With Malice Towards All, And Charity for None:
A Reflection on Our Poisoned Political Discourse
(In 1856, two days after Senator Charles Sumner, an abolitionist from Massachusetts, gave a speech decrying slavery, Congressman Preston Brooks beat him to within an inch of his life. Many consider it to be the symbolic moment in which all forms of American discourse broke down, making the coming Civil War inevitable.)
Thomas Matthew Crooks was eight years old when 20 elementary school students were murdered in their classrooms at Sandy Hook Elementary.
Eight years old.
But the theft of so many innocent lives did not lead us to soul searching – it led us to finger-pointing and hand-wringing.
We took one of the greatest tragedies in American history, and we turned it into political theater.
We did – we all did.
For as much as we may like to believe that we were not the ones spreading hate and spewing anger, we were.
I was. As much as I may not like to admit it, I was.
We may not have started this polarization, we may not have been the most guilty, we may not have even done it that often, but all of us are guilty of rhetorical extremism.
From the most conservative Republican to the most progressive Democrat, we have all been drinking from the same poisoned chalice of political brinksmanship for more than a decade.
We have indulged our darker angels, allowing ourselves to enjoy the excitement of extremism with no care for what consequences might follow.
We have indulged in vain speech and hyperbole, calling our fellow countrymen things we ought to be ashamed of.
For, as much as we all may have been shocked by the tragic events of last Saturday, none of us may say that we were surprised.
None of us may say that the possibility of a political assassination had not crossed our minds
In the 12 years since Newtown, we have seen more political violence than in any era since the 1850s, and we have become so accustomed to it that we now expect violence as the norm, not the exception.
A Timeline of Violence
Sandy Hook – 2012
Dylan Roof – 2015
Pulse NightClub – 2016
Unite the Right – 2017
Las Vegas – 2017
Tree of Life – 2018
George Floyd Protests – 2020
January 6th – 2021
University Encampments – 2023
Trump Assassination attempt – 2024
Future historians will look at this timeline and ask how this descent into madness was not more obvious to us.
But the answer is simple – we just became mad ourselves.
In the cacophony of anger that followed these events, we became more interested in striking our own chords than in building harmony with the people around us.
We blew our own horns so loudly that we grew deaf to the people around us, and we forgot that no man can play a symphony without a full orchestra.
The beauty of music is in contrast; the beauty of democracy is in dissent.
But there is nothing beautiful about disrespect.
There is nothing beautiful about name-calling and fear-mongering – these are the misbehaviors of children, more befitting to the temper-tantrums of a toddler than the political rhetoric of adults – and they have no place in our national discourse.
Mutual respect is the foundation upon which all societies are built. Without mutual respect, we cannot enjoy the beauty of dispute.
And we have grown very disrespectful of late.
If we wish to live in a country without so much violence, we must ask ourselves if we are willing to learn to respect our political opponents.
Because, until we can learn to treat our enemies with the same respect we believe they ought to show to us, we cannot hope to escape from this downward spiral of escalating violence.
For so long, we have let our darker angels prevail.
It is much easier to break something than it is to build it back up again.
It is much easier to criticize someone else’s behavior than it is to change your own.
It is much easier to hate than it is to love.
But we can no longer live with malice towards all and charity for none.
We must find a way to bind up the nation's wounds, to come together in our love of peace and our hatred of disorder.
We must once again build a world in which a man is more than his political beliefs, and a community is more than a zip code.
In Abraham Lincoln’s “Second Inaugural Address,” he offered the nation a vision of peace built upon mutual respect and a desire to move forward.
The last lines of that speech are some of the most beautiful ever written:
“With malice toward none; with charity for all; with firmness in the right, as G-d gives us to see the right, let us strive on to finish the work we are in; to bind up the nation's wounds; to care for him who shall have borne the battle, and for his widow, and his orphan — To do all which may achieve and cherish a just, and a lasting peace, among ourselves, and with all nations.”
(Abraham Lincoln, March 4, 1865)
Now, as we stand on the brink of a very violent time, we must ask ourselves – are we willing to do all which may achieve a just and lasting peace?
Are we willing to forego our party tribalism in order to better understand the people we have so long disdained? Or would we rather continue to mock and deride our opponents from the comfort of our own homes?
Are we willing to listen to the people we have so long tried to silence? Or would we rather remain comfortable in our algorithmical echo chamber.
Are we willing to admit that we have been just as guilty of brinksmanship as the politicians and the media? Or would we rather keep pointing fingers?
Now is the time for soul searching. Now is the time for self-reflection. Now is the time for truth and reconciliation.
Even in this election year, we must find a way to be anti-politics, to seek out and celebrate the ties that bind us – to come together, as one nation, united in our love of peace and freedom.
To bury this decade of decadence and disaster, to shake the hands of those at whom we have spit, and to build for ourselves a new nation, a better nation, a beautiful nation, rooted in mutual respect and appreciation.
This is the task at hand.
The future belongs to those who build it – so let us build ourselves a future we can all be proud of.
Spread love, Spread light,
Ted Goldstein
If you had lived in Berlin on November 11, 1938, the day after Kristalnacht, would you have published this piece? How about January 31st, 1933 the day after Hitler became Chancellor?