Albion W. Tourgee: the beginnings of Democratic timidity

[Ladyhawk]

After the Civil War, a Union officer named Albion Tourgee moved to the South to help with Reconstruction. I first read his semi-autobiographical novel, A Fool's Errand, twenty years ago when I was still a Republican and fundamentalist Christian. I'm sure it was one of the many tomes that ultimately convinced me I was in error.

I am in the process of re-reading it now. I'm blown away by Tourgee's understanding of the problems of the South and his compassion for the people of the South (both recent slaveholders and the recently freed). I'm especially flabbergasted at how similar today's problems are to those that existed in the late 1800's.

Here are some excerpts from Tourgee's book:

In fact, my dear Doctor, I begin seriously to fear that the North lacks virility. This cowardly shirking of responsibility, this pandering to sentimental whimsicalities, this snuffling whine about peace and conciliation, is sheer weakness. The North is simply a conqueror; and, if the results she fought for are to be secured, she must rule as a conqueror. Suppose the South had been triumphant, and had overwhelmed and determined to hold the North? Before now, a thoroughly organized system of provincial government would have been securely established. There would have been no hesitation, no subterfuge, no pretence of restoration, because the people of the South are born rulers,--aggressives, who, having made up their minds to attain a certain end, adopt the means most likely to secure it. In this the North fails. She hesitates, palters, shirks.

This excerpt reminds me of the compromise on health care reform:

The second Christmas in his new home had come before any thing was done; then a plan was adopted which was a compromise among all these ideas. This was the fourth plan. It was not selected because those who chose it deemed it the best manner for settling the ills with which the body politic had been afflicted; not at all. No one can be so simple-minded as to believe that. The far future was very dim as the legislators' eyes when they adopted it: the near future was what they dreaded. A great election was at hand. The President and his supporters were going to the country on his plan of reconstruction. When the Congress threatened impeachment, he sought for justification at the ballot-box. Some plan must be devised with which to meet him. What should it be? The logic which carries elections answered, "One on which all who are opposed to the presidential plan in the North can be induced to unite." From this womb of party necessity and political insincerity came forth this abortion, or, rather, this monster, doomed to parricide in the hour of its birth.

Like all compromises, it had the evils of all the plans from which its pieces came, and the merits of none of them. The coward, who, running with his conscience and holding with his fear, makes a compromise by taking the head of one thought and the tail of another, is sure to get the wrong ends of both.

I seldom post here anymore, but I may make a few more posts based on Tourgee's observations following the Civil War.

Before the flame wars start, I am NOT trashing the South. Though he loathed the violence of the South, Tourgee was not trashing the South. As the book progresses, he gains an understanding of the South the Republicans of the time did not possess. (Republicans then = Democrats now.) The Republicans, in not recognizing the culture of the South, totally screwed up Reconstruction. There's enough blame for everyone.

You can read the entire book here: A Fool's Errand by Albion W. Tourgee.

[Crunchy Frog]

1. I love this line:

"Like all compromises, it had the evils of all the plans from which its pieces came, and the merits of none of them. The coward, who, running with his conscience and holding with his fear, makes a compromise by taking the head of one thought and the tail of another, is sure to get the wrong ends of both."

I may use it in a sig.

[Ladyhawk]

2. Yeah, that's a great line...wish I'd written it. :) nt

[Ladyhawk]

3. Kicking this because I think it's interesting as hell. ;) nt

[hootinholler]

4. Recommending it for the same reason. n/t

[tom_paine]

5. Thank you for pointing this book out to me, Ladyhawk.

NOTE: This is not a bashing of the South. There are many good and decent people in the South, as there are everywhere. But the historical reality is thus, the center of the New Medievalism is clearly centered in the Old Confederacy, and to ignore this is to ignore reality. And that's what the KKK-Republicans do.

I am already more than halfway through it in horror and with knowing (and of this I have known for a long time, but it is another thing entirely to have the whole hideous thing laid out beforehand) that the malevolent witch-burning spirits of the Dark Ages, so alive and virulent in the culture of the NeoConfederate, now NeoConservative South, now lives and breathes with greater strength than the 60s..MUCH greater strength than the 60s.

Briefly, with the application of massive government power and during the brief time in which the American Media actually WAS a little bit free, we made them stop killing and murdering.

But they just figured out a way around that and now disenfranchise with computers and lynch with their NeoRebfederate-controlled law enforcement, eschewing the more direct approaches that worked so well for them for a hundred years and more after those "Yankee Liberals" forced them to give up their terrorized slaves.

It is quite obvious to see that, when they are no longer afraid to perform the old KKK tricks, they will start performing them again (if they haven't already- how could we tell with our laughable joke of an American Corporate Media?).

This book makes one stare it in the face. This book is a taste of things to come, if not things already begun using "kinder and gentler" methods.

Dear God, the insane RW Authoritarian zealots NEVER give up, and how can we stop them? The Civil War didn't stop them, the 60s didn't stop them, hell, their kissin' country cousins, the Nazis, STILL command the allegiance of hundreds of thousands, perhaps millions, around the world.

I guess, with the laughable performance of our Democratic Leadership under Obama (or should I say our Liberal Leadership for in Servoss' time, we were Republicans), which so very neatly replicates the timidity and complacency that I am just now reading about, is just more despair.

The KKK-Democratic coalition ruled the South for 100 years, until they were FORCED to stop the terror in the 60s (or at least encode and hide the terror better, with better PR,marketing & plausible deniability).

Now that it is rising again as the KKK-Republican Coalition, how long will it rule THIS time? And in the Age of Peak Everything, where the reptile brain is sure to wax triumphant as primordial survival matters overtake "liberality-as-a-result-of-increased-energy-budget-and increased-material-comforts" which is already waning, what other horror and atrocities will come to the fore?

With friends like Obama and the Corporate Democratic Leadership, who needs enemies? In the absence of their leadership, we are as bereft as Servoss, his family, the freedmen, and the Southern Unionists.

And once again I am reminded, plus a change, plus a la meme chose (the more things change, the more they stay the same).

As we plunge back into medieval darkness, who's trend and trail stands out as bright as the tail of a comet, may God have Mercy on the souls of the victims to come...

[tom_paine]

6. This thread deserves to be on the Greatest Page, so more people can see it

That means it will in all likelihood sink and never be seen again.

:-(