The Trump Party Brings Back Memories of Days Gone By When He Thought America Was Great

Reading about the advent of the Civil War I have a feeling that what is happening in our society today is similar to what happened back at that time.

That brings to mind the saying in the Douay-Rheims version of the Bible in Ecclesiastes 1:9-10: “What is it that hath been? the same thing that shall be. What is it that hath been done? the same that shall be done. Nothing under the sun is new, neither is any man able to say: Behold this is new: for it hath already gone before in the ages that were before us.”

I turn to Wikipedia to refresh my recollection. It starts off: The Know Nothing, formally known as the Native American Party and the American Party from 1855 onwards, was a far-right nativist political party and movement in the United States which operated nationwide in the mid-1850s. It was primarily an anti-Catholicanti-immigration, and xenophobic movement, originally starting as a secret society. The Know Nothing movement also briefly emerged as a major political party in the form of the American Party. Adherents to the movement were to simply reply “I know nothing” when asked about its specifics by outsiders, providing the group with its common name.”

Here we are today confronting another far-right nativist political party and movement which is clearly xenophobic surprisingly composed of many of the papists, a derogatory term freely applied to Catholics. I was always struck by Herman Melville’s description in his 1857 novel The Confidence-Man: His Masquerade where he mentions papist as a particular type of people who traveled on the Mississippi steamboats prior to the Civil War: “Quakers in full drab, and United States soldiers in full regimentals; slaves, black, mulatto, quadroon; modish young Spanish Creoles, and old-fashioned French Jews; Mormons and Papists; Dives and Lazarus; jesters and mourners, teetotallers and convivialists, deacons and blacklegs; hard-shell Baptists . . ..”

Clearly the Trump Party is xenophobic. Just think, a couple of days ago we read reports of World leaders came together in a virtual summit Monday to pledge billions of dollars to quickly develop vaccines and drugs to fight the coronavirus. Missing from the roster was the Trump administration, which declined to participate . . . “  Which shows the consistent xenophobic vision of the world Trump set out in his inauguration speech: We assembled here today are issuing a new decree to be heard in every city, in every foreign capital, in every hall of power – from this day on a new vision will govern our land – from this day onwards it is only going to be America first – America first!”

Is it not so long ago that America was looked up on as a world leader? Wasn’t it in the late 19th century that we received the Statue of Liberty whose purpose was to shine America’s liberty to the benighted nations of the world? Is the idea behind making America great again bringing it back beyond those days to the days of the Know Nothings? It certainly looks like it.

This time the New Know Nothings include among their cult their former enemies the papists. I can never understand how people become like their former enemies. How is it they can engage in the same actions that at one time they found so obnoxious and repelling. The American Patriot poster shown above has words that sound so familiar that they could easily be said today, in fact have been said by some. These Patriots were opposed “To being taxed for the support of Foreign paupers millions of dollars yearly.’ They go on with words heard daily from the Trump acolytes especially today: “We are tampered with in our religion. We are injured in our labor.  We are assailed in our freedom of speech.”

According to Wikipedia Abraham Lincoln, who shed tears seeing Trump sitting in his memorial, stated:  “As a nation, we began by declaring that “all men are created equal.” We now practically read it “all men are created equal, except negroes.” When the Know-Nothings get control, it will read “all men are created equals, except negroes and foreigners and Catholics.” When it comes to that I should prefer emigrating to some country where they make no pretense of loving liberty—to Russia, for instance, where despotism can be taken pure, and without the base alloy of hypocrisy.” 

It is hard to imagine how many exceptions to the “all men are created equal” will come about if Trump remains in office much longer. Let’s hope that the Trump Party quickly follows the fate of the Know Nothings.

7 Comments

  1. Sorry NC. I meant WC.

  2. The divisiveness being hawked in these paragraphs by normally christian, kind, intelligent, and reasonable people is a symptom of of a stark cleavage I can only hope is ephemeral and fleeting.

