Party Evolution, Revolution

When I was born in the 40s, there were still people alive who fought in the Civil War. In fact, the last Union Army Civil War veteran was Albert Henry Woolson, and he died in 1956 at the age of 106. The last Confederate veteran had predeceased him in 1951. His name was Private Pleasant Riggs Crump. It was now official; the Confederate States of America had even lost the war of attrition as the last man standing was a Union soldier.

General Robert E. Lee had surrendered on April 9, 1865, but it wasn’t until August of 1865, that Lt. Cmdr. James Waddell got word aboard the CSS Shenandoah that the last of the fighting had ended. Waddell stowed his guns and sailed to Liverpool, England where the Confederate flag flew for the last time aboard a Confederate fighting ship.

 

 

The Civil War was over. Its’ end happened over several months. Lee surrendered at Appomattox, and then Gen. Joseph E. Johnston’s Army of Tennessee got word of Lee’s surrender. He refused an order from CSA President Jefferson Davis to continue fighting and surrendered to Gen. Sherman. Confederate General Richard Taylor surrendered in May and several days later Nathan Bedford Forrest surrendered at Gainesville, Alabama. He told his men, “That we are beaten is a self-evident fact, and any further resistance on our part would justly be regarded as the very height of folly and rashness.”

If only President Donald J. Trump were a student of history or, at the very least as observant as Nathan Bedford Forrest, he might realize that this current fight for the presidency is “the very height of folly and rashness.” But Donald Trump is a transactional president just as he had been a transactional businessman. He sees every event as a singular transaction to be negotiated for his ultimate benefit. There is no big picture, just the transaction. His focus is often myopic. The expression “can’t see the forest for the trees” comes to mind.

 

Can't see the damn forest with all these big trees in the way.

Much, if not most, of Trump’s support comes from people who are still fighting the Civil War. They sell Confederate flags at his rallies. They won’t admit that the Confederate States of America lost the war 155 years ago. They also sell Nazi flags at his rallies in support of another losing ideology. They won’t admit that Nazi Germany lost their war 75 years ago. The Nazis lost. The Confederacy lost. Trump lost.

 

Flags at Trump Rally

Historically, Democrats were the party of racial inequality who wanted to continue the theory of white supremacy championed by both the Civil War and Hitler’s Nazis. The southern Democrats, aka Dixiecrats, were fighting for segregation and Jim Crow laws long after the end of the Civil War. Famous segregationists included Jesse Helms from North Carolina, Herman Talmadge of Georgia, Allan Shivers of Texas, Harry Bird of Virginia, James Eastland of Mississippi, Lester Maddox of Georgia, and George Wallace of Alabama. These were all Democrats.

 

George Wallace defying court ordered integration of school.

 

 

 

Over the course of time, the cause of white supremacy switched parties. The south, unhappy with Public Law 88-352k, aka the Civil Rights Act of 1964, began a migration to the Republican Party where people found sympathy for their perceived white minority persecution. The south and much of middle-America moved to the Republican Party while many of the coastal states and certain large urban centers became more Democratic.

Donald Trump, with the guiding hand of his advisor and confidant Stephen Miller, found the smoldering embers of this white supremacy contingent and emboldened them to action. They provided a national platform for this marginalized group. Using racism, hatred and fear as a strong motivators, the Miller/Trump contingent managed to take over the Republican Party and to use that triple threat to build a support base that would walk through fire for their new Messiah. Whatever was left of “normal Republicans” were struck dumb with the fear of antagonizing the power of Trump’s base. As the song goes, it’s all about the base.

The odd faction within this vocal base were the Nazi supporters. While they readily deal in white supremacy, they include Jews in their targeted groups. Stephen Miller is Jewish, and Donald Trump has a Jewish son-in-law. I can only guess at the consternation caused by this dilemma. Perhaps they figure that they can postpone one goal to achieve another. Stephen Miller has advocated many extreme white supremacist concepts like the “great replacement theory” where whites are being eliminated through immigration. He has also linked immigration with crime. These themes run throughout Trump’s rhetoric.

 

Trump's "nice people on both sides"; Nice Nazis

 

While many Republicans would be loath to consider themselves racist, their support for Donald Trump provides a certain validity to that perception. You can’t champion a race-baiting xenophobe and then distance yourself from the fallout caused by his actions. You can’t support his recent attacks on our democracy and later try to wrap yourself in the flag.

 

 

While both dominant parties have evolved during my lifetime, this latest change was the most jarring. It happened in less than four years. The Trump presidency will be studied not so much for its few achievements, but for the damage to our democracy and for the challenges it presented to political normalcy. Republicans told Nixon his time was at an end and he walked away. It is time for Republicans to admonish Trump in the same way. I won’t hold my breath. One way or another, he will be out of power in just a matter of weeks.