President Abraham Lincoln established the Thanksgiving holiday so that each family could celebrate being American, according to its own traditions and religion.
Many large retail chains are opening on Thanksgiving day, depriving their workers of the opportunity to so celebrate it with their families.
To provide a disincentive for the practice, we propose that large retail chain stores be required to pay their workers three times their normal wages for work done on Thanksgiving day.
If Congress can act quickly enough, this can be done before Thanksgiving 2012. Perhaps such an effort will generate a bipartisan spirit that will enable Congress to solve other, more-pressing problems.