30 minute read
Opinion Ted Lewis
No justice, no peace! A restorative perspective
As protests have spread across our nation during the first half of the summer of 2020, the powerful chant, “No Justice, No Peace,” has been spreading as well. In the wake of racist violence from police, triggered anew by the killing of George Floyd, it was understandable to increasing numbers of people that something had to change. If there was ever to be real peace, it had to stem from real justice.
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This has not been the only chant, of course. “Black Lives Matter” is still a centerpiece slogan for the majority of protests, even as protests have spread internationally among groups expressing solidarity.
What I would like to explore in this article is how the phrase “No Justice, No Peace,” with its potential for varied meanings, can invite protesters to think more deeply about the way they define both justice and peace.
Is there an agreed upon meaning for “No Justice, No Peace?” Does it mean we want better systems to replace unjust systems? Does it mean we want justice as retribution against wrongdoing? Does it mean we want fair processes that engage all sides? Might it mean that if justice isn’t happening, then don’t count on peace happening either?
What is clear is the slogan’s multivalent character: it can hold multiple meanings that may or may not harmonize together.
Those who say “No Justice, No Peace,” are certainly in good com
OPINION
TED LEWIS
pany. Desmond Tutu, who laid the groundwork for South Africa’s Truth and Reconciliation process in the 1990s, described how in the Apartheid system “there is no peace because there is no justice. There can be no real peace and security until there is first justice enjoyed by all inhabitants of this beautiful land.”
Pope Francis, in 2015 before an audience of children at the Peace Factory, echoed Tutu’s sentiment in the same context of prizing equity for all people. Everybody has the same human rights, he stated, and if society is unjust and “does not follow the rule of justice... where there is no justice, there cannot be peace.” This quote, along with Tutu’s, implies a desire for both justice and peace to be positive realities in society.
One of the earliest uses of “No Justice, No Peace” helps us to see the complexity of meanings associated in the phrase.
In December of 1986, a group of white male young adults assaulted three black men whose vehicle had stalled in Howard Beach, Queens, which is east of Brooklyn, NY. The incident resulted in the death of one black man.
When legal proceedings indicated elements of race-based negligence, pressures mounted from the black community for better justice.
Outrage and mourning related to both the racism of the incident and of the justice process understandably led to numerous marches, including one through the Howard Beach neighborhood. The largest one brought together more than 4,000 black protesters in Manhattan who marched 30 blocks down Fifth Avenue to the Greenwich Village home of Mayor Edward Koch.
Veteran activist Sonny Carson promoted the slogan, “No justice! No peace!” with these qualifying words: “No peace for all of you who dare kill our children if they come into your neighborhood . . . We are going to make one long, hot summer out here . . . get ready for a new black in this city!”
Carson’s statement reflects a sequential “if...then…” usage of the phrase. This is reinforced in an interview he had with The New York Times where he said he hoped the slogan would emerge as a rallying cry for his cause. “You don’t give us any justice, then there ain’t going to be no peace. We’re going to use whatever means necessary to make sure that everyone is disrupted in their normal life.”
Predictably, “No Justice! No Peace!” gained momentum and popularity in the wake of the Los Angeles race riots of 1992, ignited by the acquittal of four white police officers in the Rodney King beating.
As the smoke rose on our TV screens, we all watched the enactment of Carson’s logic: since there was no justice from our city, there will be no peace in our city.
The multivalence of the phrase cuts both ways. If there is not a positive unfolding of justice and peace, then in their absence there will be a negative unfolding of both.
While we might decry the burning and destruction of the Rodney King riots, it is important to complexify this situation of “no peace.”
A study of targeted white-owned businesses that were burnt down can show how deeper, race-related economic tensions can exasperate communities of color when their pleas for systemic change have previously fallen on tonedeaf ears.
As John F. Kennedy said in 1962, “Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable.”
Disturbances of the peace
Similar to Carson, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. also understood how it was necessary to “disrupt” the normal course of things to stimulate social
change.
Civil protests are designed to disturb the ‘peace’ in service of a greater peace. “We who engage in nonviolent direct action are not the creators of tension. We merely bring to the surface the hidden tension that is already alive. We bring it out in the open where it can be seen and dealt with” (Letter from a Birmingham Jail, 1963).
