Congressman Thomas B. Reed, the Last Founder

Review by Steven LaTulippe
Review by Dr. Steven LaTulippe

The Proud Tower, A Portrait of the World Before the War
By Barbara Tuchman

The era before and after WW I has always been of keen interest to me. As a student of historical trends and cycles, I believe that this period represents a profound turning point in human history.

Simply put, WW I was the Götterdämmerung of Western Civilization. Almost all of the horrors of the 20^th Century can be laid at the doorstep of that bloody, hideous, and pointless war. The Western World was riding high in 1900.  Europe and the overseas Western nations were the undisputed centers of learning, science, industry, and culture. But after four years of the terror of trench warfare, which consumed the best men of an entire generation, the West began a downward spiral which continues to this day.

My fascination with this period drew me to Ms. Tuchman’s book The Proud Tower, A Portrait of the World Before the War. It is broken down by chapters describing each of the major nations of the Western World in the decades before the Great War.

Each chapter seemed to be more profound than the next. But the one concerning the United States, aptly titled "End of a Dream," left me flabbergasted.

In a nutshell, it relates the story of a man who has since largely been lost to history, but who should be prominent in the hero gallery of every true American: Maine Congressman Thomas B. Reed.

By 1889, Congressman Reed had risen from humble beginnings to become the Speaker of the House of Representatives. At his zenith, his contemporaries called him "the greatest parliamentary leader of his time…far and away the most brilliant figure in American politics." Although he was the descendant of a Mayflower family, he was solidly middle class and had all of the level-headed attributes of that stoic breed. A prominent Senate contemporary said of him, "In my opinion there never has been a more perfectly equipped leader in any parliamentary body at any period."

Using his keen intelligence, folksy wisdom, and encyclopedic knowledge of procedure, he steadily rose during his congressional career to become a Speaker of legendary power.

While he was at the top of his career, he became embroiled in an issue that was to be his defining moment as a leader and a man: The imbroglio of the Spanish-American War.

In the decade before that war, America was undergoing several profound changes. First, the frontier was no more. The tide of pioneers had ended what was, up to that point, the central reality of the American experience.  The seemingly limitless lands to the West had finally been conquered.

Numerous commercial and jingoist factions in America were desperate to continue "Manifest Destiny" elsewhere. The sugar trust wanted to annex Hawaii. The shipping industry wanted to annex part of Central America and build a canal. The militarists and many industrialists wanted to conquer overseas territories for new bases and markets. Jingoists wanted a blue-water navy to flex America’s muscles abroad.

Henry Cabot Lodge, a typical expansionist of that era, is quoted in one famous Senate presentation, "We are a great people; we control this continent; we are dominant in this hemisphere; we have too great an inheritance to be trifled with or parted with. It is ours to guard and extend."  Lodge then wrote an article in Forum in which he stated that "once the canal was built, the island of Cuba will become a necessity." 

Democratic Senator Morgan of Alabama stated flatly, "Cuba should become an American colony."

Senator Cullom of Illinois stated, "It is time someone woke up and realized the necessity of annexing some property – we want all this northern hemisphere."

When the USS Maine was destroyed in Havana’s harbor, the bugle went up and the jingoists went wild.

It was while standing athwart this maelstrom that Speaker Reed experienced his finest hour.

Throughout this period of war fever, there were still scattered individuals who clung to the doctrines of the Founders. They were a hodgepodge of sometimes eccentric citizens from different regions, classes, and backgrounds. From steel magnate Andrew Carnegie to labor leader Samuel Gompers, these brave men rose to fight for America's soul.

Ms. Tuchman observes:

 "The surge of militancy evoked by the Venezuela Message [a call to war against the UK over a S. American border dispute] shocked people who still thought of the US in the terms of its founders, as a nation opposed to militarism, conquest, standing armies, and all the other bad habits associated with the monarchies of the old world…. They were closer to Jefferson, who had said, ‘If there is one principle more deeply rooted in the mind of every American, it is that we should have nothing to do with conquest.’"

Her observations continued with passages that are haunting to the modern observer:

"They took seriously the Declaration of Independence and its principle of just power deriving from the consent of the governed. They regarded the extension of American rule over foreign soil and peoples as a violation of this principle and a desecration of the American purpose."

Charles William Eliot, the president of Harvard University, denounced jingoism as "offensive…absolutely foreign to American society…yet many of my friends endeavor to pass it off as patriotic Americanism."  He denounced Lodge and T. Roosevelt as "degenerated sons of Harvard."

Speaker Reed took up the standard of these valiant souls and fought ceaselessly to stop America’s descent into a war of imperialism.

Tuchman notes:

"The proponents of war burst into hysteria [after the sinking of the Maine]; the peace-minded were out shouted. McKinley hung back…Speaker Reed did not…. When Senator Proctor, who owned marble quarries in Vermont, made a strong speech for war, Reed commented, 'Proctor’s position might have been expected.  A war will make a large market for gravestones.'"

As the war progressed, the brave dissidents formed The Anti-Imperialist League in an attempt to dissuade the government from annexing the Philippines. Tuchman describes their general argument thus:

"The war…must not be turned into one for empire. The quest for power, money, and glory abroad, the League maintained, would distract from reform at home and bring in its train a strong central government destructive of traditional states’ rights and local liberties."

Various and sundry individuals, from ex-President Cleveland to Stanford President Starr Jordan and from unionist Samuel Gompers to author Mark Twain rallied to the cause and joined the League.

