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When Floridians go to the polls this November, we will be deciding, among other things, who will be the state’s next member of the United States Senate.
The incumbent senator, Republican Ashley Moody, was not elected. She was appointed to the job by Gov. Ron DeSantis after Sen. Marco Rubio quit to become U.S. Secretary of State. So, this will be the first time for Moody, as well as her opponent, to face the voters.
The likely Democrat to challenge Moody will be either Alex Vindman, a retired U.S. Army officer and former director of European Affairs for the National Security Council, or Jerry Demings, the mayor of Orange County.
I mention all this because ordinary citizens didn’t always have the right to select their senators.
The Founders, in their wisdom, granted that authority to state legislatures.
That’s right, if it hadn’t been for the 17th Amendment to the Constitution, the same lame-os in Tallahassee who couldn’t pass a budget in the last session and who totally failed to name the flamingo the state bird, would have been entrusted with this important task.
Sends shivers up the spine to contemplate that, doesn’t it?
That all changed on April 8, 1913, an anniversary we celebrate this month.
After a series of humiliating scandals, the Senate finally agreed to change the way its members were selected, and the Constitution was amended to give that power to the people, where, let’s face it, it should have belonged in the first place.
This long had constituted an embarrassing lapse of imagination—one of many—on the Founders’ part, modeling the makeup of Congress’s upper chamber after the English House of Lords. Good grief! We’d just fought a war to rid ourselves of that elitist form of governance.
So, this week marks the 113th year since that was repaired.
Interestingly, it would be another seven years before another unjustifiable omission in the Constitution was fixed. On August 18, 1920, women were finally granted the right to vote when the Constitution’s 19th Amendment was finally adopted.
Tennessee was the 36th state—the required minimum at the time—to sign on. However, members of the Florida Legislature, once again failing to get their jobs done, dragged their collective feet for another 49 years before ratifying the amendment in 1969.
And Florida legislators never got around to ratifying the 17th Amendment at all, for that matter.
In all fairness, this was likely before helpful, deep-pocketed lobbyists took up permanent residence in legislators’ wallets and, absent their guidance, our elected representatives simply had no one to tell them what to do.
That was then. This is now. So, why is the northern mockingbird still the state bird instead of the flamingo? I suspect fowl play by the Mockingbird Lobby.
Onward
April 9 is the last day of Passover, a celebration that commemorates the biblical Exodus when the Israelites were liberated from slavery in Egypt, marking the very first No Pharaohs Day.
April 10. It’s a day of mourning for music aficionados. It was on this date in 1970 that The Beatles broke up. Paul McCartney announced it a consequence of “personal differences and musical differences.” Ringo Starr, the band’s drummer, went on to fame as the greatest rock and roll star of all time. You read it here first.
April 11 is International “Louie Louie” Day. Why? Because the song is widely regarded as the most popular rock song of all time, it has been recorded more times than any other rock song (even more times that Ringo Starr’s “Yellow Submarine,” if you can believe that), and it was very nearly declared the official state song of Washington, but was beat out by the sappy “Washington, My Home,” yet another monumental legislative failure.
J.C. Bruce. -FLORIDA WEEKLY
April 12 begins Dog Bite Prevention Week. It’s disturbing, but more than 4.5 million people a year are bitten, many of them children. With proper training (of people as well as pets) this could be preventable.
April 13 is Plant Appreciation Day. Most plants, unlike dogs, don’t bite (we’re not talking about you, Venus flytrap). Why the celebration? Quick question: Do you like breathing oxygen? Then be thankful for plants.
April 14 is National Dolphin Day. I’m not sure if this is either a holiday to celebrate the famous aquatic mammals generally, or just the one that emblazons the helmets of Miami’s football team, the only squad in NFL history with an undefeated season. Works either way.
J.C. Bruce is an award-winning journalist and author of the Strange Files series of mysterious adventures. He holds dual citizenship in the United States of America and Florida. Check out jcbruce.com to order copies of his books. Copyright, 2026, J.C.Bruce.