I’ve no wish to be a doom-sayer. And I am neither easily frightened nor am I paranoid. Yet I am deeply, profoundly troubled by trump’s latest move against the press.



With so much attention being focussed on an ailing stock market and an increasing concern about the Corona Virus, it is easy to lose sight of the utterly chilling fact that president trump has opened a lawsuit against an organ of the press; in filing suit against the New York Times, we see the unprecedented spectacle of a sitting president actively attempting to silence critics in the media through intimidation via the courts.

Despite years of blustering threats of suits, trump rarely makes any follow-through on suing the media, and with good reason: long before he assumed the presidency, trump was a sufficiently public figure that the bar for such suits would be extremely high. Heretofore, it would have been a hurdle unthinkable for a sitting president to even attempt. And, in fact, this absurd suit is going to go nowhere. Our courts are not yet completely corrupted; they will uphold the Constitution.

So why has trump pursued this particular suit, and why now?

One might think it is just an attempt to garner free publicity. The media that favor trump will surely find this inane suit a bold and courageous stand against dissenting opinions. Chilling in and of itself, but not unexpected. So publicity could be a motive.

But I fear the motive is more sinister in its end goal. The very act of a sitting president suing a newspaper for libel is so unnatural and so utterly un-American that it has never happened before. Not even Richard Nixon, who had such a contentious relationship with the press throughout his career, contemplated such an unorthodox move toward chilling Freedom of the Press. Yet by taking this step toward the trappings of a tyrant, trump is simply laying groundwork.

Even a year ago, a president who took such a step would have had critics and opposition even from among supporters and Congress members of his own party (back in the days when adherence to an oath to support and defend the Constitution mattered more generally; once upon a time, such oaths were taken so seriously that the wording was specifically crafted to ensure that loyal ex-Confederates could not serve.) But today, trump is testing the waters on all fronts to determine just how imperial he can be before someone, somewhere within the power structure tells him, “Enough!”

It starts as a mere fripperous lawsuit, but it normalizes a president punishing a dissenting press. Soon that “dissenting” press becomes that “dissident” press. The unthinkable of the historic past becomes the plausible for today; the inconceivable of last year becomes the inevitable for 2020. It is not so very great a leap from filing dogging lawsuits intended to intimidate newspaper after newspaper, or chill broadcaster after broadcaster, or silence journalist after journalist, to the next stage: actually criminalizing dissent.

 “But that cannot ever happen here!” people may confidently cry, “This is America!”

But sadly it could. Even now we have seen a vast array of actions that are so utterly unpresidential evolve into the new normal. We have seen sweeping abuses of power that would have greatly constrained or unseated previous administrations pass as if unremarkable. Freedom of the Press, alas, despite being a “God-given” right, is nevertheless fully subject to being revoked by human agency. It starts with previously unimagined suits, but where it ends could very well be a far further descent into the unimaginable.

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— Jamie Rawson
Flower Mound, Texas

The people never give up their liberties but under some delusion.
— Edmund Burke

I guess that Congress would like me to feel proud that we at last have a Federal law criminalizing the vicious terrorism, and utterly lawless crime of lynching.

I suppose I should be relieved that it has finally been formally criminalized.

But I am not proud. I am ashamed. Deeply, achingly ashamed.

Congress has failed to enact this plainly obvious legislation almost two-hundred times since 1900. TWO-HUNDRED TIMES. In the 120 years between 1900 and 2020, Congress has never heretofore decided that this legislation was worthy. Not during the heyday of “Jim Crow.” Not during the resurgence of the Ku Klux Klan in the 1920s. Not during the racial tensions preceding the Civil Rights Era, and not during it or thereafter.

Not in a dozen decades has Congress had the courage or principle to do the right thing before today. Today. Two decades into the 21st Century.

If there is any piece of evidence that shows how slowly we have progressed, surely this is it. How could it have ever been a question to make lynching a crime? And by the time of Emmet Till’s murder, sixty-five years ago, it was already long overdue to treat lynchings as especially heinous. But to have allowed twelve decades to have elapsed before today’s legislation is a disgrace that fully covers this nation with a heavy blanket of grievous shame! Yes, it is right to finally accomplish this. But the circumstances are still a deep and pervasive shame.

I am glad this is finally going to be sent to the President for his signature, which surely will happen, no matter his personal preferences, but I am ashamed that it has taken twice my entire life-span to come to pass.

This is a distinctly “political” post. But herein I make no citations of contemporary politics; I write about the politics of two millennia past. The subject is a favorite theme of mine, because I find it illuminating: The Roman Republic. This is far too brief to be comprehensive, but I have aimed to keep it short enough to be readable.

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The Roman Republic may well be the most important, influential, and enduring republic that human history has ever produced. Its span lasted from the overthrow of the Roman Kings in about 509 BC until the rise of Augustus Caesar as the first Emperor of the Roman Empire in 27 BC, in those five centuries, Rome grew from a small, agrarian city in a backwater of the Mediterranean world into an empire which subsequently became unrivaled in human history. (Some empires governed greater land areas, and some lasted longer by some measures, but for size and duration, no other empire truly comes close.) And during those five centuries, Rome excited the interest and envy of the classical world from Spain to Egypt. The Greek political historian Polybius, writing the the mid-second-century BC, attributed Rome’s unparalleled success to its ingenious blending of Democracy, (Rome’s Popular Assemblies) Aristocracy, (Rome’s Senate) and Monarchy, (Rome’s binary executive, its two Consuls.)

