Abstract:
I examine two of the most controversial issues that came before Parliament during John Stuart Mill's time in office: parliamentary reform, and the Morant Bay Massacre. I argue that Mill's relentless pursuit of the prosecution of Governor Eyre for the Morant Bay Massacre made him a target of Carlyle's conservative populist oppositionalism, which cost him the justice he sought for the families of the victims of Morant Bay, and re-election to Parliament in 1868. Moreover, I argue that some twenty-first century politicians still make Mill's mistake of pursuing pet policies relentlessly. For example, President Obama's relentless pursuit of the ACA made him the target of the conservative populist oppositionalism of the Tea Party. I conclude that if Mill and Obama had pursued alternative compromise policies, they would have increased their chances of achieving their ends, and of resolving the discontent and disillusion that led to the election of conservative politicians after them.
1. Introduction
In the terminology of Paul Taggart, "Populism serves many masters and mistresses" (Taggart 2000, p. 10). Indeed, both conservative and liberal politicians have led populist movements based on nationalism, globalism, progressivism, protectionism, racism, sexism, traditionalism, homophobia, islamophobia, xenophobia, and nearly every kind of ism or phobia imaginable, all while claiming to be the faithful defenders of the interests of the people. Scholars who are enamored with this way of thinking often characterize populism in terms of a charismatic strongman who exalts some and denigrates others in an effort to gain a cult-like following and establish autocratic rule over his country. However, the problem with this way of thinking about populism is that it is too narrow to be useful for evaluating conceptions of populism that fall outside of the scope of political demagoguery. After all, there are many examples of populist movements that do not involve political demagoguery, like the one Lawrence Goodwyn describes in Democratic Promise: The Populist Moment in America in which the early American populists sought to re-constitute the United States on a communitarian model of shared governance.
Scholars looking for an alternative conception of populism often base their theories on contending political groups rather than on an autocratic strongman. Such scholars argue that populism is essentially a clash between the perceived interests of the politically powerful elite and the politically powerless population. Those who articulate this conception of populism recognize that the interests of the elite and the interests of the general population are thought to be diametrically opposed. Of course, the conception of populism as grounded in diametrically opposed interests is often inadequate. For, when we examine cases of populism closely, we sometimes find that the perceived interests of different factions within and between the elite and the general population align and conflict based on many factors, including race, religion, and political affiliation. This explains why some members of the political elite sometimes identify with the general population, and why some members of the general population sometimes identify with the political elite. Either way, the conception of populism as a conflict between the interests of the elite and the interests of the powerless is problematic because it is often too broad to be useful for understanding important nuances between competing factions within actual populist movements. Consequently, since most scholars conceive of populism in terms of a political strongman, or in terms of a conflict between the perceived interests of the political elite and the general population, their conceptions of populism tum out to be either too narrow or too broad to be useful for understanding actual populist movements. For these reasons, I believe that we ought to conceive of populism as a political strategy rather than as a political ideology, one that is best understood in the context in which it is used.
With this in mind, I examine two conservative populist opposition movements, one that occurred in nineteenth century Britain, and one that is occurring presently in twenty-first century America. I demonstrate that John Stuart Mill's radical liberalism on the questions of parliamentary reform and retribution for the Morant Bay Massacre made him a target of Thomas Carlyle's conservative populist oppositionalism. I argue that Mill's parliamentary reforms were simply too progressive for nineteenth century England so there was nothing he could have done to get Parliament to accept his position. This, however, was not the case with Mill's campaign to get justice for the massacre at Morant Bay. Regarding this issue, I argue that if Mill had sought to galvanize public support for the Jamaica Committee, and if he had compromised on prosecuting Edward John Eyre in favor getting economic support for the families of the victims, he would have had a much better chance of getting justice for the families, and of being re-elected to Parliament in 1868.
Surprisingly, many twenty-first century politicians make Mill's mistake of pursuing pet policies relentlessly while ignoring alternative ways of achieving their ends. For example, President Barack Obama made Mill's mistake on the question of universal healthcare. I argue that, instead of pursuing the Affordable Care Act, President Obama should have pursued a nationwide infrastructure renovation program, like the New Deal Programs of the 1930s, and connected healthcare to it. I conclude that this would have allowed him to require companies that received federal infrastructure contracts to provide healthcare insurance to all of their employees. More importantly, by pursuing a nationwide infrastructure renovation project, the Obama Administration could have stopped the skyrocketing unemployment that resulted from the 2008 housing crisis and provided millions of uninsured Americans with healthcare coverage in the process. Such a compromise would have given progressives a way to pre-empt the discontent and disillusion that lead to the conservative populist oppositionalism of the Tea Party and the election of Donald Trump in 2016.
