E Pluribus Unum: A Different Kind of Patriotism

Who is an American? What do Americans believe? Your worldview, and presidential choice, likely depends in part on your answer to those two questions.

Who is an American? What do Americans believe? Your worldview, and presidential choice, likely depends in part on your answer to those two questions. The Trump camp, according to David Brooks, sees America in a very unusual way. He calls it “blood and soil” patriotism, which is more European than American. It’s a connection based on ethnic group and geography.

That’s not the patriotism we’ve had in the US before — I’ve written in the past about how the thing that holds us together is an idea — an idea of liberty, dignity, and participation in government. Much of the world still does not live under that type of system and it’s our job to ensure that we keep the dream of that freedom alive by being true to the ideal — not necessarily the historical reality of the past 240 years.

What’s hardest for me about Trump is seeing those American flags and the “Make America Great Again” slogan, because I love America. But when Trump talks about America, I feel like we’re talking about different places.

Trump sees a judge with a foreign last name and questions his impartiality. I love the idea that a Mexican-American is a judge — it sounds like the American Dream to me. Trump has stated repeatedly that immigrants are a problem, either pouring in from the Americas to sinisterly take our jobs, or that all Muslims who come to the U.S. are secretly aligned with terrorists. I see people who were attracted to our ideal of liberty, freedom and safety from oppression. People like my own family, and probably yours, who came to the US with nothing more than that themselves. It feels like Trump’s goal is to shout down people like me because his patriotism is a brand, not a belief.

Trump’s patriotism is like the nativists of the 1800s who thought Catholics were secretly aligned with Rome and wanted to end the American Republic. Seen in perspective, we realize how ridiculous that was. I imagine our great-grandkids will feel that way about the immigrant-baiting that Trump is doing now.

But, there is a real patriotism problem that needs addressing, Trump is just wrong, or cynical, in his answer. David Brooks identifies the issue in this week’s column We Take Care of Our Own. Unfortunately, like many of Brooks’ columns, he takes a while to build up, offers something that sounds like a good solution, and then stops. Because I agree with his alternative, I’m going to expand on it here.

Brooks thinks there are three main points of view about patriotism or nationalism: ‘blood and soil’ nationalism, like that in Europe — where people have a long-term ethnic bond or relation to a particular geography. That was never the reality in America, but Trump is tapping into that sentiment today. Second, multicultural globalism. This is what we learned, fellow millennials, in our schooling: all cultures are valuable, we shouldn’t put one above the other, take the best from all.

The third alternative, which has a long history in the United States, is the idea of a ‘universalist nation.’ Brooks sees it this way: “You can be fiercely patriotic and relatively open because America was founded to take in people from around the globe and unite them around something new.” I read that and said ‘that’s me!’

So, what is a universalist patriot? Brooks doesn’t say, but, since I think I’m one, I’ll try my hand at some general principles for universalist patriotism:

• Commitment to the ideal of America as found in the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution;
• Support for traditional American values such as liberty, egalitarianism, self-reliance, and upward mobility; and probably most important:
• Embrace of people from any place and any class who share these ideals.

Of course, sharing ideals doesn’t mean having to share generic consumer culture, which has come to replace traditional definitions of what it means to be American. Just because Ford and Chevy, and Trump with his hats, claim the mantle of ‘America’ doesn’t mean that America is reduced to those symbols. They were cashing in on the cherished idea of ourselves as a nation, but over time, they withdrew too much, and all that is left in our dialogue is the symbol, not the substance.

So where does that substance come from? Brooks points us to Whitman, but there are many more lights to guide our way. In the coming weeks, I’ll return to this topic (with some other posts inbetween, probably, because let’s face it, we all change our minds from time to time) but for now, here are a few of my favorites:

Declaration of Independence — what better place to start than with the ideal itself? I wrote about the need to recover the spirit of the Declaration when I reviewed Go Set a Watchman, a truly American novel.

“We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness”

Whitman’s America:

Centre of equal daughters, equal sons,

All, all alike endear’d, grown, ungrown, young or old,

Strong, ample, fair, enduring, capable, rich,

Perennial with the Earth, with Freedom, Law and Love,

A grand, sane, towering, seated Mother,

Chair’d in the adamant of Time.

Whitman’s For You O Democracy (Leaves of Grass)

Come, I will make the continent indissoluble,

I will make the most splendid race the sun ever shone upon,

I will make divine magnetic lands,

With the love of comrades,

With the life-long love of comrades.

I will plant companionship thick as trees along all the rivers of America, and along the shores of the great lakes, and all over the prairies,

I will make inseparable cities with their arms about each other’s necks,

By the love of comrades,

By the manly love of comrades.

For you these from me, O Democracy, to serve you ma femme!

For you, for you I am trilling these songs.

Lincoln, on what sets America apart (from the Gilder Lehrman Collection):

Most governments have been based, practically, on the denial of the equal rights of men, as I have, in part, stated them; ours began, by affirming those rights. They said, some men are too ignorant, and vicious, to share in government. Possibly so, said we; and, by your system, you would always keep them ignorant and vicious. We proposed to give all a chance; and we expected the weak to grow stronger, the ignorant, wiser; and all better, and happier together.

I’ll leave you with those thoughts for this week. Please send me your ideas about what keeps America together, or if we’re headed towards disunity. You can comment below, or email me at chris@firesideblog.org.

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Originally published at firesideblog.org on July 17, 2016.