But there are not a lot of newcomers recently arrived from Italy, not at all. There are a few professors, doctors: it’s a completely different kind of emigration, either for the number of those who came here, and for their education and skill.
Wisconsin is just next to Minnesota, where recently the Minneapolis City Council unanimouslyvoted to rename Columbus Day to Indigenous Peoples Day. Do you think that this is something that could one day happen in Wisconsin too? What’s your thought about this?
A lot of bad things happened to Native Americans, at the hands of the non Native Americans, whoever they were: and very few of them were Italians: the Italians were the explorers, but not the conquerors. So whoever is trying to put this on Columbus’ shoulders and blame him for everything is not doing a right thing, because blaming the wrong man is not justice at all.
So, I don’t know if this is something that couldhappen here in Wisconsin too. It may, but I don’t know. We do have a State holiday to celebrate Christopher Columbus: actually my grandfather, my mother’s father, was one of those who were there when the State holiday was appointed by the Governor of that time.We do have a large Native American community, in Wisconsin, because Andrew Jackson, when he was President, moved a lot of native American people from New York and Pennsylvania to the Midwest: butI don’t know if there has been a tentative plan to do so here as in Minneapolis.
By Umberto Mucci
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