2. Liberalism and Conservatism: The Struggle for Nineteenth Century Britain
2.1 The Road to Parliamentary Reform
By the time John Stuart Mill was elected to office he was already England's most celebrated living ethicist. In fact, the only other Member of Parliament who was as celebrated as J.S. Mill for raising the moral consciousness of Great Britain was William Wilberforce. To be sure, in the early nineteenth century, William Wilberforce was the most vocal critic of Parliament. He criticized Parliament for failing to prohibit British merchants from participating in the transatlantic slave trade, and for failing to abolish slavery within British colonies. More importantly, Wilberforce was skilled at forming alliances and galvanizing support for the causes of abolition and emancipation. As a result, the Anti-Slavery Society was able to push for legislation abolishing British participation in the transatlantic slave trade, and for legislation emancipating slaves in the British West Indies, decades before John Stuart Mill entered office in 1865. Still, from Mill's perspective, there was much work to be done. For, Parliament had not achieved full liberty because it had not enfranchised women in England, equalized "Black" people in the West Indies, or liberated "White" people in Ireland.
Not surprisingly, Mill's version of parliamentary reform included universal suffrage, universal political participation, and proportional representation. To be sure, in the Considerations on Representative Government, Mill tells us that the best form of government is one in which "sovereignty... is vested in the entire aggregate of the community" (Mill 1996, p. 336). He argues that every autonomous citizen ought to have a voice in the exercise of sovereignty, and be called upon to "take an actual part in government by the personal discharge of some public function" (Mill 1996, p. 336). According to Mill, universal suffrage and equal participation are the only ways to guarantee that everyone's "rights and interests" will be protected from infringements by others (Mill 1996, p. 336). This includes the rights and interests of women in Britain, "Black" people in the British West Indies, and "White" people in Ireland. After all, for Mill, Great Britain's domination over others was not a question of the Englishman's innate superiority, but rather, a question of how to organize British social and political institutions so that those in "the dominant [group] could accelerate the progress of those in less" dominate groups (Kinzer et al. 1992, p. 180). More importantly, since women, "Black" people, and White people in Ireland have the capacity to be guided by their own reason, they ought to have received equal rights and liberties. Given that they had not received equal rights and liberties by 1865, Mill took it upon himself to fight for equal rights and liberties on their behalf.
Of course, Mill's version of parliamentary reform was far too progressive for nineteenth century Parliament. Although Great Britain abolished slavery in the British West Indies in 1834, and the apprenticeships in 1838, Parliament had allowed slavery to continue in other British colonies like India and the Gold Coast. So, while Mill's calls for universal political participation, universal suffrage, and proportional representation were noble, they were far too progressive for the times. Instead, Parliament settled on a moderate version of reform that only included suffrage for some working-class "White" men. Mill objected that suffrage for working-class "White" men only was not enough to achieve the common good. He pointed out that, without universal suffrage, proportional representation, and universal political participation, the politically powerful elite would simply legislate in their own interests and ignore the interests of those without political power (Mill 1996, p. 357). Parliament of course disagreed. Indeed, Mill's full packet of reforms never made it to the floor, and his partial packet of reforms was defeated swiftly. Instead, Parliament passed the modest version of reform in August of 1867.
2.2 Thomas Carlyle's Opposition to Parliamentary Reform
Not everyone was happy about the changes that were being made and proposed in Parliament, least of all Thomas Carlyle. In fact, after Parliament abolished slavery and ended its apprenticeships in the West Indies, Thomas Carlyle launched into a tirade against it, accusing Parliament of favoring "Black" people over "White" people, and of undermining "White" society. To be sure, in the Occasional Discourse on the Negro Question, Carlyle writes: "with twenty million pounds, a mere trifle dispatched with a single dash of the pen, Blacks were rendered free" while "Whites faced universal bankruptcy abroad and the dim dreary stagnancy" of a stale economy at home, with nothing to do but "wait... till Black anarchy" destroys them as it has destroyed others in nations where "Black" people were liberated (Carlyle 2011, p. 4). By this, and other examples, he argues that anarchy reins in the streets in nations where liberty and equality are the guiding principles (Carlyle 2011, p. 17). Carlyle warn us that Great Britain will experience similar chaos unless governance is placed in the hands of a Heroic Man of Force, one like Governor Edward John Eyre who will reject the liberal reforms being proposed in Parliament and organize society according to the guiding principle of work.