    When faced by leader who brings shame on his office so blatantly and so frequently, his supporters must take extremist measures in the defense of the indefensible. Wave the red herring so as not see what the snake salesman is selling. Goebbels? Really NC?

    • william m connolly

      Like many liberals, my friend, you have little tolerance for opposing views , , ,at least on these pages.

      It is a hysterical and grotesque hyperbole to compare Trump to Hitler and Stalin as many liberals in the MSM and elsewhere have done, and as Matt has repeatedly done.

      It is factual that the today’s MSM is by and large an arm of the liberal wing of the Democratic Party and has been vicious in its coverage of the Trump Administration these last 3.5 years. THE MSM tells the big lie that President Trump is lying every time he estimates, approximates, uses hopeful statements, or exaggerates, etcetera. It is the MSM that is lying to us, especially CNN, MSNBC, the Wash Post and New York Times.

      It is a fully appropriate analogy to say the NAZIS killed 12 million innocent human beings (handicapped, mentally impaired, gypsies, Jews, Slavs) and our own country the United States has killed 60 million human beings in the womb, since Roe v. Wade made abortion throughout pregnancy legal, and even after the Planned Parenthood v. Casey decision, a million abortions of innocent human beings annually continues unfettered in this country

      Liberal Dems may deny the science of embryology, and deny that a human being lives inside a mother’s womb, but pro-life Americans understand that 90% of abortions are done on healthy woman carrying healthy human beings inside their wombs.

      God forbid, I ever stop speaking these elemental truths to any and all with open minds and open hearts to hear them.

      Do you deny the Democratic Party favors abortion, virtually on demand?

      What restrictions would you put on a women’s right to choose?

      I would legally allow abortions only when it was not medically possible to save both lives.

      You speak of “burdens” imposed on women during nine months of pregnancy; once a child is born the “burden” to raise that child for 18 years is imposed on mother and father by law.

      Yes, what the liberals have done to America in terms of PROPAGANDA is Goebbels-like, , , please read Larry Tye’s book on Bernays, the father of modern advertising, and please consider Hate Speech laws, abused to stifle dissent, and consider that liberals have persuaded one in four American women that it is O.K to kill.

      And yes the killing of 60 million innocent human beings aborted and favored by the liberal democrats is comparable to the killing of 12 million human beings by the NAZIs, except that it is worse by a factor of five.

      Face the facts.

  3. The day after Trump issued his travel ban for China Biden called him a hysterical xenophobe. Seems like a prudent step. All the Democratic aspirants for president supported open borders. i. e. free health care for illegals and making unlawful entry a civil matter not a crime. As Reagan said if you don’t have borders you don’t have a country. 2. When JFK ran against Nixon in 1960 two thirds of all the Catholics voted for him. In 1968 Nixon ran against Humphrey and got the majority of the Catholic vote. The majority of that vote is pro family, pro faith, pro work and pro country. It doesn’t embrace the virulently anti Catholic policies of the NY Times and Globe. ( They tried to shut down the St Patrick’s day parade). 3. It seems all the major epidemics of late, 1958 Asian flu, 1968 Hong Kong flu, the bird flu, the swine flu and Covid 19 emanate from China. Shouldn’t we try to restrict these plagues from getting here or should we adopt the Biden approach? 4.Robert Frost’s poem’s line ” Good fences make Good neighbors” should replace the Lazarus poem on Lady Liberty. Remember the line from Willa Cather’s favorite book written a century ago, My Antonia ” foreigners can give you disease” So they can.

