As the Republican primary elections for legislative offices approach on Tuesday, June 6th a mailer is delivered daily with the candidates out flabbergasting their opponents with one more scandalous accusation after another. These indictments appeal to the baseness of human disposition and titillate the curiosities of those not interested in the requirements or qualities that make a good legislative representative. The strategy utilized by the campaign is that the more shocking the charge is made against an opponent the better political traction can be made in defeating your opponent.
The history of smear in American politics can be seen looking back to 1796 when Presidential Candidates John Adams and Thomas Jefferson engaged in a bitter campaign filled with insults and rancor. Presidential Candidate Andrew Jackson and his wife in 1824 were branded as adulterers. Abraham Lincoln was called a “Black Republican” by his opponent Stephen A. Douglas for U.S. Senate from Illinois in 1858. Lincoln would be depicted and accused of being an ape, a ghoul, and a traitor in 1864 running for re-election as president. Smearing political opponents has existed in practically every political campaign from local, to state, and national elections ever since.
The question then becomes is smearing right? To campaign strategist they work and that is the bottom line in getting their candidates elected. The Machiavellian principle of “the ends justify the means” mentality has existed on both ends of the party spectrum and continues to escalate in salacious accusation one after another each campaign. If the voters repudiated these tactics and demanded substance and respectful debate on policy or for example, why a bad legislative proposal would need extinguishing rather than forming new regulations, this would require candidates to become “constitutionally conscience.” The electorate must become familiar with the purpose of government as defined in the Declaration of Independence and then the Constitution that authorizes the just application of government.
We see the same clichés used each campaign cycle. “I’ll fight for you,” or “you deserve better,” or “I’ll drain the swamp,” or “we can do better,” yet, these clichés provide no substantive explanation for the purpose of representative government or identify with the constitutional responsibilities of holding an elected office. When was the last time you saw or heard the word, “constitution” utilized in literature or during what is becoming extinct: a debate? It’s the constitution, federal and state that the citizens of the United States that include New Jersey have “ordained and established,” as their authority to govern rather than the personality they elect. Regrettably, personality dominates the temperaments of many Republicans who are overwhelmed with passion and devotion to a demagogue who best speaks to their grievance, anger, fear, and suspicion.
Republicans have great examples to follow in waging campaigns as our Founders would have hoped and anticipated would be assured by an informed and enlightened electorate. Calvin Coolidge would climb the political latter each rung of the way from Massachusetts State Representative, Mayor of Northampton, Massachusetts State Senator, Massachusetts President of the Senate, Massachusetts Lieutenant Governor, Massachusetts Governor, Vice-President of the United States and President of the United States and never spoke unkindly of his opponent or resorted to “smear,” in any way whatsoever. Coolidge spoke to principles and policies derived from constitutional precepts. Gerald R. Ford and Ronald Reagan are examples of Republicans who never engaged in ad hominin (against the person) attacks against their political opponents but exemplified the dignified “statesman” exemplified by the Party’s greatest Republican, Abraham Lincoln, who also stayed away from personalities and stuck to principles.
When you receive your next “smear” mailer, or TV Ad “smear” remember, that it’s because they are deemed by candidates and their campaign staff in helping them get elected that you’re getting them in the first place. These campaign strategies will remain until voters reject personality for principle, smear for acclaim, immaterial for substance, illiteracy for intelligence, illegitimacy for constitutionalism, and vice for virtue, we will continue to receive them in our mail and watch them on TV. One cliché that is appropriate to conclude this web log would be “we can do better” indeed, as voters we can do better and require candidates to address principles, policies, and character rather than ambiguity, indecency, and iniquity.
“And to the Republic for Which it Stands, One Nation, Under God.”
J.R. Carman