This perspective allowed Dr. King, in his 1967 Stanford University speech, to view riots as the “language of the unheard” despite the fact that they are also “socially destructive and selfdefeating.”
In this light, “Certain conditions continue to exist in our society, which must be condemned as vigorously as we condemn riots.”
By ignoring root causes, history is bound to repeat itself as we are now seeing in 2020.
King was sympathetic to the emotional energy that caused riots, understanding how the same energy finds its “voice” through planned protest.
“There comes a time when the cup of endurance runs over, and men are no longer willing to be plunged into the abyss of injustice where they experience
the bleakness of corroding despair.”
King was asking white moderates to “accept our legitimate and unavoidable impatience” (Birmingham Letter).
This sentiment could apply to both rioting and protesting.
Whereas President Trump spoke of
rioters and protesters in Minneapolis as a single force in order to delegitimize peaceful demonstrations, King distinguished them with respect to legitimacy. Nevertheless, he understood their intersectionality.
Both are responsive to the systemic disregard for muted voices of the past. In this complexity, he developed his theory of nonviolent civil disobedience as a constructive (though indeed, disruptive) force for social transformation.
King helps us to see two kinds of peace. In his Letter from a Birmingham Jail he explained how the white moder-ate, devoted more to “order” than jus-tice, “prefers a negative peace which is the absence of tension, to a positive peace which is the presence of justice.”
Justice here is not simply an outcome from a legal process, typically viewed as retributive justice; it speaks broadly and economically of a distributive justice, one that delivers life and liberty for all.
The irony is that those who simply want the security of civil order more than the presence of justice will tend to label protesters as the source of the problem. Protesters are identified as instigators, the real “disturbers of the peace.”
A “law and order” response would get rid of them, since protesters give rise to the tensions. King, on the other hand, advocated a “disturbance of the peace” against the status quo, against
systemic injustice, to awaken people to a fuller and equitable justice.
Asad Haider, in his insightful Viewpoints article “No Justice, No Peace” (June 4, 2020), recognizes the value of King’s delineation of positive and negative peace. If people are truly committed to the long-haul in the movement for genuine social change, the insistence of predicating peace on justice makes good sense.
“No justice, no peace” is a slogan which represents the intransigent pursuit of justice, against all the forces of containment wielded by the state, against the voices of the white moderates who would blame protestors for the violence of the police, and against all those who fail to grasp King’s lasting message that a politics of overcoming injustice is a politics of revolutionary change.
To sum things up thus far, we can understand how “No Justice, No Peace” can have a strong conditional meaning which functions somewhat as a threat. “If you don’t deliver justice, then don’t count on us to keep the peace.” But, from King’s approach, the phrase can have a wider and longer-range meaning. “As long as injustices remain in society, we will not stay quiet. We will continue to disturb the peace until we see true transformation.”
Rather than viewing justice and peace as either rising or falling together, I see King as offering a more inter-sectional meaning.
In 1967 he went to California to show solidarity with anti-Vietnam protesters held in the Santa Rita prison. Joining anti-war activity with civil rights activism, he said, “I see these two struggles as one struggle. There can be no justice without peace and there can be no peace without justice.”
He not only said that war and racism can’t be separated; justice and peace can’t be separated either. They inform
each other.
King’s dual commitment to peace and justice led him to consider how the tactics or means of protest had a direct effect on the ends of protest. In other words, how you protest deserves a lot of consideration.
“I believe in this method because I think it is the only way to reestablish a broken community….We adopt the means of nonviolence because our end is a community at peace with itself” (King, “The Quest for Peace and Justice,” Nobel Lecture, 1964).
A restorative JustPeace perspective
King’s view of justice, similar to what one finds in Jewish and Christian scriptures, makes no division between criminal justice and wider social just-ice. This would include racial justice, too.
All injustices are intersectional. It does no good to simply have a fair and just legal process when issues of poverty and racism severely restrict the distribution of life and liberty for all.
The Ferguson unrest of 2014 and 2015 revealed how the institutional failures of distributive justice cannot be separated from the legal failures of retributive justice.
A host of wider injustices were nam-ed throughout the unrest, including how income from escalating court fines was the second-largest source of revenue for Ferguson in 2013.
The emotional response to the officer’s acquittal is best seen against the backdrop of a justice system that held a heavy hand over poor and black communities.
