O pinion
Pennsylvania Needs Driver’s Licenses for All
BY RABBI ALAN ISER
BEFORE 2002, you did not
need a Social Security number
to apply for a driver’s license
in Pennsylvania. Instead, to
prove your identity, you could
provide a federally issued tax
identification number along
with other documents.

This meant that undocu-
mented immigrants were able
to take and pass the driving
exam in order to apply for a
driver’s license.

In 2009, the Pennsylvania
Department of Transportation
canceled the driver’s licenses
of tens of thousands of undoc-
umented Pennsylvanians
who had legally obtained
their licenses using pre-2002
criteria. As anyone who
lives beyond easy access
to public transportation
knows, driving is a necessity
for much of day-to-day life:
taking children to school,
shopping for groceries, going
to work or getting to medical
appointments. In addition to making these
everyday activities of life much
more difficult, not having valid
identification creates fear and
stress within immigrant commu-
nities, including those where
various family members have a
different immigration status.

Having valid identification
means that if an undocumented
immigrant is pulled over during
a traffic stop, they will not
automatically be put into jail
and be thrust into the quagmire
of deportation hearings. Having
state-issued identification is
also vital for many other family
functions. People might need
an ID to get their prescriptions,
or to enter a medical facility or
to prove they can pick up their
children from school.

There is a remedy for this
situation being proposed in
the Pennsylvania legislature,
HB-279. This bill would provide
driver’s licenses for all. Opening
up driver’s licenses for undocu-
mented immigrants is not only
good for them, but for all of us,
for our safety and our economy.

If implemented, it could expand
the number of those who know
the rules of the road, have car
insurance, buy cars and gas
for their cars, and have greater
accessibility to more jobs.

Undocumented immigrants
are a vital part of our economy.

In Philadelphia alone, approx-
imately 50,000 undocumented
workers pay more than $128
million in taxes annually.

As Jews, we have additional
reasons based on our historical
experiences and our religious
tradition to be concerned about
the welfare of immigrants.

The Torah commands us to
befriend and protect the
stranger, no less than 36 times.

The Torah gives two reasons
for this commandment. The
first calls on our experiences
and our compassion: “You
shall not oppress the stranger,
having yourself been strangers
in the land of Egypt” (Exodus
23:9). The second reason
the Torah gives is we were
mistreated while strangers, so
do not do to others what was
done to you.

To reinforce this, the Torah
reminds us that God hears
the cry of the oppressed. Not
just our sojourn in Egypt, but
thousands of years of wander-
ings and being outsiders should
sensitize us to the experience
of immigrants.

We just celebrated Sukkot,
where each night we invite
ushpizin (guests) in the symbolic
form of Abraham, Isaac, Jacob,
Joseph, Moses, Aaron and
David, to enter our sukkot.

We are supposed to donate the
amount that would feed these
supernal guests to the needy. Let
us transform our sukkot into a
metaphorical sukkah to protect
all who need shelter and support.

Pennsylvania should join 15
other states, including New York
and New Jersey, that have passed
legislation providing driver’s
licenses for all. Urge your
state representative to support
HB-279. It is both the moral and
sensible thing to do. l
Rabbi Alan Iser is a member of the
board at HIAS Pennsylvania and an
adjunct professor of theology at St.

Joseph’s University and St. Charles
Borromeo Seminary.

Why I Made a Podcast About Father Coughlin
BY ANDREW LAPIN
AS A KID growing up in
suburban Detroit, I used to
pass a church right by my house
every day. It was a huge church,
standing 100 feet tall, with a
massive, limestone carving of
Jesus on the cross staring down
at a busy thoroughfare. And
when I came to learn about
this church’s origins, it terri-
fied me.

This wasn’t any church. This
was the National Shrine of the
Little Flower, seat of a parish
12 OCTOBER 7, 2021
started in 1926 by Father
Charles Coughlin — known as
the “Radio Priest” because he
hosted a wildly popular weekly
radio show that reached tens
of millions of listeners (and
donors) nationwide during the
Great Depression.

His show began as a
purely religious one, but
soon Father Coughlin would
taste the thrill of an adoring
audience and exploit their
fear and uncertainty. He
started casting his followers
as the “true” Americans while
spinning wild, antisemitic
conspiracy theories — tales
of “atheistic Jews” running
rampant across Europe and
commanding the Communists
to overthrow Christianity and
Americanism. Over the air
and in his magazine, “Social
Justice,” Coughlin would
say that something must be
done to combat this threat,
and some took him up on his
suggestion. During the course
of Coughlin’s career, he created
a political third party so his
movement could mount a run
for the White House — and,
when that didn’t work, his
followers instead plotted to
overthrow the government.

It’s a strange experience to
see a still-thriving institution
in your community that was
founded on the back of hate
and intolerance. But Father
Coughlin was pushed off the
air in 1940 by a combination
of pressure from the Catholic
Church and new anti-sedition
broadcasting laws, and died in
1979. Most locals seemed in
agreement that his story was no
longer relevant — after all, we
didn’t stop driving Ford cars
just because Henry Ford once
published a newspaper with
the headline “The International
Jew: The World’s Problem.”
So my fascination with
the Shrine began as a mere
JEWISH EXPONENT
curiosity. But lately, it’s turned
into something else: a sense of
fear. If Father Coughlin’s story
was just a footnote, why was
I now hearing echoes of him
everywhere? Because there he was
whenever conspiracy theorists
and demagogic figures found
a new toehold in our politics
and media. There he was in
the barely regulated world
of social media, where every
extreme voice can find its
followers. There he was lurking
in the background of the
Charlottesville white-suprem-
acist march, the Tree of Life
synagogue shooting, the Jan.

6 insurrection and a multitude
of other horrific moments in
recent American history. Few,
if any, of the perpetrators
behind those events could cite
Father Coughlin by name, but
they’re following his playbook
all the same. The Radio Priest
has gone from a historical
footnote to the modern era’s
biggest progenitor — the one
whose increasingly unhinged
broadcasts predicted a society
where antisemitism, scape-
goating, xenophobia and
disdain for democratic norms
would thrive again in new
forms of media.

This is how I realized
Coughlin’s story shouldn’t
be limited to the whisper
networks of a few Jews in
Detroit. It needed to be heard
by everyone.

My new
podcast, “Radioactive: The Father
Coughlin Story,” is a deep
dive into the rise and fall of
the demagogue, the barely
regulated mass-communica-
tion medium he took advantage
of, and the antisemitic, fascist
movement he inspired right
here in America — including
the “Christian Front,” a militia
that plotted, on guidance
from Coughlin himself, to
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