What Does This Even Mean?
By Jamelle Bouie - Nov 14th, 2008 at 10:10 amReason’s Damon W. Root is playing Jonah Goldberg with history, and attempting to tie today’s “progressives” to deeply illiberal impulses of the early 20th century variety:
But what the current vogue for the term progressive fails to acknowledge is that the original progressives embraced the worst abuses of state power in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Libertarians, by contrast, stood as consistent defenders of individual liberty in all spheres of human life.
Consider the Jim Crow South. As historian David Southern has written, disfranchisement, segregation, race baiting, and lynching all “went hand-in-hand with the most advanced forms of southern progressivism.” Plessy v. Ferguson (1896), the Supreme Court decision that enshrined the doctrine of “separate but equal” and serves as perhaps the most potent symbol of the Jim Crow regime, dealt with a Louisiana law forbidding railroads from selling first-class tickets to black customers. That’s not the free market making life worse. It’s the government.
Moreover, as economist Tim Leonard points out, progressives believed in a “powerful, centralized state, conceiving of government as the best means for promoting the social good,” a belief that directly contributed to the widespread progressive support for eugenics, racial collectivism, and various coercive “reforms.”
Correct me if I’m wrong here, but doesn’t it kind of seem like Root is suggesting that progressive majorities will result in deeply illiberal policies on the scale of institutionalized racism or government-sponsored eugenics?
Now, it certainly is the case that those progressives held some pretty repugnant views. But, and this is an important point, today’s progressives have little to nothing in common–besides the name–with the progressives Root describes. Most of those whom identify as progressive fit firmly into the mold of 1990s liberalism; and indeed, there is little to differentiate a “liberal” from a “progressive,” outside of a greater willingness to tack left when the opportunity presents itself. Simply sharing a name–especially one whose meaning was never that clear–isn’t enough to indict a contemporary political movement with the sins of another.
Frankly, I’m tired of folks–regardless of ideology–making ridiculous historical analogies and then refusing to actually say what they mean. And so, with that said, I have a few questions for Root: What is the point of the essay? What are you driving at? Do you think we’re likely to see terribly illiberal policies in the next four years? If so, what are they and what would they look like?
I’m not being facetious here; I really would like to know whether Damon Root honestly believes that contemporary progressives are, well, dangerous.
Actually, in some fields I think it is quite likely to see some dangerous policies in the next four years.
As I noted in a comment on an earlier post, change.gov had featured an item stating the plan for a system of annual required service, 50 hours for middle and high school students, 100 for college students. Rahm Emmanuel and others that will be close to the president and help influence his decisions have been supporters of similar initiatives.
There’s nothing good about conscripted service. The draft was an outrage and this is as bad if not worse - with the draft there was at least the possibility of not being selected. With this there’s no exemption.
Furthermore, mandating service denigrates the moral value of the act of community service.
Additionally with this program the government will be sanctioning what counts and doesn’t count as service. While it might be ok for you under an Obama administration, would you be equally ok with it under a Republican one?
That’s only one example. The fact is, historically the most dangerous regimes have been ones that had faith in government’s power to “improve” society. That includes the U.S. too - particularly FDR and Bush. Both of them aggressively used the government to meddle in the economy, with negative results; both were supportive of curtailing individual liberty in the interest of the common good; and both unjustly imprisoned people on the flimsiest of arguments.
Progressives, Neocons, and other government action enthusiasts don’t mean harm, they’re just blinded by their faith in the power of government and fail to see how such policies harm the individual and destroy his or her liberty.
November 14th, 2008 at 10:46 amWell, gosh. Here I thought I might have something to add. Once again, however, The Waterman beat me to it. with an even more articulate contribution than I would have offered.
November 14th, 2008 at 12:39 pmI think the game here is “redefine progressive as something most people don’t like!”
November 14th, 2008 at 6:12 pm