2021 / Kansas-Nebraska

What to learn from history…what not to learn….

What if you had a congress that required

*massive infrastructure investment (say like bridges/roads falling apart, uneven internet access, etc) *education financing and/or reform (student loans, for-profit colleges, a lack of vo-tech education) *issues with insane property prices (rent prices in big cities, red-lined districts) *dealing with racism (police brutality, housing/redlining, voting rights) *inequality (CEOs making 4,000% of a normal employee)

…and Congress happened o be the focal point for massive partisanship?

Does that sound familiar? It should–especially since I put real-world examples next to all four of those points…except I’m not really talking about 2021. I’m discussing 1850-1854 and legislation that passed…and failed to get through Congress and the aftermath.

The problems mentioned above were all recognized in 1850 (spoiler: they don’t get fixed in 1850…or 1854). Back then, there was a brilliant senator from Illinois, Stephen Douglas, and as the partisans in Congress refused to budge, Douglas was able to work some legislation through. He couldn’t do it all together (as Henry Clay attempted to do) so he worked to create a committee and broke the issues down into separate pieces of legislation. At that point, he worked with the ‘moderates’ (my word, not his) to pass all the legislation–by combining the pro- people on an issue with the moderates, then working with the next group of pro- people on the next chunk. In this way, Douglas got five key pieces of legislation through Congress, what becomes known as the Compromise of 1850.

Did it solve any of the issues above? Nope. Did it fix complaints about southern or New England states having too much power–and that we needed to completely rethink how Congress worked? (No–which should be a lesson to idiots demanding the system be completely changed now). Instead, the issues were all kicked down the road.

There’s one advantage in that for the good guys–by 1861, Northern states were more solidified in standing up to the South and industry/finance had another decade of growth. A war between North/South in 1850 may not have gone the same way as the war went in 1861-1865.

So did those bullet issues ever get addressed? Yup…just as soon as Southern senators/representatives left to start their rebellion. That takes place in 1862 during the 37th Congress. You get: *Trans-Continental Railroad Act of 1862 (taking care of the pressing infrastructure issue) *The Morrill Act of 1862 (making advanced education affordable for EVERYONE not just business/plantation elites) *The Homestead Act of 1862 (free land for people moving west if they remain a certain amount of time)

The racist issue of the day (slavery) was being dealt with through armed force…which doubled as dealing with inequality (there are references from non-plantation southerners calling the rebellion ‘a rich man’s war but a poor man’s fight).

The 37th Congress did the work that shaped American expansion/greatness for a century.

The problem is–we now have similar issues in front of us–and face similar problems fixing them (white, rich southerners blocking reform). It leads to a depressing question–one I wonder about given a recent American Political Scientists Assoc. poll–can the necessary reforms be done without violence (that poll says 10-15% of people on the political fringes…LEFT AND RIGHT…believe the use of violence to achieve electoral victory is acceptable)?

The remedies are there and doable…if the people in office wished to act: *End gerrymandering (oh, how the proposed districts in Illinois fit this…this is not just one party’s actions) *Change the tax system to a value-added tax system…which would ease issues for the poor (no tax on basic food items, etc) *Change residential districts in big cities to permit multi-unit dwellings, make neighborhoods mixed (by every definition possible) *Pass legislation to cripple the SCOTUS ‘Citizen’s United’ decision.

The reality is that change in America starts at ground level. It doesn’t originate in DC. That’s a lie that Americans are fed–it keeps people from taking action whether that’s running for office, charity work, protesting/being an activist, etc.

The other reality is that since Newt Gingrich (*cough* boomers *cough*) became the key Republican leader in 1994, politics has not been about governing–it has been about ‘winning’, about pushing a radical agenda…there’s no concern for the people in the middle. And with that, those radicals are now the parlor-pinks who have spawned other radicals willing to burn cities down, willing to storm the Capital to deny an election.

But that’s a different question. Are we reliving a version of 1850-1854 right now or are we reliving Weimar 1928-1932?