Carlyle's principle of work is grounded in his conception of the natural, racial hierarchy of man. In the Occasional Discourse, he argues that Europeans are at the top of the racial hierarchy because they are born with a superior intellect, an entrepreneurial spirit, and the social graces to be the leaders of society (Carlyle 2011, pp. 27-28). Conversely, Carlyle argues that Africans are at the bottom of the racial hierarchy because they are born dull and anarchic, but with strong backs, which makes them well suited for following commands and laboring under harsh conditions (Carlyle 2011, pp. 27-28). For Carlyle, these "cosmic facts" become evident when "Black" people are liberated and left to their own devices, because they fall back into their natural habits of idleness and anarchy. Thus, he concludes that servitude is good for "Black" people because it keeps them productive and orderly, and, for this reason, Carlyle grounds his principle of work in the natural, racial hierarchy of humans. He writes: "I put as a general principle... that no black man who will not work according to the ability the gods have given him for working, has the smallest right to eat... but has an indisputable and perpetual right to be compelled" to work, at the end of the lash or at the tip of the sword if necessary (Carlyle 2011, p. 29).
Of course, the idea that humans exist on a natural hierarchy did not originate with Thomas Carlyle. In fact, it was articulated centuries earlier by Aristotle who argued that those in whom reason is generative are, by nature, masters, and those in whom reason is not generative are, by nature, slaves (Aristotle 1992, book 1). Aristotle inherited this conception of humans from his mentor Plato (Vlastos 1941, p. 289). Like Plato, Aristotle concluded that the state functions best when humans are organized according to their natural capacities to reason (Aristotle 1992, book 1). However, neither Plato nor Aristotle grounded their natural hierarchies in race (Smaw 2017, p. 392). Rather, the racialized part of the natural hierarchy was introduced by modern philosophers like David Hume. For example, in the Essays and Treatises on Several Subjects (1758), Hume argues that
the negroes, and in general all the other species of men... are naturally inferior to the whites. Indeed, such a uniform and constant difference could not happen in so many countries and ages, if nature had not made an original distinction betwixt them. [In fact,] there never was a civilized nation of any other complexion than white, nor even any individual eminent either in action or speculation. No ingenious manufactures amongst them, no arts, no sciences... [And yet] in Jamaica they talk of one Negro as a man of parts and learning... 'tis likely he is admired for very slender accomplishments, like a parrot, who speaks a few words plainly (Valls 2005, pp. 128-129).
Hence, unlike Plato and Aristotle, Hume grounds his natural hierarchy in race. This led him to conclude that society functions best when it is organized according to the natural, racial capacities of humans.
So, it comes as no surprise that Carlyle agrees with Hume. Like Hume, Carlyle believes that "White" people are naturally superior to "Black" people, and that society functions best when it is organized according to the racial capacities of humans (Carlyle I 867, pp. 5-8). For example, in the Occasional Discourse, Carlyle argues that "when all men are counted equally wise and worthy ... and the vote of a Demerara ni _ _ er is equal... to that of a Chancellor Bacon... the minimum of wisdom will be produced" (Carlyle 2011, p. 16). In this way, according to Carlyle, liberty and equality will lead to the election of unworthy politicians who will unwittingly bring about the destruction of society. This explains why Carlyle blames "traitorous politicians" for "grasping at votes... from the rabble" and ruining Great Britain in Shooting Niagara (Carlyle 1867, p. 11). He therefore concludes that the only way to stop the destruction of British society is to place governance in the hands of a Heroic Man of Force who will reject the liberal reforms being proposed in Parliament, and organize British society according to the principle of work.
