Dolores M. Klein, Peoria, IL

Things never were the way they used to be! That saying applies to the kinds of statements in the atmosphere as the election gets closer.

An Associated Press series about Social Security contained an assertion that had me scratching my memory’s head. It was said that there were many in the beginning who did not want Social Security protection. Now, I do recall a story about one of my grandfathers chasing an insurance salesman away with a shot gun, and I recall a very old aunt sending back her dead husband’s pension checks he had earned working at Keystone.

But, in the reality of life in depression years and before, people did starve, people did freeze to death. Regardless of statements such as one, a well-known minister made at the time in which he claimed that the Church’s right to take care of the poor was being taken over! Can we imagine individual churches across rural and metropolitan America feeding and housing poor people, besides caring for the sick and dying?

One objection I’ve heard from time to time about Social Security is that there have been too many “add-ons,” more categories of recipients of Social Security checks. The fact is that one of the first additions came almost immediately after President Roosevelt introduced it. It was a personal plea from Helen Keller for those afflicted as she was!

The Social Security System has had its problems, but it is a proven life-saving and religiously well-founded American success story.