I would guess we’ll hear a lot of Lincoln over the next few weeks. Specifically, the second inaugural address. And it feels a little melodramatic.
After all, the Trump presidency was not the Civil War. Little blood was shed in combat, compared to the massive death totals of the 1860’s. Evils were fought, but they lack the clarity history has shed on slavery, and I will make no comparison between their severity and that of the brutal human bondage our country’s first 90 years (and 160 before those) knew as commonplace. It feels melodramatic, and it may be melodramatic. But my greater fear is that it’s premature.
It’s an interesting landscape this morning, politically speaking. On one end of things, the Republican Party, in its last electoral event with Trump as its highest elected official, has just lost two Senate races in what had been, pre-Trump, a stronghold: Georgia. And it’s worse for the GOP than just losing Georgia. These two Senate races will give the Democratic Party full control of Congress as a Democrat takes over the White House. These races were the tipping point. The Senate tipped away from Republicans. Analysis will be done as to what caused this defeat: Changing demographics? Civil rights hunger? The coronavirus and its peripherals? Some will credit Donald Trump for the loss, and in the immediate term, some Republican officials are blaming Donald Trump. But we do not know with certainty why voters chose to vote the way they voted. And the reasons are likely multiple for many.
On the other end of things, this afternoon in the Capitol, a group of Senators and Representatives plans to dispute the results of the presidential election, the latest act in a series of efforts to overturn the votes of the American populace, this one—like the other such efforts—ostensibly based upon baseless allegations of widespread fraud. As with Georgia, there’s uncertainty here too. We don’t know the extent to which these congresspeople really believe what they’re saying. We don’t know how many they’re convincing, or to whom their encouragement of these falsehoods matter. We don’t know whether this behavior will be repeated following future elections, what sorts of conflict it will provoke, or how much trust in electoral processes is necessary to maintain a functioning democracy.
It is this paradox that makes “malice toward none” quotes feel premature, along with all the uncertainty the two ends provide. We don’t know exactly what has happened. We certainly don’t know what will. Will the weeks between now and inauguration pass quietly? Will there be more upheaval? And what of the next four years? The next eight? The next twenty? The political environment that gave rise to Trump and the conflict that surrounded him is as disastrous as ever, and—fueled by the man, his allies, and his opponents—it only appears to have grown stronger in its grip on us societally, rearing its head so rabidly at times that it seems to swallow us whole into a nasty stomach of tribal hatred.
I hope that my perceptions are mistaken. I hope the severity of this is not what it appears, and that I am a symptom myself, being as engaged as I am with political media. But since others will quote Lincoln, I’ll point you his way too. I won’t point you towards the famous part of his second inaugural address. At least not right away. Instead, I’ll point you toward all that precedes “malice toward none.”
When Lincoln gave that address, 156 years ago this winter, General Lee had not yet surrendered. Many men were yet to die. “Malice toward none” was perhaps even more premature then than it is now. For Lincoln was not speaking of a war that was over. And so Lincoln did not speak of a war that was over. He spoke of a struggle that was ending, and of a struggle that was continuing. He acknowledged both were the reapings of our sowings. And yet he did, in the end (and here we circle back to “malice”), offer a path forward. It’s a challenging one. It feels near-impossible. It is near-impossible. Because when Lincoln said, “malice toward none,” he didn’t make any exceptions. And when Lincoln said, “charity for all,” he made no exception there either. And if we’re going to make headway on this—if we’re going to stem the tide of animosity and push forward into a new light of respect—we can afford no exception ourselves. Malice for none. None. Charity for all. All.