2.3 Mill's Principle of Liberty vs Carlyle's Principle of Work
Thomas Carlyle's Occasional Discourse on the Negro Question did not go unchallenged. John Stuart Mill wrote a response in which he argues that Carlyle's principle of work is nothing but might makes right clothed in the religious language of a God-intoxicated man whose Heroes are no better than demagogues, and Villains are no worse than those who stood up to them. To be sure, in Mill's version of the Occasional Discourse, he tells us that Carlyle "issues his opinions... under imposing auspices," assuring us that the gods "announce through him, not only what will be, but what shall be done" (Mill 2011, p. 38). However, in challenging Carlyle, Mill demanded to know what gods granted Carlyle access to the "Immortal Truth" of the natural, racial hierarchy of humans (Mill 2011, p. 38). After some consideration, Mill concludes that Carlyle's assumed authority comes not from deities, but from the old law of "force and cunning, the law that whoever is more powerful than another is 'born lord' of that other, and the other is born 'servant' and must be compelled to work by 'beneficent whip' if other means avail not" (Mill 2011, p. 38).
More importantly, however, Mill explains that the law of might makes right has been rejected by "the great teachers of mankind" since Thucydides wrote the Melian Dialogue (Mill 2011, p. 38). After all, any society that accepts might makes right condemns itself to unceasing cycles of violence between its oppressors and those they oppress. In light of this, it's not surprising that Parliament reached a similar conclusion and abolished slavery in the West Indies after a series of rebellions (Smaw 2017, p. 399). For this reason, I find that Mill defeats Carlyle on the practical question of which principle is best for organizing society. After all, Mill's principle of liberty allows him to avoid continuous cycles of violence between the oppressed and their oppressors because it requires each to refrain from interfering with the liberties of all. In fact, even when Mill favors having a dominate group over a less dominate group, he requires the dominate group to work towards the liberation of the less dominate group (Mill 1978, p. 10). By contrast, Carlyle's principle of work requires "White" people to force "Black" people into servitude. Carlyle therefore condemns society to unceasing cycles of violence. For these reasons, Mill's principle of liberty is preferable to Carlyle's principle of work for organizing society.
3. Carlyle's Revenge: Conservative Populist Oppositionalism in Nineteenth Century Britain
Although John Stuart Mill defeated Thomas Carlyle in the debate over philosophical principles they continued to fight because their positions had serious consequences that extended beyond the pages of Fraser's Magazine. In fact, from 1866 to 1868, Carlyle and Mill found themselves before several English commissions arguing over the fate of Edward John Eyre, the Governor of Jamaica. In short, in 1865, an educated African-Caribbean community leader, George William Gordon, urged "Black" Caribbeans to protest against the Jamaican government for its treatment of them. In response, Paul Bogle, a follower of Gordon, Jed a civil rights protest of more than 400 "Black" Caribbeans to the courthouse in Morant Bay. When the magistrate emerged from the courthouse and attempted to shut down the protest things spun out of control. The protest escalated into a full-blown riot, which resulted in property damage, verbal and physical assaults, and the deaths of several police officers (Green 1991, p. 388).
Although G.W. Gordon was not in Morant Bay at the time of the riot Governor Eyre had him arrested, tried, and hanged for high treason (Green 1991, p. 391). Moreover, Governor Eyre imposed martial law and allowed his officers to round-up, beat, and kill "Black" men indiscriminately (Carlyle 2011, p. xxix). Indeed, Eyre's officers "flogged, shot, and hanged like fun" any "Black" man who could not give an account of his whereabouts during the protest and subsequent riot (Carlyle 2011, p. xxix). The "statistics tell the grim tale: at least 85 people were killed without trial, 354 were executed after having a trial, and about 600 were flogged, some with disgusting cruelty" (Green 1991, p. 389). When it was all over the "blood of African-Caribbeans stained the streets of Morant Bay," and the "river was deemed unwholesome because of the number of Black corpses floating in it" (Carlyle 20 l 1, p. xxix). Governor Eyre attempted to justify the massacre by arguing that, if he had not acted, he might have unwittingly "lit the torch which would have blazed in rebellion from one end of the island to the other" (Winter 2012). It was therefore necessary, he told his superiors in England, to use brute force to prevent Jamaica from becoming a "second Haiti" (Winter 2012). Undoubtedly, Eyre's reference to Haiti was an attempt to remind his superiors of Toussaint L'Ouverture's successful slave rebellion on the island of Haiti in 1803.
