IBERIAN EDITORIAL: Congress gets it right with Gleason

Published 6:00 am Sunday, June 17, 2018

It is rare these days for anything resembling positive news to come out of Washington D.C., much less something good related to the state of Louisiana. Yet that is what happened on Thursday in our nation’s capital.

The U.S. Senate unanimously passed legislation to award former New Orleans Saints fan favorite, Steve Gleason, with the Congressional Gold Medal — the highest civilian honor given out by Congress. 

Other notable figures who been bestowed with the prestigious honor are Thomas Edison, Walt Disney, Sir Winston Churchill, John Wayne, Martin Luther King Jr. and Mother Teresa.

The bill must now pass the U.S. House of Representatives before heading to the president’s desk to be signed into law.

The 41-year-old Gleason entered Saints lore after his blocked punt against the Atlanta Falcons back in 2006, which was the team’s first game back in the Superdome following the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina. The Saints have a statue of the famed play outside the Superdome.

As great as that play was, and there is no denying the impact it had not only on New Orleans but the entire Gulf Coast, it was just a football play. So why does Gleason deserve such accolades?

Easy. The honor would be a fitting way to recognize Gleason for his work with the Gleason Initiative Foundation.

The foundation provides people with neuromuscular diseases or injuries with the assistance they need to thrive, has pushed for federal legislation ensuring that people living with diseases like ALS have access to speech generating devices, and the foundation (led by the efforts of Gleason) has produced the single largest coordinated and collaborative ALS research project in the world.

The foundation has become his life’s work after Gleason was diagnosed with Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis (ALS), also known as Lou Gehrig’s disease.

Even after losing his ability to speak or move on his own, Gleason, who will be inducted into the Louisiana Sports Hall of Fame later this month, has remained dedicated to helping find a cure for the disease that will eventually claim his life. 

That kind of selfless behavior deserves to be recognized and thankfully it appears that U.S. Congress agrees with that.

RAYMOND PARTSCH III

MANAGING EDITOR