“United we stand, divided we fall” is a saying which dates back to Aesop’s fables and which is often reiterated in times when national security seems most fragile. Patrick Henry used it in one of his last public speeches, given in March 1799:
“Let us trust God, and our better judgment to set us right hereafter. United we stand, divided we fall. Let us not split into factions which must destroy that union upon which our existence hangs.”
Abraham Lincoln, in a speech he gave on June 16, 1858, after accepting the Republican Party’s nomination to be U.S. senator representing Illinois, famously said:
“A house divided against itself cannot stand. I believe this government cannot endure, permanently half slave and half free. I do not expect the Union to be dissolved—I do not expect the house to fall—but I do expect it will cease to be divided.”
Unity among people groups–families, nations, world alliances–is a state greatly to be desired, but when the price of unity is accepting or ignoring injustice or when uniting around flawed principles endangers the integrity of the group, more courage is required to stand against evil–even if it means standing alone–than to simply align oneself with wrong ideas just for the sake of eliminating division.
The current state of our union is that we are clearly a house divided against itself, perhaps more so than at any other time in our history, except the period leading to the Civil War. Differences which may in other times have been resolved by compromise or reason are now deeply ingrained and neither side is willing to yield ground or listen to reason. Where there used to be areas of life and governance that were apolitical, now everything from mask wearing to being vaccinated against a deadly virus to the FBI and Department of Justice is politicized and weaponized by warring sides to support and further their political agendas.
Current calls for unity and bipartisanship are naïve and futile. Our two major political parties, and the people who belong to them, have no common ground on which to meet–even if the sides could produce reasonable arguments and show a desire to reach consensus.
President Biden, in his inaugural address, said:
“Many centuries ago, Saint Augustine, a saint of my church, wrote that a people was a multitude defined by the common objects of their love.”
He went on to ask, “What are the common objects we love that define us as Americans?”
Answering his own question, he listed “Opportunity, security, liberty, dignity, respect, honor, and truth.” With much respect to the President, I would dispute that last item on the list: “truth.” Far from being a shared value, the willingness of many to believe the most outrageous lies and ally themselves with the liars has done more to imperil our unity and our democracy than almost anything else in our history. As for “liberty, dignity, respect, honor,” we do share those values but unfortunately don’t share the desire to see them equally applied to all citizens.
Joe Manchin, Democratic Senator from West Virginia, has dominated the daily news cycle of late for his refusal to support his own party’s legislative agenda because the Republican Party doesn’t support it and he says he feels compelled to hold out for bipartisan agreement. Dismissing for the moment his fatally flawed logic, anyone waiting for agreement in Washington D.C. had better be prepared for a long intermission.
The divides in national thought have widened from gaps to vast chasms. One may as well try to build a physical bridge across the Pacific Ocean as to build a bridge of consensus between our two political parties. Democrats have, I think, the right thinking on many issues; but their calls for unity fall flat because they can’t stop saying dumb things: “defunding the police” (which never meant doing away with police departments), “wokeness,” “cancel culture,” and “identity politics” only provide fodder for their conservative opponents and do nothing to bring the sides closer together. Then Democrats whine because people misunderstand what they’re saying, and my advice to them is “Then say what you mean! Be in charge of your own message.” Oh, and I’d add “DUH.”
Conservatives today are proudly anti-intellectual; Democrats’ ignoring that fact and continuing to make arguments bound to be scoffed at is, well, dumb. I know I already used that word once, but it needs repeating. Having noble ideas and goals is worthless when half one’s fellow legislators and constituents don’t respect those ideas and consider the goals more nefarious than noble. Unity requires finding common ground, not standing one’s own ground and blaming the other side for not “getting it.”
The Republican position in the current divide is far more complex. Today’s GOP is rife with conspiracy theories, white supremacy, attempts at voter suppression, refusal to protect citizens by passing reasonable gun legislation, gerrymandering, casting doubt on the legitimacy of elections whose outcomes don’t suit them, tying their beliefs and positions to religion in a way which precludes rebuttal, and supporting a twice-impeached mob boss who incited the most deadly domestic attack on our nation’s capitol in its history.
