It's Time to Demand the Truth
Dunn's Rock Community Center hosts historian Dan Carter, July 30, 2022
Slightly nervous about the threat of rain, I join others seated on chairs under a great, mythical-looking, spreading white oak at the Dunn’s Rock Community Center. We are ready to hear the speaker of the day, historian Dan Carter. He will talk about “Saving Our Democracy”.
Since I was a child in the 1940’s and ‘50’s I’ve heard older people say, “How could a brutal dictator storm in over there and take a nation right out from under people’s noses? Why did people allow the looting of their homes, their rights and even their neighbors’ and their own families’ lives?”
Over time I’ve heard it asked less and less. And how did the pronoun somehow change from “their” to “our”? I’m wondering if today I might gain some insight into these questions.
Let me start over.
It’s a beautiful day, overcast but with a chance of sun. Red, white and blue paper decorations gaily welcome people to the event. Rows of comfortable folding chairs are set out under an old oak tree and tables offer campaign literature about the coming election. Almost every candidate is here, shaking hands and meeting voters. Later the candidates will speak indoors while people enjoy lunch.
Dunn’s Rock is a precinct in my county. Over the past decade I have come to see precincts as the magic key to political organization. People in precincts share streets, playgrounds, and community concerns. Precinct Chairs help their neighbors work together. They connect them to the larger organization, the county Party.
Today the Dunn’s Rock Precinct Chair, Nona Walker, welcomes everyone. Her Vice Chair, Barbara Lubin, will introduce us to the guest speaker. We are waiting for Dan Carter to help put our bewildering present day perhaps safely into historical perspective.
Nona says,
Dunn’s Rock is probably the best precinct in Transylvania County for Democrats because people are so responsive. After all, Dunn’s Rock is the only precinct outside downtown Brevard that was blue in the 2020 election!
Then Barbara tells us about Dan’s background. She will need more than one sentence! She says,
Dan T. Carter is University of South Carolina Professor emeritus, the author of seven books including From George Wallace to Newt Gingrich and The Politics of Rage, as well as a new one due out next February, Confederate Ghostdancer. His opinion pieces have appeared in the New York Times and other publications, including our Transylvania Times.
His many literary and academic awards include an Emmy in 2001 for a documentary, and the Robert F. Kennedy Prize. He has served as historical consultant and expert witness on voters’ rights legal cases.
The depth and breadth of Dan’s experience and research give him a unique perspective on the topic of Saving Our Democracy.
Carter is welcomed by applause and then by the silence of respectful anticipation. He begins.
The coming mid-terms and 2024 Presidential elections are the most important in my lifetime. Never before have I felt our democracy itself was jeopardy. We now join Brazil, Hungary, India, the Philippines, Poland and Slovenia in the Institute for International Democracy’s list of countries facing serious declines in the level of democracy.
Two experts agree. Brian Klaas wrote recently, “American Democracy is dying,” and Erica Frantz has said that when democracies start to die, they usually don’t recover.
It seemed for a moment that the storming of the capitol on January 6, 2021, would be a wake-up call, but it soon became clear that the Republican Party remained a political cult revolving around Donald Trump.
Carter says America has been on the brink before. Each time we had a saving grace.
In 1890 we were saved by the rise of a broad based progressive reform movement within both parties. In the 1930’s we were equally lucky to elect … Franklin Delano Roosevelt who skillfully sidelined would-be strongmen like Huey Long.
[But this time] Americans have been lulled into the belief that we can escape history.
Four elements, Carter tells us, have led to our current crisis.
The ‘Politics of Rage and Fear’. Since the 1960’s the working class and evangelical Christians — triggered by the growing assertiveness of Black Americans and vast social changes, particularly those dealing with sexuality and gender — redirected politics away from bread and butter political issues to cultural conflict. This led to emotional manipulation by financial interests.
The resentment on the part of wealthy Americans that had been festering since the efforts of FDR’s New Deal to impose taxes and regulatory limits on corporate capitalism. It was socialism!
The replacement of the politics of compromise with the politics of mortal combat. In 1979 Newt Gingrich established for Republicans that politics was a war with no quarter given. Compromise is impossible when the stakes are between good and evil.
The transformation of the media — the internet, social media and the splintering of common sources of information. Views have hardened. To gain the nomination of his or her party today a Republican candidate has to lie. And state legislatures are making it harder for minorities to vote, through laws and gerrymandering.
What can we do as American citizens to help turn this crisis around? Carter says,
First you have to accept that the threat is imminent. It requires a long-term commitment from us that is all too lacking in American life.
But for now we must fight to hold the line. And I have hope.
I believe that mainstream Democrats’ views reflect those of the majority of voters (even here in conservative territory), more than the current Republican Party’s extremist policies do.
Still, this will require supporting our candidates with the money they need to be effective.
It will require our candidates, and us, to unrelentingly link Republican candidates to their extremist policies. It’s not ‘negative campaigning’ to demand they spell out their views on things like expanding Medicaid, restricting voting rights, and legislation to certify (and potentially overturn) the will of the voters.
Here in our county we have Republican candidates with ties to the Oath Keepers, the Three Percenters, and Moms for Liberty. It’s not only appropriate, it’s essential, to expect them to voice their intentions about policies for our residents, for us, for our neighbors and for all our children.
It’s dangerous not to stand there and wait for their clear answers. Then go tell everyone what they said or didn’t say.
After Dan Carter’s address Sam Edney takes the microphone. As Chair of our county Democratic Party, Sam focuses on how we can respond locally to Dan’s warnings about the survival of our nation’s democracy.
“There are extremist Republican candidates right here who belong to national groups with repressive goals,” Sam urges. “Sign up now with the Democratic Party to help defeat them.”
Be informed.
Work the polls.
Volunteer.
Donate.
Be an ambassador for our candidates.
At the end of the day I reflected on Dan Carter’s generous, meaningful comments. He had said,
We must deal with the world as it is, not as we wish it were. …
I’ve always liked what … Ralph Waldo Emerson once wrote when asked: What should be our goal in life?
‘To love much; to win the respect of those around you and the affection of children; to earn the support of honest citizens; … to find the best in others; to give of one’s self and leave the world a bit better … — this is to have succeeded.’
It’s a goal for life, but also for the kind of world we would like to create.
Thank you, Dan. I, too, have hope because the majority are on our side. But as you said, we have to work to succeed together unrelentingly, "unrelentingly” — until The Institute for International Democracy drops the United States from their grim list.
Thanks! Very inspiring !!
You help get me motivated for the day with your fascinating post! Thanks!