitors to the Liberty Bell and Independence Hall.
Perhaps they felt that the Democratic Congress would only do it anyway, so why not change the plans and at least get some good press out of it. In any event, the revised security measures were welcome news.
But into every life a little rain must fall. Snow too. For example, last week Pennsylvania had major problems with its roads during a relatively minor storm. Less reported, however, the same storm caused the closure of Washington Square and Independence Square in Philly. Nathanial Popkin wrote a post on Valentine's Day at Phillyskyline which describes the cordoning off of the Squares:
[Y]our government . . . decided that because of snow (or was it slush?) you ought not to enjoy your park. Caution tape was strung across all seven entrances to Washington Square (and all those I could see of Independence too) after they had taken the trouble to power sweep all the pathways. Swept clean and closed. Why? Is it because a government this incompetent can't imagine -- can't imagine! -- keeping the pathways of an historic public square in the center of a bustling city -- that square itself filled with the remains of thousands of men who died to secure our freedom from the inveterate enemy of liberty, as Paine called George III -- free of snow and ice so that you may walk through it, stop to look at the white flakes gathering against the gray branches of the plane trees, or watch your child play? . . . . Is it because they thought they knew so well that you or I might slip in the slush, hurt ourselves, that it wanted to think, decide, protect us on our behalf? (Where the hell are all the libertarians while this is going on?) Is NPS really worried that if I fell and hurt myself I might demand to know why we have a national park service if it can't keep the shrines of our national heritage accessible to the public in the middle of the afternoon on day that produced rain and no more than a dusting of snow?Somehow the caution tape mysteriously disappeared (with the aid of Popkin) and the park had it's usual visitors -- kids, pets and tourists. When he called to inquire about the need for the closure, Popkin was told "that the caution tape was put up to keep visitors safe from icy conditions. When I asked her why they had done so after using their new expensive equipment to clear the paths, she had no answer."
That's because there is no answer.
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