In the first and badly edited section of this essay, I talked about the part that the American Revolution played in the formation of the Republican Party. Anti-federalists, as they were known then, were filled with the idea that all people should have the right to make their own choices. As Michael Palin so brilliantly says as “Dennis” in Monty Python and the Holy Grail, “supreme executive power derives from a mandate from the masses, not from some farcical aquatic ceremony.” Though in this case, he’s talking about the legendary/fictional coronation of King Arthur, real monarchy wasn’t so much different. Before there was such a thing as democracy, there was a concept called “divine right of kings,” which basically meant that leaders could do whatever they felt like because they were, in a sense, ordained by the Judeo-Christian God. This led to such oppression, tyranny, and violence that Thomas Jefferson advocated a coup against the government- a new revolution- every twenty years just to avoid complacency.
Nowhere was this more evident than at Shays’ Rebellion. Though it went on for a year or so, the main event was an uprising of farmers who were protesting what they felt was a financial scam in Massachusetts. Western and central parts of the state were still using a barter economy, and the east had switched to both coinage and paper money. When the people in the barter economy were monetarily taxed, they were often forced to sell their land at a third of the price it was worth, thus risking their right to vote- because at that time, voting was tied to the ownership of land. In a letter to James Madison, Thomas Jefferson extols the virtue of uprising against one’s government, because even if you lose, at least you’re getting some publicity to the problem:
I hold it that a little rebellion now and then is a good thing, and as necessary in the political world as storms in the physical. Unsuccessful rebellions, indeed, generally establish the encroachments on the rights of the people which have produced them. An observation of this truth should render honest republican governors so mild in their punishment of rebellions as not to discourage them too much. It is a medicine necessary for the sound health of government.
Thomas Jefferson, founder of the Republican Party, was insistent upon the idea that the United States didn’t need a federal hand to guide it. As men and women of principle and morals, we individually are capable of being responsible for ourselves.
And that brings me to my dilemma with the Republican Party today. They’ve created a situation where you’re only fit to govern yourself if you hold the same ideals that they do… “Father Knows Best” writ large. President Bush, I know Nick at Nite. And you sir, are no Nick at Nite.
In the Republican Party, women are not respected enough to make their own decisions about whether or not to have a child. Lots of people would argue, and I agree with them, that this is a way of keeping both the glass ceiling and the general inequality of women in place, because if the debate on abortion was really for the children’s sake, the Republican Party would be lined up around the block with blankets and bottles for the children we already have.
In the Republican Party, environmental protections that took the Clinton administration years to pass have been dismantled in the name of lifting restrictions on big business, and thus, more money… though I could understand more readily if those restrictions were lifted in an effort to save the world economy from permanent ruin. But when President Bush came into office, there was a large surplus of money that no one saved- knowing full well that it was time for an economic downturn. And yes, I know that the tax cuts were supposed to reinvigorate the economy, but what do people do when they sense a downturn in the market? They save. Therefore, all those tax cuts are probably still in banks across America. I’m sure The Gap is furious.
In the Republican Party, Biblical literalists have been tasked with providing the guided hand that used to belong to the “divine right of Kings.” Now, I’m going to say this very carefully. I believe that divorce is terrible. I have been through two, both my parents’ and my own. I would not abort my child unless my life was in danger mentally or physically. I believe that single mothers often get the short end of the stick and its better not to go through being a single parent unless you have to. I fully intend to raise my child (if I have one) with a trusting and loving co-parent. But the bottom line is that those are MY CHOICES TO MAKE, and I didn’t need my political party to help me with any of them.
So, really, what makes me the angriest about the Republican Party is that the party born from the ashes of the American Revolution, the party that centered around the idea of free will and the ability to create one’s own prosperity, is now drowning in the pool of patriarchy that it struggled to leave.
Stories That Are All True 