"CIVIL WAR?"

 “CIVIL WAR?”

As I give thanks for those who have served our country, I am remembering a question that still haunts me in relation to the origins of Memorial Day. It began in the midst of the Civil War, to honor those killed in that war.

 Almost a year ago, I was leading a seminar for German students at Helmut Schmidt University at the invitation of my colleague Andreas Holzbauer.  It was part of his course on “White Christianity,” and after I had given my thoughts on white Christianity in the American context, he opened it up for questions from the students.  One of the first questions was “Do you think that there will be a civil war in the United States in the near future?”  This question was raised at the time of the rise of Trumpism in our country, and several students compared it to the rise of Nazism in Germany in the 1930’s.

I answered at that time, that although I recognized deep divisions in our country,  I did not think that civil war would come anytime soon to the USA.  The events of this last year, especially the slaughter of children in Texas last week, have made me wonder if we are on our way to civil war.  My good friend, Ed Loring, believes that we are already in a civil war, that the moderates and those on the left simply have realized it yet.  Perhaps it is like the 1850’s, when huge events and movements prodded us into the Civil War.  Events like the “Fugitive” Slave Act that was passed in 1850, requiring all free people of any racial classification in any state to cooperate with authorities or slave-masters seeking to recapture those who had escaped slavery.   Looking back, it is easy to tell how dehumanized those people held in slavery were – the law is not called the “Escaped People” Act, but rather the “Fugitive Slave” Act.

Second, the violence seen in Buffalo and Texas last week was the repeat of that in Kansas after the passage of the Kansas-Nebraska Act in 1854, where Congress allowed the new territories to decide for themselves whether holding people as slaves would be permitted.  It turned into a mini civil war, and John Brown found his vision to end slavery through violence in Kansas.  Third, the SCOTUS decision of 1857 in the Dred and Harriet Scott case, in which the Court decided that those classified as “Black” were not human beings and thus were not entitled to the fundamental human rights of the Constitution.  Fourth there was John Brown’s raid on Harper’s Ferry, Virginia, in which he sought to get weapons to begin the violent overthrow of slavery in the USA.  Brown’s raid brought hope to many, but it also sent a chill down the spines of those who held people as slaves.  And, finally, there was the election of Abraham Lincoln as President, a victory which caused  the slavemasters to break from the country, as they sought to keep the ideology of “white supremacy” at the heart of the nation.

Are we in that kind of preliminary decade now?  Are we in a prelude to a civil war, a prelude that most of us have not yet recognized?  What are those events in our time that might be harbingers of such a terrible ordeal?  First, there was 9/11 in 2001, in which the mighty power of technology was used in a horrible way against us, reminding us that our military might and our wealth did not exclude us from the repercussions of our worship of racism, materialism, and militarism.  Second, there was the election of Barack Obama as president of the United States, the first person categorized as African-American to be elected to that office.  It was a scary blow to the idea of white supremacy, and much of what we have seen since that 2008 election is in reaction to that.  Third, the terrible SCOTUS decision of 2013 (Shelby v. Holder) that eviscerated the Voting Rights Act of 1965 was a reaction to the election of Obama, and it has led to the campaign to severely limit voting rights, especially those of Black and Brown people.

Fourth, the election of Donald Trump as President in 2016 was a clear expression of the re-animating force of white supremacy.  In many ways, we were fortunate that Trump is as inept as he is, so that he would be repudiated in 2020.  

    Those who follow him in the Trumpist, white supremacy movement will not be so inept.  And, finally the proliferation of guns and weapons – and our idolatrous belief that they are god – makes me tremble for the future of our country.  Black and Brown people will not be returning to the neo-slavery days of pre-1965, and white people are determined to reassert white supremacy – the mindset of “The White South” is rising.

Will there be a civil war again in the United States?  I am much less certain now than I was a year ago, when I was asked that question.  I’m hoping, hoping, hoping that the forces of justice and equity will yet prevail without the horror of civil war. Yet I also recognize that my classification as “white” means that I am much less aware of the daily violence and oppression faced by Black and Brown people and by women.  I’ll have more to add next week, but I’ll be glad to hear from you on this topic.  In the meantime, if you have not read “Parable of the Sower” by Octavia Butler, find it somewhere and read it – written in the late 1980’s, it is the most prescient novel on current American life of which I am aware.  And, if you want to see the violent side, with another Black protagonist, see the “Watchmen” series.  Both works of art take seriously the depth of violence, materialism and racism in American history and American life.