Dr.
Nathan R. Shrader
Chair,
Millsaps College Department of Government and Politics
Remarks
at New England College Pre-Inauguration College Convention
January
19, 2021 @10:30am CST
Good morning from Mississippi the
birthplace of Elvis Presley and the blues, the American home of the
International Ballet Competition, and one of the nation’s most important and
ongoing battlegrounds in the fight for civil rights in the United States. I am
truly appreciative of New England College for the invitation to participate in
this event today and I thank you for indulging this political operative-turned
professor for a few minutes.
My name is Nathan Shrader and I am
the chair of the Department of Government and Politics and director of American
Studies at Millsaps College here in Jackson, just a few minutes from our state
capitol building. It is truly a historic moment in Mississippi politics as days
ago, the new state flag was hoisted above the capitol for the first time, which
won overwhelming approval by voters last November to replace the prior state
flag that had been in place since the 1890s and featured the Confederate battle
emblem.
I’m honored to be with you this
morning, especially considering the magnitude of the events which have unfolded
in American politics in a very short span of time and our need to best
understand them in order to know what may come next.
As we begin thinking about the
inauguration of the 46th president of the United States, the severity of the
challenges facing the nation, and the political upheaval of the past five
years, it may make sense to turn to one of America’s most celebrated literary
voices.
Maya Angelou once wrote that “I
have great respect for the past. If you don't know where you've come from, you
don't know where you're going. I have respect for the past, but I'm a person of
the moment. I'm here, and I do my best to be completely centered at the place
I'm at, then I go forward to the next place.” I personally love this remark
because is simultaneously optimistic and forward-looking, yet firmly rooted in
reality. This strikes me as a much-needed combination for all of us who are
engaged in American politics right now.
Perhaps given the past five years
in American politics, a quote by the American philosopher Lawrence Peter “Yogi”
Berra is appropriate as well: "You've got to be very careful if you don't
know where you are going, because you might not get there."
Let me begin by saying that this is
an extraordinary time to be studying, observing, and participating in American
politics. Those of you who are current students, whether in high school or
college, should know that every generation and every era witness their share of
political transformations and turmoil, but I sense that what you have
experienced in a very short time is basically political change and disorder on
steroids.
Having grown up in politics in the
late 1990s and early 2000s, I feel as if it is my obligation to tell you quite
plainly that what you have witnessed in your formative years studying politics
is not what those who came before you would describe as “normal” in any sense
of the word. Perhaps this is the “new normal,” but it is still abnormal none
the less.
I would like to briefly highlight
five things to underscore this point and then have a conversation with you
about what to anticipate in the First 100 Days of the Biden presidency.
First, in the past few weeks we
have seen the manifestation of neo-fascism move from the shadows and fringes of
American politics to openly storming the United States Capitol in an effort to
brutalize America’s democratically elected political leaders, challenge the
legitimacy of our nation’s institutions of government, and loudly assert that
they are no longer to be marginalized by the norms of political society.
The entry for “neofascism” in Encyclopedia.com
states that it is embodied by the following precepts:
- ·
Extreme,
militant nationalism
- ·
A
belief in authoritarian rather than democratic governance
- ·
A
total rejection of socialist or leftist philosophies and egalitarianism
- ·
Appeals
to those deprived of their once dominant societal status at the expense of
emerging groups
- ·
Xenophobia
and hostility toward minority groups believed to have caused their social and
economic decline
As I look back at my own experience
on September 11, 2001 I am even more perturbed and disgusted by the events in
our nation’s Capital on January 6, 2021. Over 19 years ago I was working as an
intern on Capitol Hill in the office of the late US Senator Arlen Specter when
al Qaeda terrorists directed two planes towards Washington. One landed in the
side of the Pentagon while the other, which was aimed at the Capitol Building
itself, was brought down by patriotic passengers over Shanksville, PA not far
from where I grew up. Having been a witness to the terror attack on the Capitol
by those terrorists 19 years ago, I never thought I would see the day when
domestic terrorists actually managed to storm and hold the building while
flying flags of an American president.
Second, and somewhat linked to
this, the past several weeks alone has reignited an important, yet
controversial discussion about the basic tenants of “freedom of speech” and
whether what is said on internet forums and social media platforms is protected
despite these being non-governmental entities. Do platforms have the right to
ban speech…. Do employers have the right to fire people for attending protests…
Are we treating political speech differently for those on one end of the
spectrum or the other? In short, are we allowed to do the equivalent of
shouting “fire” in a crowded theater by spreading dangerous and false
information on the internet through privately run platforms?
This is certainly now a new
conundrum for us to address. On December 16, 2016 Fox Sports published a story
with the headline “PHILLIES FOOD VENDOR WHO SUPPORTS WHITE NATIONALISM IS
FIRED,” and was later featured on an episode of the Michael Smerconish Show on
Sirius/XM about all of the issues tangled up within this situation. In short,
Citizens Bank Park food vendor Emily Youcis was fired after appearing at an
event sponsored by a white nationalist group which, according to Fox Sports “drew
headlines after some attendees evoked Adolf Hitler's Third Reich with cries of
''Heil Trump'' and use of the Nazi salute.”