Consequently, police and commun-ity relations became increasingly strained, setting the stage for a downward spiral of polarization and microaggressions.
That was six years ago. The same tensions help us understand the reaction to the murder of George Floyd. Understandably, most people of color and white progressive communities want the justice system to work fairly, but, here’s the rub – work fairly for them.
Traditional (punitive) justice is designed for winners and losers. Like sports, it is built for competition. We want justice “done” to those who caused race-based harms, and we want perpetrators of racist systems to be ousted.
This issue is more complex than just wanting justice to be done. Deep histories of trauma, both gener-ationally and individually, can be stirred by interactions with the justice system. When a black person’s fight-or-flight response to a police encounter is construed as “resistance to arrest,” the tensions and mistrust that are already there are compounded. And when disempowered people “lose” when an offending party is acquitted, it gives the community one more traumatic setback.
But what if there was a form of justice that aimed at helping people on all sides of the equation to be winners? What if there was a justice process that ended up strengthening rather than weakening police and community relations? What if a unified process brought healing to victimized parties and meaningful accountability to offending parties, yet in a way that helped both sides reintegrate into a community that addressed root causes?
One of the sad realities of our justice system is that it is so thoroughly in the hands of professionals who are far removed from local communities that deserve more ownership in resolving matters.
The same could be said, for example, of the way hospitals, for decades, controlled the birthing experience, re-moving it from family and midwifebased empowerment.
When people say they want “justice done,” they often don’t realize they expect professionals to handle things in which communities could have greater involvement.
Restorative justice may not have all of the answers to heal divided communities, but it does promise community empowerment. It offers a new paradigm of addressing harm that has major implications for building stronger communities.
A restorative circle process was used in Seattle after a police officer fatally shot a First Nations wood carver in 2010. Street protests ensued, and tensions escalated over time as the victim’s family experienced multiple episodes of disrespect from the police.
Eventually, at the request of the victim’s brother, Seattle police leaders agreed to participate in a 3-hour restorative circle with family and community members.
According to facilitator Andrea Brenneke, “By choosing an action following the shooting, but symbolic of the underlying tensions, we found a portal through which to explore the deeper rifts and ongoing conflicts between the Seattle Police Department, the family and the community.”
During the meeting the chief of police shared regrets and sadness for the harm done and for the broken trust experienced in the Native community. This encounter, along with follow-up meetings, served to replace alienating litigation processes that are costly and time-consuming.
It also led to new reforms where the police discovered and addressed patterns of excessive force.
Just as King distinguished a positive peace from a negative peace, here we see a “positive justice” that is distinct from the traditional and often abstract “negative justice.”
This alternative, rather than reducing justice to establishing blame and administering punishment, seeks to restore wholeness to the community. Restorative justice, in the words of Navajo Judge Robert Yazzie, seeks to have “life come from it.” It is measured by the positives delivered to all involved.
This brings us full circle to the relationship between justice and peace. Restorative justice, by focusing more on broken relationships than broken laws, includes peacebuilding elements in the very means of justice.
In short, it recognizes that if peace is not a key part of justice, justice will not bear the fruit of peace. Hence, the term, JustPeace.
By creating space for listening, trust-building, empathy, apology and reparation, harming and harmed parties find new strength to coexist with each other.
How, then, does restorative justice relate to King’s advocacy of nonviolent direct action?
For one, both peacemaking dialogue and peacemaking civil disobedience value the “conversation” created in spaces that inevitably involve dissonance and discomfort. In the midst of clashing narratives, either between two parties or two visions of society, there is the hope of a shared narrative that dispels the enmity between sides and strengthens relationships for future coexistence. Ideally, shift happens.
Restorative justice, therefore, can be viewed within a full spectrum of peacemaking strategies. While mostly known as an alternative process for resolving casework through dialogue, restorative justice also seeds deeper social transformation.
Fania Davis, in her 2019 book, The Little Book of Restorative Justice and Race: Black Lives, Healing, and US Social Transformation, makes a strong case for integrating the healer impulse to guide resolution processes through dignifying dialogue, and the warrior impulse to build better societies where racial justice and equity are normative.
