The Remembrances of History

A few things on historical characters and how they are remembered.

First, if Bush isn't Churchill, and he plainly isn't, who is he?

I'd say he's closer to Lindbergh than Churchill.

Lindbergh in his role as titular head of America First surely ignored the threat of Germany and Japan as not being in America's interest. He continued to belong to America First long after it became obvious that America would need to be involved in the Second World War -- even the Republicans nominated Wilkie, an internationalist in 1940.

But at this same time there was Lindbergh still stubbornly ignoring the danger and making stupid speeches lashing out against his critics in the most imbicilic of ways, on September 11 (ironically), 1941 in Des Moines, Iowa.

As I have said, these war agitators comprise only a small minority of our people; but they control a tremendous influence. Against the determination of the American people to stay out of war, they have marshaled the power of their propaganda, their money, their patronage.

Lindbergh then goes on to single out the these groups as being the British, the Roosevelt Administration as another. And then, most infamously:

History shows that it cannot survive war and devastations. A few far-sighted Jewish people realize this and stand opposed to intervention. But the majority still do not.

Their greatest danger to this country lies in their large ownership and influence in our motion pictures, our press, our radio and our government.

So Lindbergh twiddled and fretted while the world burned and the warning called.

Churchill spent most all of his years in the political wilderness, considered a traitor by Liberals, detested by Labour, not trusted by the Tories. He was wrong on any number of things. Wrong on Ireland, wrong on South Africa, wrong on India, wrong on women's suffrage. A blowharding, anti-communist gadfly.

But in the early 1930s it dawned on him just how powerful and dangerous Hitlerism was becoming and he became the prophet. As Hitler rose in power, Churchill's voice grew louder, while at the same time he, like all prophets, became more shunned than lauded by the powers that be in his party; be they Stanley Baldwin or Neville Chamberlain.

It took a time of profound crisis and threat for Churchill to be welcomed back to power. It took the invasion of Poland for him to get back into the Admiralty, and it took the invasion of France for him to become Prime Minister.

It was then, as a spiritual and psychic leader that the legend of Churchill arose. A marvelous wordsmith, Churchill's speeches and bravado was of inestimable value to the British.

He was right about few things in his life, but of one thing he was most correct and it was a huge thing. Without the eventuality of that thing, Churchill would have remained an isolated and eccentric figure on the world stage. Now, he is a legend and considered one of the great leaders of the 20th Century, and people refer to him like they refer to Lincoln, or either Roosevelt.

Churchill is emblazoned in History.

There is an American that I consider to be relatively close to Churchill of a different era. Some would quickly think Lincoln, or naturally FDR. But that person is someone else, of similar oratorical power and long-standing influence. Yet he is often not recognized and, indeed, the cause of his late career served not to aid him into legend; but to turn his otherwise impressive legacy into mockery.

That man is William Jennings Bryan, the Great Commoner.

Like Churchill, Bryan had a mercurial rise -- one from far more humble origins than Churchill.

Barely into his mid-30s, Bryan made one of the great speeches of the 19th Century, and perhaps the first truly modern political speech at the 1896 Democratic National Convention. In an age two generations before modern media, Bryan gave a speech emphasizing progressivism, of the working class against the privileged, for a fair shake for the common-man against Republican Oligarchy. It's then reflection was over the standard upon which currency was to be based.

The humblest citizen in all the land, when clad in the armor of a righteous cause, is stronger than all the hosts of error. I come to speak to you in defense of a cause as holy as the cause of liberty--the cause of humanity. ....

The man who is employed for wages is as much a business man as his employer; the attorney in a country town is as much a business man as the corporation counsel in a great metropolis; the merchant at the cross-roads store is as much a business man as the merchant of New York; the farmer who goes forth in the morning and toils all day--who begins in the spring and toils all summer--and who by the application of brain and muscle to the natural resources of the country creates wealth, is as much a business man as the man who goes upon the board of trade and bets upon the price of grain; the miners who go down a thousand feet into the earth, or climb two thousand feet upon the cliffs, and bring forth from their hiding places the precious metals to be poured into the channels of trade are as much business men as the few financial magnates who, in a back room, corner the money of the world. We come to speak for this broader class of business men...

Our war is not a war of conquest; we are fighting in the defense of our homes, our families, and posterity. We have petitioned, and our petitions have been scorned; we have entreated, and our entreaties have been disregarded; we have begged, and they have mocked when our calamity came. We beg no longer; we entreat no more; we petition no more. We defy them...

The income tax is just. It simply intends to put the burdens of government justly upon the backs of the people. I am in favor of an income tax. When I find a man who is not willing to bear his share of the burdens of the government which protects him, I find a man who is unworthy to enjoy the blessings of a government like ours...

The sympathies of the Democratic party, as shown by the platform, are on the side of the struggling masses who have ever been the foundation of the Democratic party. There are two ideas of government. There are those who believe that, if you will only legislate to make the well-to-do prosperous, their prosperity will leak through on those below. The Democratic idea, however, has been that if you legislate to make the masses prosperous, their prosperity will find its way up through every class which rests upon them...

Having behind us the producing masses of this nation and the world, supported by the commercial interests, the laboring interests, and the toilers everywhere, we will answer their demand for a gold standard by saying to them: You shall not press down upon the brow of labor this crown of thorns, you shall not crucify mankind upon a cross of gold.

Now, only the last part of that speech remains known. But look at how prescient so many of these statements remain today, especially -- in 1896 a championing of income tax and an attack on "trickle-down" economics.

Bryan was the progressive prophet of the prairie. While thrice he lost the Presidency, his ideas permeated into the policies of the Democratic Party, and also, for a time, the Republican Party, and held sway over the next three generations. Workers Compensation, Minimum Wage, Maximum Hours, Unionization, etc. are its legacies.

Yet Bryan is not remembered for being a progressive. He is remembered, ironically, for that portion of his beliefs that fits in closer to that of the religious right.

When you read the "Cross of Gold Speech" it is evident that Bryan even in 1996 was an evangelist, a fundamentalist, and it is in that fundamentalism that he is remembered. In 1925 in the Scopes Trial his deep convictions on religion and literalism were so profoundly obliterated and embarrassed (concretized by his death right after) that it took a half-century for the movement to regain its footing.

But the embarrassment of Bryan the fundamentalist has obliterated the more far-seeing "Great Commoner". So while Churchill, wrong about so many things, but right about the last big thing is praised, let us remember also a man no longer so quoted or so loved by history, but who, in many ways, should be. William Jennings Bryan, this Evolution-Believing Progressive uses his opposable thumb to tip his hat to you.