Guard against the impostures of pretended patriotism

It’s a Presidential election year in America and, as a resident of “The Live Free or Die” state of New Hampshire, I am one of those privileged voters who is sought out and courted every four years by candidates who are hoping to fare well during the first in the nation Primary.

With the Primary now over, I am glad the campaigns and media are moving on to the other States. It feels good to have relief from the constant barrage of text messages, phone calls, television commercials and campaign literature that have been assaulting the State for weeks.

Many people are disillusioned with the political process and have become frustrated by everything they believe is wrong with American politics today, including:

• Special interests spending big money and exerting undue influence on elections and laws
• State legislators that gerrymander voting districts and enact restrictive voting rules to protect career politicians and suppress voter turnout
• A polarized and poisoned political environment that discourages qualified people from running
• A lack of diverse candidates
• Uncontrolled government spending racking up huge budget debts that threaten future prosperity

It is no surprise that 45% of eligible voters choose not to vote during a presidential election. These voters feel disenfranchised and believe that their vote does not matter and will not change anything.

Although politics is depressing most of the time, I still take my right to vote very seriously and believe it is the best way for citizens to elect leaders who will faithfully represent them and move the country in the direction that they want to see it go.

It took some effort for me to seriously weigh the positions and platforms of the dozen or so candidates who were vying to win this year’s presidential nomination contest and to choose the candidate that I felt would be best for the country.

I worked to dive below the surface of the political jingoism, platitudes and slogans that seem to be built into every professional political campaign; reminding myself of the sage advice George Washington shared during his farewell address warning the American public to “Guard against the impostures of pretended patriotism“.

Unfortunately, too many candidates try to deceive voters by pretending to be someone they are not. They resort to demagoguery in an attempt to whip up passions in the electorate by exploiting emotions, prejudice, and ignorance and by shutting down reasoned deliberations.

The two most common expressions you hear spoken by politicians trying to win votes is “American Dream” and “America First“. Both expressions were born nearly a century ago and they instantly became code words embodying opposing views in the fierce political battle to define the soul of the nation.

Sarah Churchwell, a Chicago native and professor of American literature at the University of London, traces the evolution of the two expressions in her book Behold, America; a Smithsonian Magazine Best History Book of 2018.

She writes that the current meanings of these expressions is quite different from those they held originally. American Dream first began as a pledge for democratic and economic equality, representing the noble communal pursuit of justice for all of America’s citizens.

Over time, as anxieties in the country over Communism rose and the ideals of equality came to be considered a threat to unfettered capitalism, American Dream was reclaimed to mean something quite different – the individual desire to ‘make it big’ and the personal drive for success and material wealth. The ideals of justice, liberty and equality gradually morphed into a justification for selfishness and greed.

Woodrow Wilson first spoke in 1916 of putting America First as a way to urge his countrymen to remain neutral in World War I so that the nation would be in a good position to help both sides at the conflict’s end.

The expression was soon taken up by opponents of immigration and advocates of isolationism, who feared that the nation would be contaminated by contact with foreign elements. America First has now been adopted as a hugely influential isolationist slogan and put to sinister use by hate groups including white supremacy and pro-Nazi movements.

‘The American dream is dead,’ said Donald Trump in 2015 when announcing his candidacy for president. He would revive it he promised, “By putting America First“.

Trump, in his pronouncements, was exploiting political terminology that has long appealed to racists and right wing extremists. The subtle, and not so subtle, messages Donald Trump sent to his supporters is that the reason many Americans are not successful and wealthy is because our country lets in too many immigrants and is being treated unfairly by foreign nations who are taking advantage of us .

Gone was any notion of the original meaning behind those expressions, when American Dream referred to economic fairness and justice for all citizens and America First reflected a policy to keep America neutral and a voice of reason in the presence of world conflicts so that we remain a beacon for the rest of the world.

As America struggles again to project a shared vision, to itself and to the world, perhaps the meanings and history of these expressions needs to be understood afresh before the true spirit of America can be reclaimed.

In this time of great political division in our nation, when many ask what America’s future holds, perhaps it is best to remember the words spoken at the 1895 dedication of a monument to President Ulysses S. Grant. The speaker asked his listeners to view the journey America had taken since its beginning to become a flourishing great nation.

Oh, critic and cynic, dreamer and doubter, behold America, as this day she stands before her history and her heroes. See her millions of people, her free institutions, her equal laws, her generous opportunities, her schoolhouses and her churches; you see misfortunes and defects. for not yet is fully realized the American dream; you surely see her mighty progress toward the fulfillment of her philosophy.

Oration in Honor of President Ulysses S. Grant, 1895

The speaker informs us that America is in a constant state of becoming, always moving forward in an attempt to form that more perfect union envisioned by the founders. We will never fully arrive – each successive generation will need to battle for the soul of the country and decide for themselves what it is America stands for.

If you believe that “Political society exists for the sake of noble actions“, as Aristotle did, then it is comforting to have faith that America’s political leaders will eventually act nobly and do the things that will move our country into the future as a stronger moral nation.