We all know that violence tends to produce more violence. We know that hurt people hurt people. Aggravated assault leads to more aggravation. We know that repeated injustices upon a traumatized group of people will result in forceful reactions. No one wants to be hurt again. In the midst of these cyclical patterns, there is a genuine cry for justice.
The bottom line in all of this is – what kind of justice? Do we want a justice that vindicates one group over another and perpetuates more tensions, or do we want a justice that deeply addresses those tensions and transforms the future? Non-retributive justice will naturally expand the discussion into social and economic justice.
By thinking more deeply about the kind of justice we want, we are drawn into thinking more deeply about the meanings we give to the phrase, “No Justice, No Peace.”
If our slogan is simply a conditional statement whereby the absence of “negative justice” (punitive) will lead people to produce the absence of “negative peace” (civil disruption), I fear that the same old clashing patterns between empire and insurrection will dance their way toward a greater loss for everyone.
But if we have the moral imagination to seek a “positive peace” that is intersectional with a “positive justice,” I believe we can interrupt those imperial-rebel patterns, and find saner ways to build a beloved community.
That kind of peace-building will likely involve “disturbances of the peace” as King taught us. And it certainly will not be popular with either security-seeking moderates (who want negative peace at the expense of justice) or confrontation-seeking demonstrators (who want negative justice at the expense of peace).
There is a nonviolent, peaceinformed way to create “good trouble” (as John Lewis taught us) that still prizes a justice that brings life.
I have no advice as to whether we keep using the slogan, or whether we add qualifying words or punctuation. My hope is that people who want to see systemic changes will grapple with the various meanings and think more deeply about how their actions align with the meaning they choose.
But I will say this in closing: whether in protest or in resolution processes, our greatest challenge is to find better ways to weave justice and peace together.
Ted Lewis is a restorative justice practitioner and trainer, working for the Center of Restorative Justice & Peacemaking (University of Minnesota, Duluth). He also runs the Agapé Peace Center in Duluth which hosts the Restorative Church website project.
Omar’s victory affirms progressives’ control of Minnesota’s Fifth District
By Gabe Schneider and Greta Kaul
Rep. Ilhan Omar’s victory over primary challenger Antone MeltonMeaux might have felt familiar to anyone paying close attention to the history of STATE elections in Minnesota’s Fifth ConNEWS gressional District. MeltonMeaux, who MINN POST ran more as a personality than policy foil to Omar, banked a considerable amount of campaign cash and won high-profile DFLers support. He waged a serious lawn sign and mailer campaign, and some speculated there could be an upset in the district.
In the end, the race wasn’t that close. Omar won 58 percent of the district’s vote, compared to Melton-Meaux’s 39 percent.
Looking closely at the returns, it’s clear how that happened: while Melton-Meaux won considerable support in parts of Minneapolis and some of its suburbs, it wasn’t enough to overcome Omar’s edge in the bulk of Minneapolis, the increasingly progressive voting bloc that dominates the district.
Her win, thanks to Minneapolis, echoes the primary win of her predecessor and now Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison in 2006.
Over time, activists have built a turnout machine that’s energized immigrant communities and the working class. These voters, sometimes
seen as unlikely to go to the polls, have
helped elect a succession of progressive officials across levels of government.
Ellison held the Fifth District seat for more than a decade before Omar won it. His decision to run in 2006 when Martin Sabo retired put him in what was effectively a three-way race. He was a two-term state representative who had the DFL endorsement and campaigned on turning out a large cross section of what were then termed unlikely voters, including “peace activists, gay and lesbian voters and minorities, especially Somalis,” the Star Tribune reported at the time. He ran against former Sabo staffer and DFL chair Mike Erlandson and state Sen. Ember Reichgott Junge, who campaigned on health care.
When Keith Ellison took the stage to accept the DFL endorsement in 2006, activists say you could feel the winds changing. With a unanimous endorsement on the third ballot, Ellison made his pitch. “We have to unify. We have to come together from the suburb and the city,” he told the crowd. “We have to come together.”
Ultimately, Ellison won the primary with 41 percent of the vote, compared to Erlandson’s 31 percent and Reichgott Junge’s 21 percent. Despite losing CD5 suburbs, Ellison racked up a wide margin in Minneapolis, where most of the district’s votes are located.
