DEC. 9, 2002: MOMENTS OF TRUTH

Speak Up, Trent: Trent Lott did himself and the Republican party serious damage with an ill-judged remark at Strom Thurmond’s 100th birthday party on Thursday – and the damage is only growing.

Lott said:

“I want to say this about my state: When Strom Thurmond ran for president, we voted for him. We're proud of it. And if the rest of the country had followed our lead, we wouldn't have had all these problems over all these years, either.”

According to Tom Edsall of the Washington Post, “The gathering, which included many Thurmond family members and past and present staffers, applauded Lott when he said ‘we’re proud’ of the 1948 vote. But when he said ‘we wouldn't have had all these problems over all these years’ if Thurmond had won, there was an audible gasp and general silence.”

Edsall explained the reason for the gasp thus: “Thurmond, then governor of South Carolina, was the presidential nominee of the breakaway Dixiecrat Party in 1948. He carried Mississippi, Alabama, Louisiana and his home state. He declared during his campaign against Democrat Harry S. Truman, who supported civil rights legislation, and Republican Thomas Dewey [who it should be said supported civil rights rather more firmly than Harry Truman did]: ‘All the laws of Washington and all the bayonets of the Army cannot force the Negro into our homes, our schools, our churches.’

“On July 17, 1948, delegates from 13 southern states gathered in Birmingham to nominate Thurmond and adopt a platform that said in part, ‘We stand for the segregation of the races and the racial integrity of each race.’”

Lott’s birthday remark drew scant attention at first. It was broadcast live on C-Span, but the only media source to take note of it on Friday morning was ABC.com’s “The Note.” On another day, the Note’s report might have triggered a media stampede, but the announcement of the firing of Paul O’Neill and Larry Lindsey at 10:05 am on Friday obliterated all other Washington news.

Edsall’s story appeared on Saturday morning, as did a more matter-of-fact one in South Carolina’s The State. A spokesman issued a perfunctory “clarification”: “Senator Lott’s remarks were intended to pay tribute to a remarkable man who led a remarkable life. To read anything more into these comments is wrong.” And that would seem to be that. Saturday’s news was dominated by Iraq’s “nobody here but us chickens” reply to Security Council Resolution 1441. On Saturday night Mary Landrieu pulled off her down-to-the-wire victory in the Louisiana Senate race.

The Lott story seems to have been left behind in the dust. And yet I cannot help thinking that this story is not over – that Republicans will hear Lott’s words quoted at them again and again in the months to come.

I for one do not believe Trent Lott is a racist or a segregationist. My guess is that his speechwriter gave him note cards with a few jokes, and that when Lott finished reading them, he launched himself into what he probably intended to be nothing more than a big squirt of greasy flattery.

But that’s not what came out of Lott’s mouth. What came out of his mouth was the most emphatic repudiation of desegregation to be heard from a national political figure since George Wallace’s first presidential campaign. Lott’s words suggest that one of the three most powerful and visible Republicans in the nation privately thinks that desegregation, civil rights, and equal voting rights were all a big mistake.

These would be disgraceful thoughts to think, if Lott thought them. If Lott thought them, any Republican who accepted his leadership would share in the disgrace. So Lott needs to make it clear that he does not in fact think them. He owes his party, his state, his country, and his conscience something more – something much more – than a curt “I am sorry if you were offended.” If he can’t do that, Republicans need to make it clear that Lott no longer speaks for us.

-- Anonymous, December 09, 2002

Answers

must have been the strong spirits. either that or gas...

-- Anonymous, December 09, 2002