The Most Pivotal Political Virtue

Courage is badly needed, and in short supply.

Human beings are an instinctively tribal species. The desire to be accepted by an in group is a well documented aspect of behavioral psychology. The inherent benefits and adaptability of our tribal nature are obvious, having a strong and well knit community protects against violent and oppressive outside forces and makes the gathering and allocation of resources easier. But there is a dark side, that has been well observed, to being a tribal species. Thinking outside of the box from conventional wisdom can be seen as troublesome and disunifying. Yelling “stop” and pushing back on the popular ideas of the group can make one a social pariah. Don’t get me wrong, as someone with a conservative sensibility this instinct is more often than not protective. It can be an immunization from radical social movements, and a deference to tried and true social conditions (a kind of Chesterton’s fence). But what happens when our tribal instincts are hijacked by popular demagogues? Or what if the broader society becomes enthralled with the type of radical social movements the instinct was meant to guard against? Then the types of introspective self correction, warnings, and ingenuity that could ward off the debilitating stasis become the target of groupthink and the purveyors of the unwanted counsel become objects of ridicule and scorn. 

Reaganite and other traditionally conservative readers of this publication, along with classically liberal ones probably already know where I am going with this. For at least the last decade something about American politics has felt fundamentally broken. Radical social movements have taken over the commanding heights of political and cultural power, and all of those Buckley-ite history “thwarters” are politically homeless and often universally castigated. Rather than engage in normal push and pull political debates for the future of the conservative movement and the Republican Party the more populist MAGA party leaders have decided that the old order (dismissed as RHINOS) are not a faction to be worked and united with but the “real” problem: warmongers, naïve free traders, and uppity moralists. 

For anyone thinking the right sounds bad, let's not forget that the current left’s activists have spent the last decade lecturing and canceling normies for not having their pronouns in their email bio, hounding children’s author J.K. Rowling for disagreeing on transgender orthodoxy, forcing “LatinX” on the Hispanic community, and most recently rioting against America’s closest ally Israel and often in support of radical Islamist terror groups. Also don’t forget how Democratic Senator Kyrsten Sinema of Arizona was chased into a Capitol Hill restroom by activists over her opposition to the Build Back Better legislation, and how both her and Senator Joe Manchin of West Virginia were often the object of activist rage for opposing nuking the filibuster (something those activists ought to be grateful for with Trump and a Republican Senate coming back to town). 

No, both of America’s two major political parties and the ideological movements that they represent have become hijacked by radical social movements and the tribal instinct is in full force to beat back any who would offer another way. Dysfunction has therefore paralyzed the American political process. There is no easy or quick fix for our social morass, but one thing is certain, those who want to stand for timeless principles and bedrock Constitutional guardrails in both political parties are going to require immense courage and willingness to buck tribal loyalties at times. One way to build courage is to learn from the examples of courageous individuals, both contemporary and historical. All of the people I’ve mentioned so far are some good contemporary examples: J.K. Rowling, Kyrsten Sinema, and Joe Manchin have all in their own way displayed real courage. I will highlight a few more, one contemporary, and two historical. 

The first person that comes to my mind these days when thinking about courage is none other than Donald Trump’s former Vice President Mike Pence. Pence is a man that was the loyal second to the most powerful man in the world, and loved by virtually all Trump supporters and Republicans, and probably would have been the heir apparent to inherit Donald Trump’s political movement when he was off the scene. But due to the events between November 3, 2020 and January 6, 2021 the political fortunes of the soft spoken statesman altered drastically. His unwillingness to say that he and his running mate actually won that election and then his constitutional fealty on January 6th made him enemy number one for many Trump supporters. His staunch conservative and anti Left bonafides meant nothing to the mob. Mike Pence didn’t care about the political incorrectness of his adherence to the much maligned Billy Graham rule on meeting alone with women, because his marriage vows mattered more to him than social praise. And likewise, Pence cared more about his duty under the Constitution of the United States than his own political fortunes in Donald Trump’s Republican Party. Today, Pence’s organization Advancing American Freedom while not in the ascendant wing of Republican politics is creating a home for American conservatives to weather our populist moment, and to push our politics in a more conservative direction. Thank you Mr. Vice President! 

As a child my favorite person from American history was David Crockett (Davy) the famed Tennessee frontiersman, Indian fighter, Congressman, and fighter for Texan Independence from Mexico. I don’t know how many times I watched the Disney movie Davy Crockett: King of the Wild Frontier with star Fess Parker, but it was certainly at least a couple of hundred. I had a fake coon skin cap and everything. But folklore and legend aside, there is a reason why Crockett looms large in the American imagination, and that’s because he was a man of tremendous courage. Initially a volunteer with a company of Mounted Rifleman during the Creek War, a response to the Fort Mims massacre, Crockett was not someone who opposed American presence on this land or who believed we were wrong to fight for it, but he firmly believed that America had a duty to honor it’s word in treaties and to act humanely with conquered Native peoples. While he was a popularly elected Tennessee Congressman, President Andrew Jackson’s infamous Indian Removal Act came before Congress in 1830 and he voted against the bill-to the displeasure of many in his own district and he lost his next reelection bid, and while he was able to mount a comeback he was permanently out of Congress soon thereafter. Two quotes attributed to Crockett are appropriate here, one from his autobiography, on the controversy over the Indian Removal Act, “ I believed it was a wicked, unjust measure.... I voted against this Indian bill, and my conscience yet tells me that I gave a good honest vote, and one that I believe will not make me ashamed on the day of judgment” and another published in local papers upon his return to Tennessee from Congress to his constituents, “I told the people of my district that I would serve them as faithfully as I had done; but if not, they might go to hell, and I would go to Texas.” Crockett would go on to die at the Alamo in the fight for Texan independence from Mexico. In the case of Crockett, courage may have led to the end of a promising political career, but it secured his place in American history books and the imaginations of little boys in fake coon skin caps.

My final historical example is Private First Class (PFC) Desmond Doss from World War Two. Doss chose military service, even though as a shipyard worker he had deferment as an option. This choice to serve would prove extra ironic given the trouble his insistence on serving as a noncombatant would give him. As a Seventh-Day Adventist he wanted to join as a medic and he wanted Sabbaths off in training, and this aroused the ire of his fellow soldiers and commanders-how could a non violent punk aid the war effort? Well, Doss more than proved his worth in his outstanding service in Guam, the Philippines, and ultimately in the Battle of Okinawa where he saved over 100 lives from the blaze of battle. He became the only conscientious objector to be awarded the Congressional Medal of Honor. Doss’s story illustrates how courage in standing for one’s beliefs, even when the tribal tendencies of our species are arrayed against you, will ultimately lead America forward in our eternal pursuit of a More Perfect Union. 

Acts of courage are never easy at the moment, but our political age, like all political ages, demands men and women of conscience develop this essential virtue. I think one of the through lines in all of the examples of political courage I described is that all of these individuals had a resolute faith in God, a God who they feared righteously more than the praise or scorn of their fellow men. But whether you believe in God or not you must place a fidelity to truth, reason, the common good, and right over your own advancement and the praise of a crowd. 

“Success is not final, failure is not fatal: it is the courage to continue that counts.”― Winston S. Churchill