For Old Guard DFLers, Ellison’s 10-point victory in the primary was unexpected. Ellison’s predecessor, Martin Sabo, endorsed Erlandson. The Star Tribune’s Editorial Board endorsed Erlandson, too.
In Congress, Ellison was one of the most progressive members in the country. He was the chair of the House Progressive Caucus, then just a nascent political force. He was an early supporter of Medicare for All, a constant critic of the Iraq War and early endorser of Sen. Bernie Sanders’ political campaign in 2016.
A decade later, Ellison retired from Congress to run for Minnesota attorney general. His departure resulted in another three-way DFL primary race between first-term state Rep. Ilhan Omar, who won the DFL endorsement in a hastily arranged convention after Ellison’s surprise retirement, former House Speaker Margaret Anderson Kelliher, popular among more moderate voters, and state Sen. Patricia Torres Ray.
The conventional wisdom held that a candidate needed to win moderate votes in South Minneapolis and the suburbs to win the seat, said Joelle Stangler, who’s worked for several candidates and groups in the Twin Cities including Take Action Minnesota, State Rep. Raymond Dehn’s Mayoral Campaign, and Omar’s 2020 campaign.
“When I came into this work, everyone said that you need wealthy white homeowners to win any race,” Stangler said. She said that in Omar’s first race, people said there wasn’t a path forward because she wanted to win by turning out new immigrant communities and young people.
Many political observers expected it to be a tight race between Omar and Anderson Kelliher, with Torres Ray potentially attracting a significant number of votes.
In the end, it wasn’t that close: Omar captured 48 percent to Anderson Kelliher’s 30 percent and Torres Ray’s 13 percent. Though she ran in a district slightly changed from Ellison’s time due to redistricting, like Ellison, Omar’s decisive win in Minneapolis propelled her to victory.
In her first term in Congress, Omar’s tenure mirrored Ellison’s. She joined the Progressive Caucus, taking on a leadership role as whip; and she too has been an unabashed supporter of Sanders, endorsing him in 2020, as well as leading efforts to promote the Green New Deal, a progressive energy policy agenda; and Medicare-for-All.
She also quickly became one of the
body’s most visible members; she was part of the “Squad,” a group of firstterm women of color challenging the status quo in Congress. This brought her praise from progressives, but she was also singled out by the right with xenophobic and Islamophobic comments (including by President Donald Trump). Her high profile also earned her increased scrutiny when it came to missteps, as when she invoked anti-semitic tropes in Twitter comments.
Melton-Meaux launched a primary challenge against her; presenting himself as a candidate who could “bring us together, not tear us apart,” as one mailer put it. He received an endorsement from two former Minnesota DFL Chairs (Brian Melendez and Erlandson) and raised a considerable amount of cash.
Of Omar’s second race, Stangler said there was again pressure to focus on more moderate parts of the city.
“When she ran a second time, people didn’t say there was no path, but there was a similar assertion that, ‘Oh, well you really need to make sure you’re spending all of your time in Southwest Minneapolis and in Wards 11, 12, and 13,’ to combat what, will inevitably be, a lack of support from the suburbs.”
But many voters in the district weren’t interested in what they per-ceived to be a more centrist candidate.
For Renae Steiner, 54, her impression that Melton-Meaux was the more moderate candidate convinced her to vote for Omar. Steiner, an attorney in Linden Hills, isn’t interested in more centrist congressional leadership.
“There aren’t, in my estimation, that many really progressive Democrat districts,” said Steiner. “So if we don’t elect progressives, where are they going to come from?”
Turnout in last week’s primary was massive. Across the Fifth Congressional District nearly 178,000 people cast votes, compared to 135,000 in 2018, a year when there was a contested gubernatorial primary on the ballot.
While Omar amassed more than 65,000 votes in 2018, she won with more than 103,000 this time around.
Primary results shouldn’t come as a surprise, said Erlandson the former Sabo staffer who ran against Ellison in the DFL primary in 2006 and endorsed Melton-Meaux this time around. He said the district has become more progressive since his run in 2006.
“I think there is an expansion of the bloc of primary voters,” he said; more people seem to be highly engaged in politics.
“The primary voter tends to be the most liberal or progressive voter,” he said. “They tend to be voters that miss very few elections. The city tends to have more of those than the suburbs.”
