The spirit of our American radicalism is destructive and aimless: it is not loving, it has no ulterior and divine ends; but is destructive only out of hatred and selfishness. On the other side, the conservative party, composed of the most moderate, able, and cultivated part of the population, is timid, and merely defensive of property. It vindicates no right, it aspires to no real good, it brands no crime, it proposes no generous policy, it does not build, nor write, nor cherish the arts, nor foster religion, nor establish schools, nor encourage science, nor emancipate the slave, nor befriend the poor, or the Indian, or the immigrant. From neither party, when in power, has the world any benefit to expect in science, art, or humanity, at all commensurate with the resources of the nation.
Ralph Waldo Emerson, “Politics”
While I do not think American radicalism quite as destructive as in Emerson’s day (if anything, it has often been toothless over the last century, moving away from radical viewpoints to the neoliberal consensus, though I do recognize the sense almost of a snake hissing and spitting but doing no good)…
…and while I deny that the greater portion of the most able and cultivated are members of today’s conservative party (indeed, I would claim that the most able and cultivated tend toward independent viewpoints though perhaps they identify as conservative or liberal)…
– despite the undeniable differences, can anyone miss the likeness of Emerson’s description of the conservatives of his day to the conservatives of our own? Not so much a likeness to the everyday self-identifying conservative individual, but certainly to the conservative politician/pundit/activist?
Likewise, the last sentence nicely qualifies exactly the impotence of our politics because of this conservative, dampening stance. So much more to be expected than what we have realized equates to a very large sense of distaste on all sides.
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