By early November accounts of the massacre began appearing in British newspapers. This prompted Thomas Buxton, P.A. Taylor, Frederick W. Chesson, Thomas Hughes, J.M. Ludlow, and others to form a committee (the Jamaica Committee) to determine what should be done to ensure justice for the families of the victims. Undoubtedly, the committee had an uphill battle. For, although slavery had been outlawed three decades earlier, many British citizens still believed Carlyle's propaganda about "Black" Villainy. This explains why Buxton urged the committee not to push for criminal charges to be brought against Governor Eyre. First, Buxton argued that no "jury would convict" Eyre, and, even if one did, "the Crown would grant him a pardon" (Kinzer et al. 1992, p. 192). Secondly, he argued that if the committee pushed for prosecution, the public would regard Eyre "as a martyr who had been vindictively and cruelly assailed" in the courts (Kinzer et al. 1992, p. 192). Either way, Buxton believed that the public would tum against the Jamaica committee if it pushed for prosecution.
Mill disagreed. He argued that the Jamaica Committee had an obligation to push for Eyre and his men to be brought to justice because the mle of law was at stake (Kinzer et al. 1992, p. 192). After much debate the committee sided with Mill. They voted 11 to 3 in favor of pushing for charges of murder and abuse of power to be brought against Governor Eyre and his officers. Shortly afterwards, Thomas Buxton stepped down as the head of the Jamaica Committee and Mill took over. Meanwhile, Thomas Carlyle used the public's sentiments about "Black" Villainy to galvanize public support for Eyre. He, along with the Earl of Shrewsbury, Lord Elcho, Sir Roderick Murchison and others, formed Eyre's Testimonial and Defense Committee, and convinced influential citizens to write letters and donate money in support of Eyre. In fact, John Tyndall, one of Britain's most famous physicists, and a dedicated follower of Thomas Carlyle, published a letter proclaiming that "the races are separate species and Governor Eyre's suppression of the Morant Bay uprising was legitimate on that basis" (Winter 2012). Other citizens "held a banquet in Eyre's honor" and raised money on his behalf. Charles Dickens and Alfred Tennyson were among Eyre's benefactors (Kinzer et al. 1992, p. 206).
More importantly, Carlyle's defense strategy of galvanizing public support for Eyre paid off. Every English commission that reviewed the charges against him and his officers dismissed them. This frustrated Mill to no end. Mill's frustrations were compounded by the fact that Carlyle led an effective conservative, populist opposition movement against those associated with the Jamaica Committee. In fact, by the time the last commission rendered its decision everyone associated with the Jamaica Committee was stigmatized and blacklisted. Given that Mill had become the public face of the committee, he bore the brunt of the stigmatization. To be sure, in the two years between 1866 and 1868, Mill had gone from one of Britain's most celebrated ethicists to the target of public hostilities and death threats. Indeed, in his Autobiography, Mill explains: "I kept some... of the abusive letters... which I received while the proceedings went on. They are evidence of the sympathy felt with the brutalities in Jamaica by the brutal part of the population at home" (Kinzer et al. 1992, p. 217). He continues: "the letters quickly went from coarse jokes to threats of assassination" (Kinzer et al. 1992, p. 217).
This dramatic turn of events was not lost on Mill's constituency. During his re-election campaign one of his supporters told him that his "relentless pursuit of Eyre had alienated quite a number of those who had voted for him in 1865" (Kinzer et al. 1992, p. 213). So, it wasn't a surprise when Mill loss to the conservative candidate, W.H. Smith. Upon reflection, Mill seemed to have realized that he failed to do the work of galvanizing public support for the Jamaica Committee, and that his failure had negatively impacted his chances of securing justice for the families. He writes: "to bring English functionaries to the bar of a criminal court for murders and abuses of power committed against Negroes and Mulattoes was not a popular proceeding with the English middle classes" (Mill 2018, p. 167). I would add that Mill's public fights with the press didn't help either. In fact, they made him look unhinged, and this only further distanced the Jamaica Committee from the sympathies of everyday Brits. To be sure, in A Moralist in and Out of Parliament, Kinzer et al tell us that "J.S. Mill was not a zealot," but "if he were judged solely on the basis of his part in the Eyre controversy, he would be mistaken for one" (Kinzer et al. 1992, p. 213).
