Forces of Evolution

On July 3^rd, 1863, after two days of horrendous fighting in the small Pennsylvania town of Gettysburg, the Army of Northern Virginia began to form up behind a tree covered tract. Directly in front of it, on a gradual hill almost two miles away, lay the Army of the Potomac. Confederate General Robert E. Lee surveyed the battlefield. For two days, his rebel army had fought, bled, and died in an attempt to defeat the Union army, march on Washington and gain peace and independence for the Confederacy.

            Lee ordered General George Pickett to lead a grand charge across the open hillside and attack the dug in Union army at its center. A clump of trees sat at the Northern army line’s mile-wide center. “Aim for the copse of trees,” Pickett urged his officers as the 15,000 strong division began the long march forward.

            The troops marched as cannon fire and small bore canister shells tore gaping holes in their ranks. The men reformed and pressed forward moving in an orderly, disciplined march into a furious wall of fire. Barely half strength, they reached the front of the Union line. During furious hand to hand fighting a small number of rebel troops managed to breach the Union defenses and pour through at the copse of trees. For a few dramatic moments the battle hung in the balance with those few Confederate soldiers on the cusp of victory. But, a rapid Union counter-attack overwhelmed the rebel soldiers. In less than six hours the haggard Army of Northern Virginia retreated from the battlefield. They were badly beaten and would never again threaten an invasion of the north. Within two years, the Confederate States of America would cease to exist as an independent body. They foolishly marched into a withering fire and were slaughtered. For a few brief moments at the copse of trees they could sense victory. It was their high water mark. It would never return.

            I thought about that army as I watched the Presidential election returns with ninety other inmates, almost every one of whom had their TV turned on as the news broadcast the results. The vast majority of men in this place saw the re-election of President Obama as a wondrous event. They cannot separate race and economic status from a campaign. Obama, they believe, is just like them. They don’t understand that the President abhors gangs and crime, and that he is part of the “one percent.”

            For me, as I watched more states go “blue” I couldn’t help but think I was witnessing the high water mark of the GOP. Never again, I fear, will they muster sufficient national strength to win. It is ironic that so many in the current Republican Party reject evolution, because evolution explains their predicament. They either evolve or die off. I believe they will choose the latter.

            I spend a great deal of time each day explaining history, philosophy, politics, and economics to my fellow convicted felons. For many in here, I’m the most educated man they’ve ever met. And, as the election approached I found myself explaining the Republican’s positions on virtually every subject. Most of the time, however, I found myself serving as an apologist for the party of Lincoln, a party that has lost its identity and its way.

            Some reading this may wonder what an inmate, a convicted felon, is doing advising anyone. Good question. Perhaps, more than most, I know what it means to lose one’s way. Perhaps, more than most, I know you can change. But staying inert means ruin.

            Republicans lost both the popular vote and the Electoral College vote even as they took more than 59% of the white vote with sizeable majorities in those ages 35 to 64 and over 65. If the United States was all married, white, church-going families with children, Mitt Romney would be president. The problem the Republicans have is that’s not America in 2013.

            Thirteen percent of all voters were Black. Romney got 7% of those. Eleven percent of all voters were Hispanic (more in some of the crucial swing states). Romney lost that block 71% to 27%. Young voters (18 to 30) accounted for 19% of the votes tabulated. Romney lost them two to one. You will not win many elections where you start out conceding one of every three votes.

            Why doesn’t the party of Lincoln have more sway with minority voters? After all, both Black and Hispanic voters match white marital and church demographics so prized among the Republican establishment. Could it be because of the harsh rhetoric and outrageous social positions taken by Republicans smack of racism?

            I have learned a good deal during my incarceration. Here are a few basics. First, any rational parent, regardless of color, wants their children to have a better life than they do. Second, people come to America for opportunity. In spite of this nation’s faults, it is still looked at as the one place where dreams for a better life can come true. It’s what drove white Puritans here in the seventeenth century and what drives Mexicans, Columbians, Sudanese, Chinese, and people from a hundred other countries to come here.

            In many ways, I now accept that my time in prison has made me into a better man. I’ve become a born again Christian. I don’t say that lightly. I never believed in such a thing. Life, however, when it tears at your gut and you wonder, “Can I survive tonight?” brings you face to face with the Almighty. I was an ordained Deacon, Elder, and Sunday School teacher in my church. And from all appearances, I was a “good Christian.” But I wasn’t. It wasn’t until I sat alone in a cell and had nothing left that I turned to God. I evolved. Perhaps that’s the place the Republican Party now finds itself.

            A good deal will be written about this election. Fault will be assessed. “Romney was the wrong candidate” some will argue. Others will blame the Tea Party for their intolerance on issues such as gay rights, abortion, and birth control. But, like inmates coming to grips with their crimes and atoning for their wrong doing the Republicans must be open to change.

            Abraham Lincoln came to believe that the Civil War, the earth shattering bloodletting the nation underwent was divinely required to end the scourge of slavery. But Lincoln also saw the future. He knew those same battling people could eventually find “the better angels in ourselves.”

            You either evolve or you die. That is the crossroad the Grand Old Party stands before.