Carson Holloway is a political scientist and the author of The Way of Life: John Paul II and the Challenge of Liberal Modernity (Baylor University Press) and Hamilton versus Jefferson in the Washington Administration (forthcoming from Cambridge University Press).
Below is an excerpt from his essay, " Donald Trump, George Will, and the Crisis of Conservatism," Crisis magazine, Oct. 15, 2015:
According to Machiavelli, a prince who faces a popular rebellion has proven himself to be an incompetent prince. If he had known his business, he would have been able to keep his people contented. The people, Machiavelli observed, are generally passive and therefore decent. They are not inclined to make trouble unless they have been provoked. The "great"-the wealthy and powerful-are troublemakers, because they tend to be ambitious and have the means to advance their ambitions. In contrast, the people do not want to oppress anyone; they only want not to be oppressed. If they are agitated and disobedient, it is a sign of misrule.
America is now facing a kind of rebellion. It is not a rebellion of the whole country but of Republican voters, and it is not a violent rebellion but a political one revealed by polls. Donald Trump-a first-time candidate for any public office-is, for the time being at least, decisively ascendant over men who have served for years in positions of high political responsibility.
As bad as that sounds, the reality is actually worse. Those Republican candidates who are clearly rebels against the Republican Party-Trump, Ben Carson, Carly Fiorina, and Ted Cruz-are currently winning, according to the national surveys, almost half of the support of polled Republican voters. Thus have the rank and file members of a great political party decided to fly off from their natural leaders-governors and senators. This could not occur unless these voters believed that their own leaders were indifferent or hostile to their interests and convictions. Republican leaders should ask themselves candidly how their own voters could come to believe this. [...]
Translated into modern electoral politics, Machiavelli's teaching reminds us that the people-voters-will not be moved to support a candidate or party by nothing but a raw appeal to self-interest. They also expect, even demand, an appeal to their sense of justice and righteousness. This is not to romanticize the people. They have no very precise notions about how to secure the common good, and they are certainly self-interested, as are all human beings. But the people are generally too decent to vote on the basis of nothing but self-interest. That is surely as true of the American people as it was of any people that Machiavelli had the opportunity to observe.
Such an appeal to something higher than self-interest is especially necessary in presidential elections, when the fate of the whole country appears to be at stake. Few voters are so small-minded and self-absorbed as to fail to have some sense that the country is something greater than their own personal interests. The strength of Democrats in such elections arises from their appeal to a moral vision of political life. That vision may be simplistic, misleading, or even wrong. Nevertheless, you can't beat a flawed moral vision with no moral vision. This is not idealism but hard political reality.
This brings us back to Donald Trump. His campaign slogan-"Make America Great Again"-is obviously lacking in specific content. Yet it clearly carries a certain moral weight, appealing to a patriotic love for the country that cannot be reduced to an interest in economic growth.
The success of this slogan tells us something about the aspirations of the campaign's supporters. The disappointment that has led large numbers of Republican voters to embrace Donald Trump is no mere personal disappointment. It is based on the sense that Republican elites have not just failed to secure their constituents' interests but that they have failed, even betrayed, the country itself by failing to defend the principles-such as the rule of law and the right of self-government-that have made the country worthy of our admiration. Such voters will not be lured back but insulted by an appeal to their interest in economic growth. A party that counters such a shallow appeal to voters' sense that the country is in decline will fail-and it will deserve to.
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