At every turn, Reed led the charge in congress. He prevented a bill to annex Hawaii from coming to the floor of the House for as long as possible. Lodge wrote to T. Roosevelt, "Opposition now comes exclusively from Reed, who is straining every nerve to beat Hawaii." Reed reached out to anti-jingoist Democrats like Champ Clark to stop the bill. But in the end, his fight was fruitless, as his own party revolted and signed a discharge petition moving the bill to a vote.

When it passed overwhelmingly, the Nation said of Reed: "Courage to oppose a popular mania, above all to go against party, is not so common a political virtue that we can afford not to pay our tribute to a man who exhibits it."

Four days earlier, the Spanish-American War ended. The USA annexed Puerto Rico and reduced Cuba to a protectorate (despite the fact that Cuba’s liberty was allegedly the original reason for the war).  Admiral Alfred Mahan, a prominent militarist, stated, "The jocund youth of our people now passes away never to return; the care and anxieties of manhood’s years henceforth are ours."

And so it was…and so it still is.

The debate next moved on to the question of what to do with the Philippines. The jingoists wanted a colony, the League wanted to grant the islands their independence. The Treaty of Paris was on the table, which would end the war and give the Philippines to America as a possession. The expansionists needed 2/3 of the Senate to make it happen.

But after the abuse that was heaped upon him in the run-up to the war and over the Hawaii crisis, Reed became disheartened. Lodge wrote to Roosevelt, "Reed is terribly bitter, saying all sorts of ugly things about the Administration and its policy in private talks so that I keep out of his way for I am fond of him and confess that his attitude is painful and disappointing to me beyond words."

The final blow came when William Jennings Bryan, the radical progressive Democrat who had opposed the war, threw his support behind the annexation of the Philippines. Hideously, his motive was pure Machiavelli:  he hoped that the annexation would cause a nasty war which would cripple the Republican administration and open the way for his presidential campaign.

Days before the ratification vote, the Filipino people rose in revolt against their erstwhile liberators. As the blood began to flow, the Senate approved the treaty and entered the business of empire. Bryan’s treachery had shifted a critical mass in the Senate and led to a victory for the jingoists.

William James wrote, "The way the country puked up its ancient principles at the first touch of temptation was sickening."

Moorfield Storey added, "We are false in all we have believed in. This great free land which for more than a century has offered a refuge to the oppressed of every land has now turned to oppression."

The Anti-Imperialists attempted to rally Reed to fight on. But, as Tuchman notes,

"It was too late. Reed’s sluggishness was that of a man for whom the fight has turned sour...Reed’s whole life was in the qualification that for him it had to be exercised toward an end that he believed in. His party and his country were now bent on a course for which he felt deep distrust and disgust. To mention expansion to him, said a journalist, was like ‘touching a match’ and brought forth ‘sulphurous language.’ The tide had turned against him; he could not turn it back and would not go with it."

After several quiet months of contemplation following the vicious treaty fight, he allowed word to seep into the press that he was intending to retire and leave Congress. He led a tranquil life from that point onward, occasionally practicing law, until passing away quietly in 1902 of chronic nephritis.

As Tuchman notes, "Reed had stood his ground on the swampy soil of politics, uncompromising to the end, a lonely specimen of an uncommon kind, the Independent Man."

With Reed’s passing from power and the victory of the jingoists, America had crossed a crucial boundary from Republic to Empire. The major difference between the debate today and then is that America of the 1890s still had a number of powerful individuals who clung to the ideals of the Founders. The Speaker of the House, powerful industrialists, major trade unionists, and prominent academics still thought in terms of Jefferson and Washington. The flame had not yet been extinguished.

Today, as evidenced by the Iraq war debate, things have become profoundly more squalid. The Republican congressional leadership is almost exclusively jingoistic (mimicking Roosevelt and Lodge of their day). The Democrats are either on-board with interventionism (Lieberman et al.) or too cowardly to risk opposing the warmongering masses. At their cynical worst, like William Jennings Bryan, they support the war in the hopes that disaster will befall Bush and pave the way for election victory (this describes, I believe, almost the whole of the left wing of the Democratic Party).

The defenders of the Republic had a powerful Speaker to carry their torch in the 1890s. The only congressman speaking the language of the Founders today is Rep. Ron Paul of Texas. But his dedication to opinions that were once almost taken for granted has earned him the status of a perennial backbencher/outsider. Aside from the principled stand of Sen. Robert Byrd, the Senate is totally bereft of the Founder’s perspectives.

The passing of Thomas Reed from power marked a crucial crossroads in the path to Empire. It was perhaps the last time that a man who believed in our beloved Republic occupied one of the most powerful positions in our government. Tragically, the current leadership is populated almost exclusively by militarists, cowards, and cynical opportunists.

We of the contemporary antiwar movement have many shortcomings. Among the most prominent of these is that we have allowed the memories of our brave predecessors to fade into oblivion. In doing so, we allow our jingoistic antagonists to rewrite our national myths and to present a false picture of our Republic to future generations. In struggling to revive the memory of their words and deeds, we can rectify this shameful situation and reacquaint the American people with a lost portion of their heritage. This book by Barbara Tuchman is a good first step in that noble direction.

December 10, 2003

Steven LaTulippe [send him mail] is a physician currently practicing in Ohio. He was an officer in the United States Air Force for 13 years.

Copyright © 2003 LewRockwell.com