So, instead of fighting with the press and pursuing the prosecution of Eyre and his officers relentlessly, Mill should have attempted to use the press to present the wives and children of the men who did not participate in the riot, but who were nevertheless killed by Eyre's officers, as innocent victims. By attempting to have Eyre prosecuted for abuse of power generally as opposed to abuse of power in the specific cases of those who had not participated in the riot, Mill over-played his hand. In fact, if Mill had focused on the economic harms suffered by the families of the victims, he would have had a better chance of galvanizing public support from humanitarian and religious groups. Mill's willingness to abandon his endeavor to have Eyre and his men prosecuted and Parliament's desire to bring the Morant Bay affair to a speedy conclusion, coupled with public pressure, might have been enough to push the courts to award compensation to the families of those who did not participate in the riot but who were nevertheless killed by Eyre's officers.
Of course, one might object to this alternative way of achieving some justice for the families on the grounds that nineteenth century racism was far too visceral for such a compromise to have been a viable alternative. After all, given the propaganda around race, British citizens would have been highly skeptical of the claims that some "Black" men were innocent victims and that some "White" policemen perpetrated murders during the Morant Bay riot. Moreover, even if British citizens could have been convinced of the facts, British courts would not have been willing to award compensation to "Black" people. Of course, Mill would have known this, which explains why he did not pursue compensation. Simply put, he did not see it as a viable alternative.
It is undeniably true that racism permeated British society in the nineteenth century. In fact, much of my discussion above highlights this fact. Nevertheless, I doubt that the ubiquity of racism would have made it impossible or unlikely for British citizens to accept that some "White" policemen had perpetrated murders against innocent "Black" men during the Morant Bay Massacre. After all, Parliament set-up a royal commission to investigate the Morant Bay Massacre and the commission's report confirmed that Eyre's men had engaged in reckless and cruel beatings and unjustified killings of "Black" men. Moreover, in the case of G.W. Gordon, the commission concluded that the evidence against him "was wholly insufficient to justify conviction on a charge of high treason," much less an execution (Kinzer et al. 1992, p. 191). Most importantly, the commission's report was largely accepted as impartial, and neither side challenged its findings (Kinzer et al. 1992, p. 190). For these reasons, I conclude that British citizens who formulated their beliefs on the bases of the royal commission's report would have known that Eyre's men had engaged in murder during the Morant Bay Massacre.
Moreover, a review of British law illustrates that there were cases in which "Black" people were awarded economic damages for harms they incurred at the hands of "White" people. The 1763 case of Shanley v. Harvey is an example of this. In 1751, Mr. Shanley purchased a slave, Harvey, to work as a servant for his niece. Years later, Shanley's niece gave Harvey eight hundred pounds so that he could take care of himself because her health was failing and she could no longer keep him. In 1763, Shanley sued Harvey in hopes of gaining the eight hundred pounds for himself. To Shanley's dismay, Lord Henley ruled that slavery was not recognized in England and that any "Black" person who stepped foot in England was thereby free. More importantly, he ruled that any "Black" person could bring an action against a "White" person for harm or habeas corpus if he were being held in bondage. Ultimately, Lord Henley dismissed the case against Harvey with cost, thereby making Shanley economically liable for the monetary losses Harvey incurred as a result of the lawsuit. Moreover, in a subsequent case, Justice Wilkes cited Henley's ruling in discharging a black slave from service and advising him to sue his former master for "the last 14 years' worth of wages" (Kaufmann 2009, p. 202).
Of course, Mill could have known about the Henley and Wilkes rulings because they occurred years before he became the head of the Jamaica Committee. More importantly, cases like Shanley v. Harvey demonstrate that some British courts were willing to award "Black" people compensation for economic damages they incurred at the hands of "White" people. Given that the families of the victims lost future income as a result of the murders committed by Eyre's men, they could have sued for economic damages. For these reasons, I conclude that if Mill had focused on the economic losses suffered by the families of those who did not participate in the riot, but who were nevertheless killed by Eyre's officers, he would have had a better chance of securing some justice for their families, and of winning re-election in 1868.