  4. William M. Connolly

    Trump is the most egalitarian president in history. His wife is a Catholic. His vice-president a Catholic converted to Evangelical Christianity. His oldest daughter is converted to Judaism and she and her husband raise their children in the Jewish Faith. His surgeon general is a former anesthiologist, Doctor Adams, an African-American, of the finest character and intellect, like folks Martin Luther KIng, Jr., extolled, those who are judged by the content of their character and their striving and their good works, hard work, and Trump’s Secretary of Housing is another African-American, an esteemed neurosurgeon, and so many of Trump’s closest confidantes are women and Latinos, and on president has done more for minorities, blacks, Hispanics, Native-Americans, and women, raising all their standards of living, and decreasing their unemployment.

    And, unlike, the great, perhaps the greatest President, the most eloquent and self-taught Abrhaham LIncoln, President Trump who is gifted with good, excellent decision making skills, lacks eloquence and tact, sometimes, and is perhaps too blunt and caustic at times, but I admire his combativeness . . .President Trump has kept us out of foreign wars . . . he is willing to work with all nations, even Russia and China, to achieve peace and prosperity.

    2. But here is a tact employed by the Leftists and by the Orwellians and by Goebbels and by just plain old democratic politicians. They get on their high horse and they call those who oppose them “deplorables” or they call them “no nothings” or “KKK-types” and they engage in ad-hominem attacks because, as I see it, they have lost the intellectual arguments; Americans do not want more taxes, bigger government, more wars, unequal treatment, a larger welfare system that keeps people down, leftist judges who see penumbras and emanations arising from plain textual languagee, abortion on demand.

    3. You are right, there is a new civil war in America, fought as I wrote in Mac the Dog, “on the relatively bloodless plains of fearless expressionism.” It is war of values, a war of conservative versus liberal, of traditionalists against those who want to tear down traditions, of preservations against those who want to rewrite history, of constitutionalists against those who want end our federalist system and instead substitute popular vote nationally, of those who want to give plenary power to activist jurists, radical left legislatures, and gut our tri-partite federal system of government, based on the rule of law.

    4. Today’s CIVIL WAR is between Conservatives and ill-Liberals; on the right are conservatives and independents and moderates and most republicans; opposing them on the left are radical liberals, many democrats, and today’s MainStreamMedia which has become on Orwellian tool of the left.

    5. It is a CIVIL WAR for the heart and soul of America: Elitist Pseudo-intellectual Leftists vs. Common Man Deplorarables; Globalists vs. American Firsters who cooperate with not kow-tow to foreign powers; Abortionists vs. Pro-Life Folk; Selfish Radical Feminists vs. ordinary hard working self-sacrificing Apple of the Eye and American-Pie All-American homespun women; Open Borders vs A Big Welcoming Hug to Legal Immigrants; Big Government (more taxes) vs Less Government (lower taxes) etcetera, etcetara, and most of all ATHEISTIC ANTAGONISTS (and their allies, as described in Mac the Dog) versus Faithful Prayerful Religiously Respectful and Observant Traditional All-American Men and Women.

    6. Finally, it is as described in Mac the Dog and my new novel, A WAR OF THE WORLDS’ WORDS: it is the liberals who hate America and its traditions and its history and the Conservatives, Moderates and Independents who daily say: “God Bless America”

    7. And I agree with these Patriotic words (even if a bad person wrote them): “These Patriots were opposed “To being taxed for the support of Foreign paupers millions of dollars yearly.’ “We are tampered with in our religion. We are injured in our labor. We are assailed in our freedom of speech.” God bless America, and God bless President Donald Trump and Vice President Michael Pence and all who serve and have served loyally in their administration for Keeping America Great.

    8. As for the huddled masses, they still are enthusiastically welcomed so long as they come here legally and abide by our laws and traditions, as most of our forefathers and fore-mothers have over the centuries. We have means to lawfully change laws we Americans don’t like, by vote, petition, legislation, it is not up to Mayors and Governors to defy laws, nor up to activist judges to rewrite them.

    P.S. I type as I think, freely. thank you for your kind consideration of these thoughts.

  5. Confidence, Matt. You’ve got to have confidence. We are reminded of its most famous and widely viewed member. Sgt. Schultz.