History Makes a Difference

By Wednesday evening, there was widespread expectation in the Democratic caucus that Senator Al Franken would step down.  https://www.nytimes.com/2017/12/06/us/politics/franken-harrassment-resign.html 

What Al Franken did was wrong. It was wrong the day before yesterday when nobody paid attention. It is wrong today, when past behavior has become the news of the day. Is it a good thing that the national ethos has shifted in this direction? Emphatically YES. Is it right to use the current and very recent ethos to judge behavior of years ago—sometimes of many decades? My view is NO. Let historians give a fair account of what has been transpiring; but let ’s not punish offenders of actions past that were then tolerated, even if very wrongly so. This entire discussion is taking place as if there were no such thing as history. We have no obligation to judge what has happened in the past was right, but we do have an obligation to understand that a past period was different from the present.

PS

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/12/07/us/politics/al-franken-senate-sexual-harassment.html

The thing to also read in this NYTimes story about Al Franken’s expected resignation are the letters of readers’ comments. 

Many of them reflect my own sentiments. There is a huge difference been Franken’s behavior and e.g. Weinsteins. We are seeing a wave of hysteria that obliterates important distinctions and couldn’t be more remote from fair and reasoned procedures. Nor do I believe that the view I have just expressed is incompatible with a belief that 95% of the behavior that has been cited during past weeks is dead wrong.