Not only did Ilhan Omar win reelection in the primary through the strength of Minneapolis’ progressive bloc, but two long-term Minneapolis state legislators who were generally thought of as progressive stalwarts – Sen. Jeff Hayden and Rep. Ray Dehn – were knocked out by political newcomers, Omar Fateh and Esther Agbaje.
It’s not the first time in recent years Minneapolis voters have sought to replace a longstanding elected official with someone new: In 2017 City Council president Barb Johnson lost to Phillipe Cunningham. In 2018, longtime Hennepin County Commissioner Peter McLaughlin was defeated by political newcomer Angela Conley.
Asma Nizami, a former field organizer for Sen. Al Franken in the Twin Cities, says politicians like Ellison and Omar represent views that are widely held by people of color in the Twin Cities. And she criticized
white voters and the Star Tribune’s Editorial Board (which has never endorsed Omar or Ellison in a contentious race) who see Ellison and Omar as too radical.
“They want to turn on KARE-11 and hear about the weather. And they want to hear these happy stories about great white people donating food,” Nizami, who currently works as the Advocacy Director for Muslim women at Reviv-ing Sisterhood, said. “They don’t want to hear about how terrible our city is to Black and Brown people.”
In a press call after her win, Omar said the shift to a new slate of candidates that happened in the primary makes complete sense.
“I first went and challenged the 44- year incumbent – that was unheard of here in Minneapolis,” Omar said, referring to her defeat of longtime Rep. Phyllis Kahn. “And because of that, we have seen so many people take that leap and unseat so many people, and it’s not surprising that that progressive movement that we have built continues.”
George Conor Reindl 5/20/1999 – 8/13/2020
George Conor James Reindl, 21, died in his home in Superior. Conor was born in Winona, Minn. Although Conor has gone far too soon, he leaves behind a legacy of hearts touched by his love, compassion, joy, and friendship. Conor had a strong passion for learning. He graduated from Denfeld High School in Duluth, where he was a part of HOSA – Future Health Professionals, Debate Team, Speech Team, and was an active member of the theater. Conor went on to attend the College of St. Scholastica, where he was studying biology and had future plans to attend medical school. His interest in theater continued at CSS, where he was involved in many plays, including Sense and Sensibility, where he met Katherine Grotte and they shared their first kiss. Conor and Katherine went on to date, and eventually marry, and were a beautiful example of love. Conor had a love for adventure. He enjoyed hiking, climbing, camping and simply being with friends and family in nature. His friends will remember late nights chatting around a fire, his great sense of humor, and his support in their times of hardship. Conor was a true gift to this earth and to all of our lives. He will be deeply missed. Visitation will be held Aug. 21, noon until the 1 pm Celebration of life in Mission Creek Church, 521 131st Ave. West, Duluth, MN.
Herman J. Hammerbeck 1/5/1919 – 8/14/2020
Herman J. Hammerbeck died at New Perspective in Superior at the grand old age of 101. He was born in Grandy, Minn., and was a resident of Superior since 1929. He graduated from Superior Central High School in 1937. Herman served in the Army Air Force Aviation Engineers in Africa and Italy during World War II, earning 3 Battle Stars. He was the owner and operator of Silver Tonsberg for 40 years. He was a very civic-minded citizen serving as director of the Northwest Wisconsin Concentrated Employment Program, the Planning Council for Wisconsin, Jaycees, United Fund and the Chamber of Commerce. A lifelong member and former President of the Lions Club, Herman received the Melvin Jones Fellowship, which is the highest honor achievable from the Lion’s International. As one of the founders of the Superior Amateur Hockey Association, he served as president, treasurer and coached many local rink teams and won several state championships. He spearheaded the drive to install the first indoor artificial ice complex in Superior. When the weather warmed in the summer, Herman helped organize the first Superior Little League and coached the Dodgers to several league titles while his sons were playing. A celebration of life will be held in the future.
James J. Cronin 8/1/1933 – 8/5/2020
James “Jim” J. Cronin, 87, of South Range, died at Hennepin County Medical Center, Minneapolis, Minn. He was born in Superior, son of George and Catherine Cronin. Jim was honorably discharged from the U.S. Air Force after serving in Korea from 1951 to 1953. He retired as a lieutenant from the Superior Police Department in 1991, after 27 years of service. Jim also worked as an over the road truck driver with his wife, Sue. Early in his life, Jim was an outstanding baseball player. He played for the Superior Blues and the Chicago Cubs. Some of his other interests included bowling, watching TV and spending time with his morning coffee group. A private interment will be held at a later date.
