Sometimes a man just has to stand up and do what's right. Not to do what he thinks he can get done in the present. Not the path of least resistance. Not the politically expedient thing. Not the big compromise. Just stand up for what's right, and fight for it. Make a stand and take it to the people. Damn the consequences.
I was thinking about a man of just such convictions the other day. He's forgotten for the most part these days, but he left an irreversible mark on history during his lifetime. I'm thinking about a man named Hubert Horatio Humphrey.
I got to remembering him when I had my flabby ass on the treadmill at the gym. After I turned off the tv in front of me, with the obligatory Faux News on, I pulled out the e-reader my lovely wife bought for my birthday, and opened up a book by one of the most inspirational men I've ever listened to. It was "Moyers On Democracy", a collection of some of his speeches over the years. I highly recommend it to everyone.
Moyers calls Humphrey's speech at the 1948 Democratic National Convention in Philadelphia, the first thunderclap of the coming storm that was going to reverberate across America. The South had change little since the Civil War. Institutionalized racism was the rule of law in the South. Lynchings were still commonplace. I still remember hitch hiking through the Carolina's in 1972, and still seeing billboards along the highway, advertising for the Ku Klux Klan.
In July, 1948, the Republicans had just nominated Thomas Dewey for President. Truman was foundering. Earlier in 1948, Truman had demanded that Congress pass strong civil rights legislation, but he was backing down because Dems in Congress were afraid of pissing off the South, and kill Truman's slight chance to win the election. The last thing they wanted was a big divisive fight on the convention floor. Especially since this was the first time a convention would be televised. The party leaders backed away from a strong civil rights plank, and instead wanted to offer something more acceptable to the South.
Humphrey, the 37 year old Mayor of Minneapolis disagreed. Strongly.
After graduating magna cum laude at the University of Minnesota, Humphrey and his wife went to Louisiana to earn his Masters Degree. They were shocked at the "daily deplorable indignities" heaped upon blacks in the South. These experiences shaped his future views on racial relations in America. He returned to Minneapolis and was elected Mayor on his second bid. Under his leadership, the city formed the first enforceable Municipal Fair Employment Practices Commission. He sent 600 volunteers door to door, and to businesses, schools, and churches to expose discrimination previously ignored. They exposed discrimination against Indians, Jews, and Blacks. He established a human relations course for police officers.
"What Hubert Humphrey preached about civil rights, he practiced. And what he practiced, He preached".
He arrived at the 1948 Convention as a spokesman for the liberal wing of the party, and was named to the Platform Committee. After a ferocious fight the Committee voted down a strong civil rights plank, in favor of a weaker one, inoffensive to the South, and supported by the Truman White House.
"Humphrey agonized over what to do. Should he defy his party, and carry the fight to a showdown on the convention floor? The leadership of the Democratic Party said no. "Who does this little pip squeak think he is"?, asked one powerful Democrat. Truman refered to him as "one of those crackpots", who couldn't possibly understand what would happen if the South left the party. If Humphrey forced the convention to amend the platform in favor of a stronger civil rights plank, the delegates might refuse, not only setting back the fledgling civil rights movement, but making a laughingstock of Hubert Humphrey, and spoiling his own race for the Senate later that year. On the other hand, if he took the fight to the floor and won, the southern delegates might walk out, and cost Harry Truman the Presidency."
Humphrey, in his diary, said the decision should have been easy. His plank was both morally and politically right and it would have "grave repercussions on our lives". It would make many people political outcasts and it could have ended his career in politics and public service.
He didn't want to split the party. He didn't want his career to end, as he called it, "from Mayor, to pipsqueak, to oblivion". But, he also understood that he had to make a clear cut commitment to civil rights.
This was "radical" back in 1948. The plank read "We call upon Congress to support our President in guaranteeing these basic and fundamental rights: 1) The right of full and equal political participation. 2) The right to equal opportunity of employment. 3) The right of security of person. 4) The right of equal treatment in the service and defense of our nation."
Really radical stuff there. The South was a different country back then. It still is in many ways. South of the Mason-Dixon line, or as some blacks called it back then, The Smith-Wesson line, segregation was the law of the land. Upheld, and protected by violence, whether necessary or not.
Humphrey knew he would be strongly opposed. But, he said that Southern Whites needed to hear his words as much as Southern Blacks. He had a reputation for giving many long winded speeches. Moyers said that when God passed out glands, Hubert got two helpings. He set records for subjects he could approach simultaneously with an open mouth. This one took less than ten minutes. His conscience took over. He knew that the way to get ahead was not to go against your party. He decided to appeal to the best instinct in man, instead of basest instinct.
"To those who say we are rushing this issue of civil rights, I say we are 172 years late". "For those who say this is an infringement on states rights, I say this, the time in America has arrived for the Democratic Party to get out of the shadow of states rights, and to walk forthrightly in the bright sunlight of human rights".
When he finished, there was a deafening roar. Delegates cheered and shouted. A 40 piece band marched the aisles, playing. Order was only restored when Sam Rayburn ordered all the lights dimmed. The delegates overruled the Platform Committee by a wide margin.
Mississippi's entire delegation walked out along with half of Alabama's. They moved on to form the Dixiecrat Party, with a platform for "segregation, and racial integrity". They nominated Strom Thurmond for President, and he carried South Carolina, Mississippi, Alabama, and Louisiana.
Even by losing the South, Humphrey so energized the Democratic Party, that Truman won the election, which he was supposed to lose badly.
What Hubert Humphrey teaches us, is what real leadership and vision can accomplish. You don't have to compromise your morals to get support from the amoral. Why do we have to kow-tow to racists, corporatists, and criminals to get their support.
If you make a stand on moral principal, the people will back you all the way. Even if it's not the most politically expedient thing to do. Their talking heads and apologists, and various corporate subversives might say nasty things about you. Make up lies, or even make jokes about you. But, when you want to do what's right. Take it to the people, and they'll have your back.
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