nomic issues! After all, his state actuallyrnspent money on welfare and soughtrnfederal dollars! As if there was a singlernRepublican governor, congressman, orrnpresidential contender who did not dornexactly the same. And all in defense ofrnthe Nixon regime of price controls andrnaffirmative action.rnFrom this juncture, looking over thernevidence of that day, it is clear that whatrnthe left and right establishments fearedrnwas not George Wallace, socialism, orrnracism. What they feared was the Americanrnpeople. As Wallace put it in 1972:rn”When the government tries to forcernmasses of people against their will tornconform to certain guidelines involvingrntheir children, their taxes, their laborrnunions, their property, it would havernbeen a phenomenon if they had notrngiven vent to their antagonism and angerrnat this drive to make everyone conformrnto what the pseudo-intellectual thoughtrnthe average citizen should conform to.”rnOr, as he said on another occasion:rn”When politicians succumb to anarchistsrnin the street, then they haven’trngot what it takes to lead us out of thernmorass.” What he said then is still true,rnand no one has said it any better since.rnThis is populism. It is a threat to thernsubsidies, tariffs, and contracts that BigrnBusiness defines as “free enterprise” (thernonly kind of free enterprise the RepublicanrnParty has ever defended). It claimsrnthat farmers and labor want a fair shake,rna level field, so it is “socialism” (thernonly kind of socialism the RepublicanrnParty has ever opposed). Populism isrnalso a threat to the most hallowed ofrnall American values: respectability.rnAmerica, which is nothing if it is not arnland of “pseudo-intellectuals,” is governedrnby fashion. No issue in America isrnever considered on its truth or falsehood,rnonly on whether the “right people” findrnit acceptable or unacceptable. OurrnFounding Fathers understood that patriotismrnand justice would often be limitedrnby self-interest, ambition, stupidity, andrndemagoguery. They could not imaginerna situation in which millions were sornlacking in ordinary firmness of characterrnthat they would be unable even to considerrna question of truth and justice. Nornone wants to say something that is not inrnfashion. Wallace’s astounding and colorfulrncandor had to be put down.rnHis was a candor that has not sincernbeen equaled, though Pat Buchanan perhapsrncame close—and received a similarrnresponse. I still remember with pleasurernhow Wallace refused to be defined andrnconfined by the media but insisted onrnand succeeded in making his own points.rnMy favorite of many is the occasion onrnwhich an arrogant Republican fouled thernSenate chamber with the accusation thatrnWallace was mentally disturbed, basingrnit upon the small veteran’s disabilityrnpension that Wallace received. SaidrnWallace: “I receive 10 percent disabilityrnfor a nervous condition caused by beingrnshot at by Japanese airplanes and antiaircraftrnguns in combat missions duringrnWorld War II. To what does SenatorrnMorse attribute his condition?”rnWhat American has paid a higherrnprice than Wallace for his public courage?rnTwo decades of invalidism andrnpain. Lesher recounts fully Wallace’s recantationrnof white supremacy, his deliberaternefforts at reconciliation with thernblack people of his state and of the countryrnat large. As he rightly observes: “Itrnwas supremely ironic that as Wallace andrnthe South moved closer to the goal ofrnracial reconciliation, much of Americarnwas turning in the other direction.” ButrnLesher, I fear, does not really know therntrue explanation for this irony. It is notrnthat the South, for the first time in itsrnfour centuries of history, has been convertedrnto the abstract ideology of equality.rnIt is, rather, that the South, unlikernmodern America, is still predominantly arnChristian society.rnClyde Wilson is a professor of Americanrnhistory at the University of SouthrnCarolina.rnLIBERAL ARTSrn-i^lrnSPIKLBERG’SFIBrnAleading Mish Rontaii Catholic nevi-spaper .sharpK critia/td the film Schindlcr’s IM,rntepcstitd the CStristtan News last March The Church-backed daily Hiowo: DziennikrnKa0idd accused director Steven Spielberg of falsifvmg the historica1 record of Wish-rn}ewuh relations.rnThe paper a ^ ed that the film had “wrongly idealised” the Ccrman businessmanrnOfksT SchintSer, who saved hundreds of Jews from Nazi concentration camps by givinglhcmrnwoik in his Krakow factory. ‘The him portravs Schindler as a selfless actorrnin Ac Holocaust drama,” the Palish daily said “I Iowe’eT, Spiellierg seems to havernbeen quite obimous to certain important facts fiom Schindlcr’s prewar past.” JewishrnsurvivoTS of the war have testified that Schindler accepted large pavmcnts in diamondsrnfor rescuing them.rnMoreover, claimed S/owo Dzienmk Katolicki. at the end of the film “we arcrninformed that only 4,000 Jews currentK live in Poland, and thai in comparison tlicrn^neration of Jews sa«d by Schindler numbered 6,01 W It suggests tliat this one goodrnGerman rescued more Jews than all the Poles put together.”rnPolitics andrnCivilizationrnby Harold O.J. BrownrnThe Wrath of Nations: Civilizationsrnand the Furies of Nationalismrnby William PfaffrnNew York: Simon & Schuster;rn256 pp., $22.00rnWilliam Pfaff, syndicated politicalrncolumnist for the InternationalrnHerald Tribune (Paris), is probably thernmost perceptive writer in the world todayrnon European affairs, particularly as theyrnaffect and are affected by American policy.rnHe is not as much of a politicalrnphilosopher as some others, like JacquesrnEUul and the late Bertrand de Jouvenel,rnbut he has an amazingly detailed grasprnof history spanning continents and mil-rn32/CHRONICLESrnrnrn
January 1975July 26, 2022By The Archive
Leave a Reply