Paul Leo Franklin 1953 – 8/7/2020
Paul Leo Franklin, 67, was born in Duluth, the youngest of four children of Leo and Carol Franklin. He graduated from Duluth Denfeld High School and was employed in Duluth until his recent retirement. A private family service will be held. Friends are invited to Paul’s Celebration of Life on the outdoor patio at the Buffalo House from 2-5 p.m. this Friday August 14. The family wishes to extend their deep gratitude for the exceptional care Paul received from St. Luke’s staff.
Patricia Horvath 11/20/1925 – 8/8/2020
Patricia Jeannette (Roney) Horvath, 94, of Meadowlands, Minn., died at Benedictine Health Center in Duluth. Patricia was born to Carl and Albina (Oulicky) Roney of Floodwood, Minn. She attended Floodwood High School, where she was very active and excelled in school sports and activities, graduating in 1943. She then worked at Floodwood State Bank as a teller and secretary. She married Frank Horvath on May 28, 1949. They settled into farming and raised their four children in Elmer Township. Pat lived and loved farming life, hard as it could be sometimes, without one complaint. Private services were held Aug. 15, arrangements by Dougherty Funeral Home, Duluth.
Corinne LaFave 11/3/1939 – 8/5/2020
Corinne Westerlund LaFave, 80, of Duluth, died peacefully at Viewcrest Health Center. She was loved by many. She grew up on the west side of Duluth, and graduated from Morgan Park High School. Growing up she loved ice skating, roller skating, singing and theater. Corinne was an intelligent woman who had a number of administrative jobs throughout her working career; however, she was most proud of being the word processing supervisor for the City of Duluth, taking that task from the ground up. She married her high school sweetheart, Michael C. LaFave, in 1957 and enjoyed 63 years of marriage until his death a few months ago. There will be a private burial service soon at Union Cemetery, where she will be laid to rest next to her husband.
Joyce C. Larson 1/29/1949 – 8/8/2020
Joyce C. Larson, 71, lifelong resident of Superior, died at St. Luke’s Hospital in Duluth. Joyce was born the daughter of Margie (Gray) and Leo Larson. She worked as a waitress at the Saratoga Restaurant before becoming a CNA and working at St. Francis Nursing Home for 38 years. Visitation will be on Saturday, Aug. 29, from 11 a.m. until the noon funeral service at Downs Funeral Home, 1617 N 19 th St., Superior.
Anthony John Peters Jr 1936 – 8/7/2020
Anthony John Peters, Jr., 84, of Duluth, died peacefully at home. Tony was a veteran of the U.S. Marines and a member of the Cement and Laborers Union. He was preceded in death by his parents, Anthony, Sr. and Dorothy Peters; daughter, Desire Amendora; and his brother, Andrew. Tony is survived by his wife, Cecelia; son, Anthony III; sisters, Annette (Bernie) St. George and Angie (Ralph) Benson; his brother, Angelo; two grandsons; and several nieces and nephews. No service will held.
Betty A. Poe 10/30/1938 – 7/31/2020
Betty was born in Duluth on to Melvin and Alli Johnson. She lost her fight to cancer on July 31. She graduated from Clover Valley High School and went on to attend college in Duluth. After that she worked for both Maurice’s and Lakeview Castle for many years. Betty married Fred Poe on June 6, 1959. They loved to travel, camp, spend time with family, dance and go to Country Fest. She was an active member of French River Lutheran Church. Betty was a hard worker, kind and always made people laugh. A celebration of life was held Aug. 15.
Stephen R. Wood 1941 – 8/8/2020
Stephen R. Wood, 78, died after a brief illness. Stephen started his working career at Skyline Webb as a gas station attendant, going on as a salesman for Pioneer Coffee and finishing up as a bus driver for Duluth Transit Authority. Stephen married Carol Kay Vukelich, and together, raised two daughters, Penny and Patti. “Steven was a great brother. I’m so thankful for all the days he was with us. May his spirit ride the waves of Lake Superior.” - David Lee Wood. A private family gathering will be held.
