Republican Compassion

It’s Martin Luther King, Jr. Day in America and we celebrate the man that took the lead on Civil Rights during the 1960s. Schools, banks, and government institutions are closed. Many reflect on the “I have a dream” speech. For me, it’s not so much about Martin Luther King, Jr. as it is about the values he preached. Most importantly, we are all God’s children.

Being a centrist, I thought it pertinent to really figure out why the majority of Blacks vote Democrat. It hasn’t always been this way. Abraham Lincoln founded the Republican Party and initially the Black population voted along with him. It wasn’t until the 20^th century that this began to change. In fact, it wasn’t until 1924 that Blacks could be in the Democratic Party.

So why the change? A big reason was Roosevelt. His New Deal gave Blacks aid they had never seen before. He desegregated the military. He also created the Fair Employment Practices Commission to ensure that the government agencies and contractors hired without regard to race or religion. When Lyndon B. Johnson pushed through the Civil Rights Acts of 1964, he secured the Black-Democrat vote through the present day.

So, you might be thinking…this is easy—just throw money at people and they’ll vote for you. G.W. Bush signed the $168 billion stimulus package which cut taxes and mailed checks to Americans and businesses. By the 2008 election, however, Republicans lost the Presidency and House. I believe that FDR’s intention was not to throw money at people in hopes of votes, but to give people a fighting chance working in a down-turned economy.

If you read or watch an FDR biography, it becomes apparent that he had a deep compassion for people. Conspiracy theorists will cringe, but I  think they’re pretty easily proven wrong—that FDR gave the order to nuke Japan because it would save American lives (not because the Russians would take over Japan). And eventually he caved to city and night-time air raids because it would end the war sooner. Nearly every decision was made with preserving American lives in mind.

And I believe that rhetoric continued to his successors. Lyndon Johnson got 94% of the Black vote in 1964 when he pushed through the Civil Rights Act and the 1965 Voting Act. Racists are cringing I’m sure, but my point isn’t whether or not these Acts were right or wrong. It’s that they gave freedoms to a people who had never had such an opportunity.

Since then, the Democratic Party has continued to promote freedoms of all kinds, possibly going too far in some circumstances. And it’s this “going too far” that has fueled the Republican Party, which acts as a balancer, rallying for more restrictions. And so the American fabric of freedom gets stretched to the extremes. But while the Democratic Party may nearly support an anarchist state of no restrictions and a communist-like regime of equally-distributed wealth, I believe there is something they have that the Republicans seem to be missing—compassion.

Ironically, the Republican Party prides itself on Christian and family values. But then they fight to downsize Welfare, Medicaid, Social Security, taxes for the wealthy, and the list goes on. It doesn’t seem like you can have it both ways “pick yourself up by your own bootstraps” and “love your neighbor as yourself.” Jesus frequently helped the poor and criticized the ruling upper class. He told the rich young ruler to sell everything he has and yet Republicans seem to argue against such notions.

My point is not that Republicans aren’t generous. My point is more about their message. They really don’t come across as good Samaritans, but more like the priest and Levite avoiding the man dying on the side of the road. Just insert the line “[When the priest] saw the man, he thought ‘a charity will handle it,’ and passed on the other side.”

A good message to have? Have compassion. Be moved by the poor and struggling and have pity on them.

Like Martin Luther King, Jr. said, quoting Isaiah: “I have a dream that one day every valley shall be exalted, and every hill and mountain shall be made low, the rough places will be made plain, and the crooked places will be made straight; ‘and the glory of the Lord shall be revealed and all flesh shall see it together.’”