4. Something's Afoot: Conservative, Populist Oppositionalism in Twenty-First Century America
Surprisingly, some twenty-first century politicians make Mill's mistake of pursuing policies relentlessly while ignoring viable compromises, even when they represent better alternatives. President Obama's pursuit of universal healthcare is an example of this. To understand this criticism, we must begin our conversation in the period of American history that many European-Americans identify as the golden age of family life, i.e. the 1950s. In the 1950s, picket fences adorned the boundaries of single family homes in suburban neighborhoods throughout the country, all of which were "protected" by the restrictive covenants of the Federal Housing Authority, and the practice of redlining by mortgage lenders (Smaw 2017, pp. 402-403). Undermining the peace and serenity of suburban segregation by taking affirmative steps to achieve integration was undoubtedly jarring for people who had internalized "White" supremacy - some wittingly, but most unwittingly. So, when Governor George Wallace blocked the doors of the University of Alabama and delivered a speech decrying the "illegal usurpation of power by the Central Government," he became a hero to hundreds of thousands of "White" Americans (Lopez 2015, p. 15). To be sure, the week following his standoff he received "more than 100,000 telegrams and letters, 95 percent" of them praising him for "his brave stand in the schoolhouse doorway" (Lopez 2015, p. 16). After reading the telegrams and letters, Governor Wallace exclaimed: "They all hate black people... They're all afraid! Great god!... the whole United States is Southern" (Lopez 2015, p. 16). And, at that moment, the Southern Strategy was born.
Later, the Southern Strategy was given full articulation by Senator Barry Goldwater: (1) Republican politicians would stoke the racial fears of "White" people without looking like the ignorant racists who were exposed by Dr. King's Civil Rights Movement; (2) they would talk about the need to be tough on crime without calling "Black" people villains as Thomas Carlyle had; and, (3) most of all, they would attack racial justice programs, like Affirmative Action, as reverse discrimination and call upon the courts to strike them down. The goal of the Southern Strategy was to find "White" people in the north and use racialized propaganda to motivate them to vote for Republican candidates. Indeed, as Ian Lopez put it in Dog Whistle Politics, "the rise of the racially-identified GOP is not a tale of latent bigotry... but a story centered on the strategic decision to use racism to be the White Man's Party" (Lopez 2015, p. 16). The result was that the GOP became the party of "White" conservatives, white supremacists, and "White" people who voted out of racialized fear. By contrast, the Democratic Party became the party of"White" people who were willing to embrace racial equality and "Black" people entering politics in the post-segregation era.
Racialized politics have dominated America ever since. But, I suspect, Republicans saw the handwriting on the wall: The Future is Nigh! For, the future brought with it, millennials and new racial minorities who identified with the multiculturalism and globalism of the Democratic Party. To be sure, of those who voted in the 2008 Presidential election, 66% of millennials, 62% of Asian-Americans, and 67% of Latino-Americans voted for Barack Obama. After the election, the "New York Times ran a... story that closed with a Republican operative lamenting the fact that there just are not enough middle-aged white guys that we can scrape together to win. There are just not enough of them" (Lopez 2015, p. 2016).
Unfortunately, however, instead of embracing multiculturalism, globalism, and attempting to bring millennials and minorities into the Republican Party, the GOP turned to conservative, populist oppositionalism. Indeed, they formed the Tea Party and began decrying the policies of liberal politicians who, they claimed, want to tax decent, hardworking Americans to pay for the housing and healthcare costs of underserving minorities (Lopez 2015, pp. 149-150). Ann Coulter drove this message home in an article entitled "They Gave Your Mortgage to a Less Qualified Minority" (Coulter 2008). In these ways, twenty-first century Republicans stoked similar fears in "White" Americans that Thomas Carlyle had stoked in "White" Brits more than a century earlier. The result is that the racial demographics of the Tea Party mirrored those of the Republican Party. For example, in 2013, "3 percent of the members of the Tea Party were Hispanic, 1 percent of the members were black, and only 1 percent of the members of the Tea Party were Asian" (Lopez 2015, p. 151). Similarly, in 2012, 89% of Republicans were "White," 6% were Hispanic, 2% were "Black," and only 1% of the members of the GOP were Asian (Newport 2008).
