The American Spectator

TAS Live

(Page 2 of 9)

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Our country has accepted obligations that are difficult to fulfill, and would be dishonorable to abandon. Yet because we have acted in the great liberating tradition of this nation, tens of millions have achieved their freedom. And as hope kindles hope, millions more will find it. By our efforts we have lit a fire as well -- a fire in the minds of men. It warms those who feel its power, it burns those who fight its progress, and one day this untamed fire of freedom will reach the darkest corners of our world.

br> Note how the rhetoric here steadily mounts in intensity while remaining securely within the confines of restraint, and note too how the rhythmic beat reinforces the idea being conveyed. Note also how the image of fire is developed through an organic and inexorable progression: first it "kindles," then it "warms," then it "burns," and finally, in a triumphant crescendo, it blazes so "untamed" that it can light up "the darkest corners of our world."

This is a level of literary power that can only be reached by a writer in total command of his material and absolutely faithful to its own inner demands.

SO MUCH, then, for the charges against the speech as a piece of writing: they are no less ridiculous than those the Chicago Times hurled against the "literary construction" of Lincoln's Second Inaugural. But making itself even more ridiculous, the Chicago Times added that "in its ideas, its sentiments, its grasp," Lincoln's speech was also "slip shod, loose-jointed, and puerile." In my opinion, the analogous charges that have been made against the substance of Bush's Second Inaugural are -- and will in time be seen -- as equally preposterous.

Let me begin with the least credible of these charges -- that there is, as the headline of Peggy Noonan's piece in the Wall Street Journal put it, "way too much God" in the speech. I for one -- but not by any means I alone -- was taken aback to see this criticism coming from Peggy Noonan, who has never previously been notable for complaining about expressions of religious faith in the public square. Be that as it may, by my count there are five references to God here (one of them within a quote from Lincoln), as compared with eight, plus several extended citations from the Bible, in Lincoln's own Second Inaugural (which, interestingly, was itself attacked by the New York World for "abandoning all pretense of statesmanship" and taking "refuge in piety"). I have not gone through all the other inaugural addresses in American history, but I would guess that they all contain at least as many invocations of God as Bush's did. (John F. Kennedy's has four, plus a verse from the prophet Isaiah.) Measured by what standard, then, is there "way too much" in Bush's Second Inaugural?

Another frequently registered objection is that the speech overreaches -- that in promising to end tyranny everywhere in the world it sets forth a goal which is far too ambitious and uses language which is far too universalist. This is a more serious criticism, and yet, as with the one about too much God, it is hard to see in what way Bush is any more ambitious and universalist than his major 20th-century predecessors, either in their own Inaugural Addresses or in speeches on other crucially important occasions.

p>The most obvious example is Woodrow Wilson, who promised to "make the world safe for democracy" by sending Americans to fight in World War I. True, the horrors and then the disillusioning aftermath of that war helped to discredit Wilson's slogan. But that did not prevent Franklin D. Roosevelt, the next Democrat to win the presidency, from going even further in preparing the nation for an eventual entry into World War II: br> /p> blockquote>We look forward to a world founded upon four essential human freedoms. br> The first is freedom of speech and expression --everywhere in the world. br> The second is freedom of every person to worship God in his own way -- everywhere in the world. br> The third is freedom from want... -- everywhere in the world. br> The fourth is freedom from fear… -- anywhere in the world.

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