Thursday, October 14, 2010

Pertinent News Stories

Did you happen to pick up on the following news stories?

1. The pastor of the Philadelphia Third Presbyterian Church gave a sermon calling for “Christian voters” to join forces to keep “pagans, Muslims, and other non-Christians” (including Deists and Unitarians) from political office. He went on to say “every ruler should be an avowed and sincere friend of Christianity.”

In response to this call, the President wrote that “among the greatest blessings secured to us under our Constitution is the liberty of worshipping God as our conscience dictates – or not.” Even a special Congressional subcommittee thereafter responded that “It is not the legitimate province [of Congress] to determine which religion is true, or what false. Our government is a civil, and not a religious institution.”

2. A quiet but highly respected Senator from a well-known political family in Louisiana spoke on the senate floor about the extreme level of partisan acrimony that we see in the political environment. Speaking about the public debate, he pertinently observed that “I think the discussion may be turned to useful purposes. It may, by the interchange of opinion, increase our own information on all of the important points which have been examined, while, not being called on for a vote, we may weigh them at leisure, and come to a conclusion, without being influenced by the warmth of the debate… However, the cost of partisanship for partisanship’s sake [is] too high for a free society to pay… The spirit [of zealotry] of which I speak creates imaginary and magnifies real causes of complaint; arrogates to itself every virtue – denies every virtue to its opponents; secretly entertains the worst designs … mounts the pulpit, and, in the name of a God of mercy and peace, preaches discord and vengeance; invokes the worst scourges of heaven, war, pestilence, and famine as preferable alternatives to party defeat; blind, vindictive, cruel, remorseless, unprincipled and at last frantic, it communicates its madness to friend as well as foes; respects nothing, fears nothing.

I am no censor of the conduct of others: it is sufficient for me to watch over my own. The wisdom of gentlemen must be their guide in the sentiments they entertain, and their discretion in the language in which they utter them. No doubt they think the occasion calls for the warmth they have shown, but of this people must judge … There are legitimate and effectual means to correct any palpable infraction of our Constitution. Let the cry of constitutional oppression be justly raised within these walls, and it will be heard abroad – it will be examined. The people are intelligent, they people are just, and in time these characteristics must have an effect on their representatives.”

3. A leading senator from Kentucky proposed that the President declare a national day of prayer and fasting to “seek divine relief” from a series of recent disasters. The President responded saying that, while he too believed in “the efficacy of prayer,” it was his determination to “decline the appointment of any mode of religious activity. I could not do otherwise without transcending those limits which are prescribed by the Constitution for the president, and without feeling that I might in some degree disturb the security which religion now enjoys in this country in its complete separation from the political concerns of the Government … I deem it my duty to preserve this separation and to abstain from any act which may tend to an amalgamation perilous to both church and state.”

4. Accusations that the President was creating and enacting near-dictatorial powers prompted a number of strong speeches. The same senator from Kentucky claimed that “We are in the midst of a revolution, hitherto bloodless, but rapidly tending towards a total concentration of the pure republican character of the Government, and to the concentration of all power in the hands of one man. [In just a few years] the government will have been transformed into an elective monarchy – the worst of all forms of government.” A well-known senator from South Carolina proclaimed that, “We have arrived at a fearful crisis. Things cannot long remain as they are. It behooves all who love their country – who have affection for their offspring, or who have any stake in our institutions, to pause and reflect. Confidence is daily withdrawing from the General Government. Alienation is hourly going on. These will necessarily create a state of things inimical to the existence of our institutions, and, if not arrested, convulsions must follow, and then comes dissolution or despotism, when a thick cloud will be thrown over the cause of liberty and the future prospects of our country.” And finally, from a senator from Massachusetts: “There never before was a moment in which any President would have been tolerated in asserting such a claim to despotic power.” All pretty strong words against the sitting President.

Did you miss these news stories? Probably yes, because they happened 170 years ago in the early 1830s. The President was Andrew Jackson, the first president not a part of the generation of founding fathers, the first president from the then-West (Tennessee), and the first president to be an avowed proponent of “the common man.” The Philadelphia pastor was the Reverend Ezra Stiles Ely; the Louisiana senator was Edward Livingston; the Kentucky senator was Henry Clay; the South Carolina senator was John Calhoun; and the Massachusetts senator was Daniel Webster. All political icons from the 1st half of the 19th century.

The point of this looking back is that America has been down the road of intemperate political arguing many times before. As discouraging as the current economic, social and political environment is, it is not new. It is more of the continuing give-and-take that has always defined our on-going experiment in representative government. The arguments and ambiguity about religion in political life, the power of the central government versus state governments, and the liberties to which we are entitled, all started at our original Constitutional Convention. They have continually risen and fallen for two centuries. Though we have lurched right, then left, then back again, somehow we have always managed to ultimately settle back into our national center.

We have lost many opportunities over the years, and we have much to be ashamed of in our country’s conduct; these are frequent omissions in our schools’ history textbooks. But through it all we remain a beacon of hope, envy, accomplishment and aspiration for many, and – if we can forgo our flashes of arrogance – better than most alternative forms of government that have been tried before. So in spite of our faults and clumsiness, we have no choice but to ignore the self-serving demagogues so ever-present today, offer up our best ideas, stay involved, and keep on plugging to try to make it all work. In essence, it is simply about continually working to see if diverse human beings can in fact coexist and work successfully with each other. The jury is still out on this, but there is no choice but to keep trying. And to remain hopeful.

(Historical notes principally from “American Lion: Andrew Jackson in the White House” by Jon Meacham)

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