Was Youcis within her rights as a
citizen to free assembly and speech, or was her activity outside of the
workplace sufficient for her termination? Expect more debates on topics such as
this in the coming days.
Third, we are now in a place to
evaluate exactly where our two-party system stands. Unlike some other scholars
and pundits, I believe that the American two-party system is immensely strong and
durable, and the likelihood of a third party or multi-party system developing
here is even less likely than ever given the constraints place on the political
process by the parties themselves to weaken competition internally using the
levers of government at the national and state levels.
Essentially, we find ourselves with
a striking absence of a fiscally conservative party in the United States at
this time, a center-left Democratic Party that has upended the long-standing
Republican hold over suburban America, and a Republican Party which seems to
exist based on a somewhat tense relationship between establishment insiders
within the Beltway, corporate elites who do not actually control a voting
majority within the party, and a large, but shrinking segment of the white population
that is guided by grievances based on race, culture, and identity more than any
other interlocking political principles.
Fourth, living in the age of the
Coronavirus pandemic, Americans and voters like all of us here today are
frustrated with each other and the government’s inability to control the
crisis. We are collectively exhausted by 10 months of economic and social
disruption that has prevented us from living our lives, visiting our friends
and relatives, and losing wages and opportunities because residual impacts of
the virus. Additionally, Americans are watching an ill-planned and poorly
prepared vaccine distribution process that has lacked a national strategy and
is instead relying upon a state-by-state approach, something that is both
archaic and unnecessary given our current situation.
In Mississippi alone, our Millsaps
College/Chism Strategies State of the State Survey released two weeks ago found
that just over 50% of Mississippians say they will either definitely or
probably get the vaccine when the time comes for them to do so. Public health
challenges like this await the new president, the new congress, and all of us
who are active in the political process.
Fifth and finally, we have just
seen an American presidential election that saw 67% of legally eligible voters
cast ballots, the highest since 1900 when nearly 74% of eligible voters
participated. Ironically, the Council on Foreign Relations reported in early
December that the highest share of eligible American voters to ever participate
in a presidential election was 1876—a bona fide stolen election in which
Rutherford B. Hayes lost the popular vote and trailed by one vote in the
Electoral College, yet still “defeated” New Yorker’s Sam Tilden—when 83% of
eligible voters cast ballots. My students in a new class called Controversies
in American Politics will be reading Roy Morris’ account of the election
starting next week in the book Fraud of the Century.
The question on the minds of many
folks like me who specialize in applied politics—the combination of scholarship
and hands-on practice—is whether the United States can sustain increased
participation and engagement, or if this was a one-off election because of
controversial nature of the incumbent, the social and political forces at play,
and expansion of much needed tools such as vote-by-mail, drop-off ballot boxes,
and no excuse absentee or early voting.
In summation, tomorrow at 12pm Joseph
R. Biden will take the oath of office as the nation’s 46th president
in the face of historically high voter participation that may or may not endure,
a raging pandemic that is now projected to leave half a million Americans dead
in another month, a structurally secure yet ideologically unstable two-party
system, a robust debate over freedom of expression and the responsibilities of
corporate platform owners, and the overt rather than covert manifestation of neo-fascist activity in American politics.
Biden’s ascent to the presidency
has been one that has lasted 34 years from the time he first announced his
candidacy in 1987 to tomorrow when he places his hand on the Bible and swears
the oath of office. Biden is a lifelong moderate Democrat who was elected
successfully at a time when the increasingly loud voices on the right and left
seemed to make such a situation improbable. Biden was able to govern for
decades in the Senate and as Vice President as a centrist institutionalist, yet
credibly run on the most liberal platform of a Democratic Party nominee since
George McGovern in 1972.
This quote from President Dwight D.
Eisenhower—whose portrait hangs behind me—seems to best summarize Biden’s
governing philosophy over the years: “Extremes to the right and to the left of
any political dispute are always wrong.” Can this 78-year-old man who is proud
of his career in public service united a fractured nation while keeping his own
party together?
To say that President-elect Biden
faces a gargantuan challenge is nothing short of an understatement. Here are a
few poll numbers to help illustrate the size and scope of the challenge Biden
faces beginning at 12pm tomorrow:
- ·
According
to Quinnipiac, Biden takes office with 31% of American voters (mostly all
Republicans) saying that he was not legitimately elected despite clear evidence
that he was and lack of any proof that he wasn’t.
- ·
37%
believe there was “widespread voter fraud” in the November election, which of
course is inaccurate.
- ·
A
poll released two days ago by my alma mater, Suffolk University found that a
vast majority of Americans, by a lopsided measure of 70% to 17% believe that
“America's democracy is weaker, not stronger, than it was four years ago.”
So, what does all of this mean for
Joe Biden in his First 100 Days?
As Churchill wrote, “A love for
tradition has never weakened a nation, indeed it has strengthened nations in
their hour of peril.” The tradition of measuring his success begins in the
First 100 Days. With that, I would like to conclude my remarks and open the
floor for your comments, thoughts, and questions about President Biden’s First
100 Days.
Thank you.
