77 - Speaking Truth to Power: An Exhortation of Conscience on Bastille Day

            Who is going to be this generation’s Margaret Chase Smith?  Is there anyone out there other than Liz Cheney in the Republican midst who is still principled and who possesses the courage of her/his beliefs and the willingness to speak truth to power?

            When these United States were beginning to be led wildly astray by Wisconsin Sen. Joseph McCarthy’s accusations against the infiltration of communism into American life, the “Reds” in the State Department,  and the “purposeful” loss of China to the “Reds,” Sen. Margaret Chase Smith, a square-jawed true Yankee from Skowhegan, Maine (now deep in the Trump-infested waters of Maine’s second congressional district), issued her Declaration of Conscience. Slightly more than seventy-two years ago she stood before the U. S. Senate (now infested with toadies, turncoats, and weaklings on the minority side) and uttered moving and profound words that spoke to her epoch and, I dare say, equally to today’s troubled times and national crises of will.

            I hope readers of this Newsletter, some of whom may know little about the remarkable woman from a mill town in Maine, will read her words. I hope readers will indulge me as I quote lengthy excerpts from her Declaration of Conscience  (June 1, 1950). If today’s Senate Republicans hear her clarion call, perhaps they will recover their own consciences and join forces across the aisle to rebuild the impeccable fortress of American democracy.

            Senator Smith:

            “I would like to speak briefly and simply about a serious national condition.

It is a national feeling of fear and frustration that could result in national suicide and the end of everything that we Americans hold dear. It is a condition that comes from the lack of effective leadership … in the legislative branch…. of our government.

            ‘I speak as briefly as possible because too much harm has already been done with irresponsible words of bitterness and selfish political opportunism.

“I speak as a Republican. I speak as a woman. I speak as a United States senator. I speak as an American.”  

(She was the first woman elected to the Senate from Maine and the first who had been both elected to the House of Representatives and then to the Senate.  She spoke as a first-term Senator.)

“The United States Senate has long enjoyed worldwide respect as the greatest deliberative body in the world. But recently that deliberative character has too often been debased to the level of a forum of hate and character assassination sheltered by the shield of congressional immunity.

“I think that it is high time for the United States Senate and its members to do some real soul searching and to weigh our consciences as to the manner in which we are performing our duty to the people of America and the manner in which we are using or abusing our individual powers and privileges. I think that it is high time that we remembered that we have sworn to uphold and defend the Constitution. I think that it is high time that we remembered that the Constitution, as amended, speaks not only of the freedom of speech but also of trial by jury instead of trial by accusation.

“… a Republican regime embracing a philosophy that lacks political integrity or intellectual honesty would prove equally disastrous to the nation…. I do not want to see the Republican party ride to political victory on the Four Horsemen of Calumny-Fear, Ignorance, Bigotry, and Smear. I doubt if the Republican party could do so, simply because I do not believe the American people will uphold any political party that puts political exploitation above national interest. Surely we Republicans are not that desperate for victory.

“I am not proud of the way in which the Senate has been made a publicity platform for irresponsible sensationalism. I am not proud of the reckless abandon in which unproved charges have been hurled from this side of the aisle…. I do not like the way the Senate has been made a rendezvous for vilification, for selfish political gain at the sacrifice of individual reputations and national unity. I am not proud of the way we smear outsiders from the floor of the Senate and hide behind the cloak of congressional immunity and still place ourselves beyond criticism on the floor of the Senate. As an American, I am shocked at the way Republicans and Democrats alike are playing directly into the Communist design of ‘confuse, divide, and conquer.’

“As an American, I want to see our nation recapture the strength and unity it once had when we fought the enemy instead of ourselves.

“It is high time that we stopped thinking politically as Republicans and Democrats about elections and started thinking patriotically as Americans about national security based on individual freedom. It is high time that we all stopped being tools and victims of totalitarian techniques--techniques that, if continued here unchecked, will surely end what we have come to cherish as the American way of life.”

Senator Smith’s Cri de Coeur was endorsed by seven other Republican Senators:  Wayne Morse of Oregon, Charles Tobey of New Hampshire, George Aitken of Vermont, Irving Ives of New York, Edward Thye of Minnesota, and Robert Hendrickson of New Jersey.

            The Senator from Maine and her colleagues were obviously addressing Cold War era issues and the extreme and unfounded accusations being made in a flagrantly dishonest manner by their foul-mouthed erstwhile fellow Republican senator from Wisconsin.  But they made it evident that not all Republicans were party to wild conspiracy theories and a cacophony of lies.  Their Declaration of Conscience tried to halt the pillorying of opponents for crass political ends.

            Are there no Republican Senators today who value honor over allegiance to false banners of calumny?  Are there none who – in this time of desperate need, with the Jan.6 Committee hearings etched firmly in our minds – pride decency and integrity more than the craven worship of blasphemous idols?