Of course, these demographics did not go unnoticed by Republican strategists, but the results of the 2012 Presidential election demonstrated that the GOP had a larger problem to worry about: winning. Donald Trump would try his hand at winning the Presidency for the Republicans in 2016. Towards this end, he sought to unite all of the factions within the GOP. He aligned himself with white supremacists and alt-right nationalists like Steven Miller and Steve Bannon; he hired Republican Party elites like Paul Manafort and Reince Priebus; and he cozied-up to Republican billionaire financiers like Rebekah Mercer. He then declared himself a populist and began tweeting racist stereotypes about immigrants, Mexicans, and African-Americans. For example, he called immigrants crossing the southern border an infestation; he called Mexicans murders and rapists; and he tweeted out a photograph of a young "Black" male wearing a mask and brandishing a gun alongside inaccurate statistics that read: "Blacks killed by Whites = 2%" and "Whites killed by Blacks = 81%" (Greenberg 2015). Thus, populism in contemporary America is characterized by a charismatic strongman, Donald Trump, who has united rich, middle-class, and poor European-Americans against racial minorities, immigration, and globalization. This is why I have identified it as conservative, populist, oppositionalism. In spite of this, or, rather, because of it, Trump secured the Republican Party nomination in 2015, and subsequently defeated Hillary Clinton in the Presidential election of 2016.
5. Undermining Conservative, Populist Oppositionalism
Like John Stuart Mill, President Obama made the mistake of pursuing his pet policy to the exclusion of alternative ways of achieving his end of establishing universal healthcare. For example, instead of pursuing a universal healthcare policy in 2010, when the unemployment rate was at 9.6% and the country was still reeling from the housing crisis, the Obama Administration should have compromised and pursued a nationwide infrastructure renovation program. This would have been more palatable because everyone knows that America's infrastructure is in disrepair, many Republicans support infrastructure renovation, and, most importantly, it would have put millions of Americans who lost their jobs in the housing crisis back to work immediately. Moreover, the Obama Administration could have required all companies that received federal infrastructure contracts to provide healthcare insurance to all of their employees. This would have been easy to achieve because the U.S. House of Representatives and the U.S. Senate were controlled by Democrats during the first two years of Obama's Presidency. Even more, this approach would have allowed the Administration to solve the problems of rising unemployment and the lack of access to healthcare insurance simultaneously because companies that received infrastructure contracts would have had to hire workers and they would been required to provide healthcare insurance to them. Conversely, the problem with Obama's approach was that it looked like his Administration was building a large bureaucratic social service program and taxing people to pay for it during a recession. This gave the Tea Party an issue to seize upon.
While President Obama was more effective than John Stuart Mill at utilizing the press, he nevertheless failed to pre-empt the growing discontent and disillusion of those living in the middle and southern parts of the country, primarily because he didn't undermine the Tea Party's narrative that the government was taxing hardworking, middle class Americans to pay for the healthcare of "Black" and "Brown" minorities. President Obama might have undermined this narrative by simply pointing out that the vast majority of those who didn't have access to healthcare in 2010 were adults who had lost their jobs because of the housing recession. More importantly, if Obama had compromised and combined infrastructure and healthcare then he would have had an easy way of engaging with those who live in the rust belt, suicide belt, and coal country, and of dissolving their discontent and disillusion, because he would have put them back to work and provided them with much needed healthcare insurance. Ultimately, Obama's attempts to reach out to them were ineffective because the recession was dragging on and they did not have gainful employment or healthcare. Or, to put it in another way, they were growing desperate. Even worse, the conservative, populist oppositionalism of the Tea Party was effective at getting them to associate President Obama with increased taxes to pay for healthcare for "undeserving minorities," which, in tum, only made them angry and susceptible to radicalization because they believed that the government was helping minorities but not them. Thus, by the time of the 2016 election, those living in the middle and southern parts of the country were discontented, disillusioned, and they had been radicalized by the Tea Party turned Alt-right. Donald Trump's racist rhetoric feed into their beliefs, which made him their candidate of choice.
6. Conclusion
In this article, I have argued that John Stuart Mill and President Barack Obama both made the mistake of pursuing their pet policies relentlessly. For Mill, the pet policy was the prosecution of Governor Edward John Eyre, and, for Obama, it was the Affordable Care Act. I have argued that Mill's pursuit of the prosecution of Eyre made him a target of Carlyle's conservative, populist oppositionalism, which ultimately cost him the justice he sought for the families of the victims of the Morant Bay Massacre, and re-election to Parliament in 1868. Similarly, President Obama's relentless pursuit of the ACA made him a target of the conservative, populist oppositionalism of the Tea Party, which ultimately cost the progressives the 2016 election. I have concluded that if Mill and Obama had pursued alternative ways of achieving their ends, they would have increased their chances of getting what they wanted, and of pre-empting the discontent and disillusion that led to the election of conservative candidates after them.
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