Free Republic

Culver Pictures In an 1862 lithograph, a slave is depicted fleeing toward Canada before the Civil War.VANCOUVER, British Columbia — Heaven was the word for Canada and the Negro sang of the hope that his escape on the Underground Railroad would carry him there," the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. once noted in describing the codes American slaves used in their spirituals to fool their masters before taking flight. Canada is heaven again for Lance W. Bateman and William E. Woods, two American men who were married here recently. The wedding on Aug. 31 looked like a typical Hawaiian...

Anti-Americanism is a fact of life in our city and it's getting hard to be a U.S. Democrat here, says Anti-Americanism is a fact of daily life for Americans living in Toronto. The slurs aren't always directed at U.S. foreign policy, but at Americans in general, as in, "That's so American." Like most prejudice, this one is coded: "American" has come to mean pushy, self-promoting, and arrogant. Oh yes, and fat. It's getting worse. Every encounter, every banal elevator conversation, every talk show, carries the risk of a barb, a stereotype. Americans, I heard at a party just last week...

Tough Vote Parliament approves the tough version of the alternative military service law The Russian legislators in the lower house, the State Duma, voted yesterday for making alternative civil service a real punishment for pacifists and other young men who are conscientious objectors. Of the three bills on alternative service, the parliamentary deputies approved the government version in the first reading, which proved to be not much more liberal than the draft law initially submitted by the General Staff. Labor Minister Alexander Pochinok, who presented the bill, made assurances that it had been coordinated with all the parties concerned and...