Rome’s masterful blending of these varied elements of ancient forms of government became known as “The Concerns Of The People,” in Latin, “RES PVBLICA,” which evolved into our modern term “republic.” Rome was never a pure democracy (there have been precious few of these in the world, because pure democracy does not scale well to larger polities) but there was the democratic element of the Popular Assemblies, where registered citizens cast their votes to elect governmental officials. These assemblies also originated a variety of domestic legislation including bills of finance. Rome’s abiding dread of Kingship led to the development of a *dual* executive consisting of two consuls selected from the top two vote-getters in an annual election. Each Consul could override the acts of the other, which made for a cumbersome, yet typically a surprisingly effective executive. But the third “branch” of Rome’s creative government was the most powerful: the Senate.

The Senate was not directly elected. Those who has served in the senior elected positions served in the Senate, and to a very real degree, membership in the Senate was an inherited position, because a small number of influential families maintained a presence in the Senate for centuries. The Julian clan, from whom Julius Caesar sprang, for example, was represented in this august body for the entire span of the Republic and thereafter. The Senate controlled foreign policy, had the power to declare and wage war, and controlled a variety of crucial state revenues and resources. Yet the Senate was to a degree beholden to the popular assemblies. Notably, for much of the life of the Republic, the popularly elected Tribunes had the power to veto acts of the Senate (“VETO” means “I forbid!” And that is what the Tribunes did.)

For centuries, the Roman Republic successfully balanced the needs of the people with the wants of the aristocracy. The resulted in the pragmatic formation of an effective government which was willingly borne by the commoners and nobles alike. It is worth remembering that Rome’s very self-identity is expressed by the acronymic “SPQR,” “SENATVS*POPVLVSQVE*ROMANVS,” “the Senate and the Roman People.” This formula succinctly expressed Rome’s concept of its government.

As Rome grew more and more powerful, the impact and effect of an expanding empire induced strains upon this successful civil government. By the late First Century BC, several factions formed within the Senate, ultimately becoming two major rivals: The “Optimates,” or “the Best People,” and the “Populares,” or “the Popular Party.” The Optimates clearly favored the interests of many aristocrats in the Senate. (“Aristocrat,” bear in mind, comes from the Greek for “government of the best people.”) The Populares were associated with many programs that assisted the common citizen, such as agrarian land reform and public assistance for citizens.

Note that I will refer to these two competing groups as “factions” and not parties. They never represented anything like what we have termed political “parties” for the past 250+ years. In modern times, some interpreters assert an analogy between the Optimates Faction and the United States’ own Republican Party; likewise a parallel is drawn between the Populares and today’s Democratic Party. The comparison is temptingly easy, and satisfyingly simple. Yet it is also unhelpful and ultimately false. The two factions in Rome’s Senate did each have certain “popular” or “optimate” “planks,” but fundamentally, these two factions did not represent any identifiable principles at all.

Marxian historian Michael Parenti, in his 2003 work, “The Assassination of Julius Caesar,” claimed to find in Julius Caesar a champion of the common man against the arictocrats. Yet this seems far too much of a reach. Julius Caesar did build a powerful base of support from the commoners, but he was an aristocrat first and foremost. The real basis of the conflict and contest between Rome’s two major factions was simply rivalry for power. Ideology, such as it existed, was purely a means to the end of gaining power. The Populares built their base upon the leverage of the Popular Assemblies and the like, whereas the Optimates more plainly served the interested of the power elite. But neither “party” really gave a tinker’s dam about the people. The superordinate goal was simply power for each faction’s adherents and cronies.

By the late period of Rome’s remarkable Republic, the only consistent characteristic of either of its leading political factions was a drive for power for its own supporters and destruction of its rivals. So consumed by this petty infighting did the Republic become that its last century was basically ten decades of upheaval, chaos, and civil disorder. So fixated were Rome’s Senatorial factions that they neglected or abandoned the care of the state and the needs of the people; misery and catastrophe dominated. The end of this confusion came about with the demise of the Republic. First, Julius Caesar seized control as “Dictator for Life,” and after his assassination, his adopted son, nephew Octavian arose to become the first Emperor of Rome.

Stability finally returned to Rome, but the Republic survived only in ceremonial references. The people of Rome never regained their ancient Rights. For the final one thousand years that the last vestiges of Rome’s Empire survived, only autocrats and aristocrats had political sway. There were no parties, only factions; no principles, only the drive for power.

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Jamie Rawson
Flower Mound, Texas

I doubt that I can even begin to I compose a proper bibliography. But some titles I am informed by include:

Michael Parenti, “The Assassination Of Julius Caesar,” ISBN-10: 1565847970

H. H. Scullard, “From The Gracchi To Nero,” ISBN-10: 0415584884

Erich Gruen, “The Last Generation Of The Roman Republic,” ISBN-10: 0520201531