By JAMES K. FITZPATRICK
Even though I spent my graduate school years nodding in agreement with the writers for conservative publications such as National Review, Triumph, and Intercollegiate Review, I went through a year or so when I was intrigued by the writers associated with the Progressive Era of the early 20th century: people such as Eugene Debs, Herbert Croly, Edward Bellamy, and especially Walter Rauschenbusch. It is not that I thought about becoming a liberal. No chance. But I found the Progressives’ thesis persuasive.
The Progressive theorists’ premise was that the rise of corporate power required a broad-based campaign for a large and active central government to serve as an advocate for the ordinary American in the formation of public policy. What Rauschenbusch added was the idea that a strong Christian presence was needed to give this movement a sound moral base. He became one of the leaders in the school of thought that became known as the Social Gospel.
In his book Christianity and the Social Crisis, Rauschenbusch argued that capitalism had the power to generate great wealth, but at the price of “exalting selfishness to the dignity of a moral principle. It pits one against one another in a gladiatorial game in which there is no mercy….It makes men who are the gentlest and kindliest friends and neighbors, relentless taskmasters in their shops and stores.” It leads merchants and producers to “beseech and persuade us to buy what we do not want. Their show windows and bargain counters are institutions for the promotion of covetousness.”
What results, he maintained, is a “heartbreaking condition forced upon Christian businessmen by the antagonism of Christianity and competitive commerce. They have to do what Christ declares impossible: to serve God and mammon,” finding themselves “halting and groping, perplexed by contradicting voices.” When “two moral principles are thus forced into practical antagonism in daily life, the question is which will be the stronger. If the Church cannot Christianize commerce, commerce will commercialize the Church.”
Nothing objectionable there, I thought back then, and still do now. Rauschenbusch is not calling for a radical socialist answer to our economic dislocations, but rather a moral awakening among business owners that will lead them to voluntarily share their prosperity with their employees and consumers in the form of just wages, safe working conditions, fair prices, and well-made products. It is reminiscent of what one would hear in Catholic lay associations that call for bringing our faith into our everyday lives.
What held me back from becoming an open advocate of Rauschenbusch’s theories? I looked around. The leftists in the 1960s and 1970s, including those who identified themselves as the “Catholic left,” who attacked capitalism with rhetoric resembling Rauschenbusch’s, always struck me as insincere, concerned far more about left-wing causes that Jesus’ words about caring for the poor.
I found it hard to see myself as an ally of people who supported Tom Hayden, Jane Fonda, and Abbie Hoffman. I couldn’t picture St. Francis in those circles. Things haven’t changed. There are still Catholics who seek to distort Christian teachings in order to further a political agenda.
A recent example was an essay on the website the Huffington Post by onetime presidential candidate and former governor of Maryland Martin O’Malley. In it, he points out why he believes that “Donald Trump will have a big problem with Catholics,” adding, “he’s earned it.”
O’Malley begins with how Trump has “made Latinos the villains of his campaign.” This has led “even Catholics who are not Latino to recoil from him, since they are descendants of immigrants from Ireland, Italy, Poland, Germany, and other European countries” and remember “the stereotypes and discrimination” they endured.
“When he says build a wall to keep out Latin Americans and ban Muslims, he sounds just like the bosses who said ‘No Irish need apply’ and the nativist politicians in the 1920s who passed laws to stop Italian immigration.”
There’s more. O’Malley writes, “For reasons that may not become clear unless he releases his tax returns, Mr. Trump is remarkably fond of Russian President Vladimir Putin. And remarkably weak when it comes to honoring our country’s commitment to NATO….That concerns many Americans of all faiths. But it’s particularly important to Americans with family ties to Poland, Hungary, Croatia, Ukraine, and other neighboring countries on the front lines of renewed Russian aggression. And, of course, these Americans are overwhelmingly Catholic.”
Last, but not least, O’Malley brings up Pope Francis, who he says, “brought to the Papacy the New Testament spirit we learned in American Catholic schools — tolerance, forgiveness, and love, particularly for refugees fleeing death or oppression.”
This is why, O’Malley continues, “Hillary Clinton, raised in the social gospel of Methodism, could earn the largest share of the Catholic vote than any Democrat since JFK. Is America a great country or what? You don’t have to be Catholic to understand Mr. Trump’s danger to the American dream — but it helps.”
Yecch. O’Malley’s hucksterism gives political shills a bad name, whom Wikipedia describes as individuals who act “to discredit opponents or critics of the person or organization in which they have a vested interest through character assassination or other means.”
One can easily picture the Clinton operatives who helped O’Malley write this speech chuckling to themselves as they pretended to give a hoot about Eastern European Catholics threatened by Russia. Bill and Hillary and their counterculture friends cut their intellectual teeth in the 1960s mocking the “the irrational fear of Communism” that led to the Cold War. Now they expect us to believe that they are losing sleep over Eastern European Catholics put at risk by a potential weakening of NATO. Please.
Do you think anyone helping O’Malley with his speech had any qualms of conscience when they came up with the line that Trump “is making villains” of Latinos? They know that Trump’s efforts are directed against illegal immigration, not all Latinos. They know that and don’t care in their determination to smear him.
Trump does not put up “No Latinos Need Apply” signs in his businesses. He is seeking to protect the jobs of Latinos who are in the United States legally — and the rights of those seeking to immigrate to the United States through proper channels.
Did O’Malley and the Clintonites really think that American Catholics cannot tell the difference between the legal immigration of their forebears and the illegal immigration going on today, and would be fooled by this con job? I guess they did.
Look: There is nothing contrary to Catholic doctrine about preferring an orderly system of immigration that protects the rights of both immigrants and workers already in the country, over the uncontrolled waves of illegal immigration of today. It is either ignorant or a cheap shot to maintain otherwise. I know which term fits the Clinton operatives who helped O’Malley write this article for the Huffington Post: the latter.
I am not sure which one fits O’Malley. During the debates against Hillary and Bernie Sanders it was easy to get the impression that he is not the sharpest knife in the drawer. But one need not be bright to be a Machiavellian. All it takes is ruthlessness. And an unattractive eagerness to ingratiate oneself with one’s superiors.
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