What would unity or bipartisanship look like with that group? It might look a great deal like “peace at any cost” or selling out one’s own principles for the sake of trying to build a bridge. Battles are seldom won by simply putting aside differences, joining hands, and singing a round of “kum ba yah.” Often, history’s heroes are those who have the courage to stand apart until the conditions for unity have been met.
Among other reasons for the width and depth of the current divides is that political passion has been infused with religious fervor. Republicans are more overt in their conflating political platforms with religious convictions, but Democrats’ unwillingness to accept any deviation from their stance also smacks of devotion to religious beliefs. While Republicans carry crosses and gather for prayer when executing a murderous terrorist attack on our capitol, Democrats are prone to “cancel” those who question accepted positions or who wish to consider any deviations.
In a guest essay from today’s New York Times, Dr. Molly Worthen cites the fact that American church attendance and the tendency of Americans to find “answers about the meaning of life” in church has steadily declined. Yet she says those “old spiritual cravings” still exist and that people still “hunger for a sense of control over their destinies and reassurance that they’re on the side of good against evil.” She quotes Catholic philosopher Charles Taylor in his “Sources of the Self”: “The aspiration to fullness can be met . . . by connecting one’s life up with some greater reality or story.”
Each side, though not at all equal in the effects of their politico-religious zeal, find a sense of righteousness and fulfillment in adopting the beliefs and lifestyle of the party or movement they have chosen to join. That fact alone prohibits many from being willing to respect opposing views and acknowledge that there may be some truth outside their own narrow perspective. Religious or pseudo-religious beliefs are the hardest to refute and the hardest to compromise for a number of reasons. Obviously, letting go of any point of view with a God element feels like a falling from faith; and since such beliefs are accepted without hard evidence in the first place, all the hard evidence in the world is not going to change them.
In 2021, as in 1861, we’re too far apart to simply shake hands and “let bygones be bygones.” We are at war; but the battlefields are Congress, the Internet, election campaigns, media outlets, neighborhoods, and families.
The time for unity is not yet; right now is a time for courage, for standing strong against injustice. At this juncture in our history as a people, we may need to say “Divided we can find a place to stand, united we fall.” To be clear, unity should be our long-term goal, but we have a lot of work to do to find a place to stand where everyone is equal and receives equal justice under the law.
Look again at President Lincoln’s words:
“A house divided against itself cannot stand. I believe this government cannot endure, permanently half slave and half free. I do not expect the Union to be dissolved—I do not expect the house to fall—but I do expect it will cease to be divided.”
Lincoln seems to recognize that the division which was threatening our nation was not going to end instantly and that there would not be a quick and painless solution. Facing controversies, finding root causes, having hard conversations, crafting legislation, convincing others to unite around right ideas and to create common ground take time. For the people of the 1860s, beginning to bring justice to the enslaved people among us happened only after a deadly war. May that not be the case in the 2020s.
Few people have been more often quoted than Martin Luther King Jr., and few people have worked more diligently and tirelessly for unity than he did during his relatively short lifetime. Yet Dr. King never advocated unity or peace at any cost. He knew there was work to be done to discover the common ground on which we could all stand together as equals. “Let nobody give you the impression that the problem of racial injustice will work itself out. Let nobody give you the impression that only time will solve the problem.” What will solve the problem, he said, is “the tireless efforts and the persistent work of dedicated individuals.”
Dr. Worthen, in her New York Times essay, says healing begins with caring about others and listening to their stories. She quotes Alexis Lewis in reference to a program Ms. Lewis had directed:
“It wasn’t about trying to change someone’s views but realizing that the truth you have might not be the whole truth.”
I agree, the starting point has to be ceasing to demonize those who hold different points of view, committing ourselves to recognize the humanity of every other person with whom we share this planet, asking them questions about why they believe what they believe, and then listening with respect to their answers. It does not mean always agreeing with them, and disagreeing does not mean hating or “canceling” the other person. But why would we want to be unified with people with whom we can’t have a respectful conversation?
We desperately need unity, but we can’t get there from here. The only way to the goal is through doing a lot of soul work. It won’t be easy, but our existence as a free people and our nation’s existence as a democracy depend on it.