Can This Nation Long Endure?

A look at the fault lines within U.S. society

Today we tackle a big question. Are the divisions in U.S. society caused by Donald Trump’s four years as president?

Many believe that Trump is the source of polarization in American society, and that during his presidency the United States lost its true sense of patriotism and national unity. They say that the attack on Congress and the killing of five American citizens during that attack happened because of Trump. However, contrary to popular belief, this notion is incorrect. The U.S. already had a history of separatist tendencies and armed conflict. The root of these issues can be found in the American system of governance, the distribution of wealth among the states, legalized discrimination, some people’s deep desire to leave the union and the revival of the state secession movement. Trump was really just a case study in American sociology.

The reality is that since June 22, 1865, when the Civil War came to an end after four years, and even before that, the U.S. has never met the definition of a united society. During the conflict between the South, or really the Southeast (consisting of South Carolina, Georgia, Florida, Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana, Texas, Arkansas, Tennessee, North Carolina and Virginia) and the 19 Northern states, 10 states remained neutral by today’s definition, and in five states, despite their being considered part of the North, slavery was still legal. This war was more a battle between the Northern institutions of power and the Northern privileged class, and the business and economic interests of the South. Southerners wanted independence and were opposed to the Senate’s intervention in the issues of slavery and trade, which they considered to be the state’s business. Northerners wanted a united political and economic system under their own direction. It was this that led to the war between Richmond, Virginia, and Washington, which divided the U.S. into Yankees (Northerners) and Rebels (Southerners).

Following the Civil War, 19 of 24 Northern states granted Black Americans the right to vote, while all of the Southern states denied Black Americans the right to vote until at least 1900, and imposed segregation from white Americans. Even so, in certain corners of American studies, Southerners are referred to as oppressed, while the North is remembered as an oppressive power. It could be said that the Emancipation Proclamation was also a proclamation that permanently divided the United States.

Abraham Lincoln’s assassination had roots in the Southerners’ desire for revenge against the North. Even the North’s efforts to rebuild the nation were never able to repair the divide in U.S. society, and in practice, led to increased poverty in the South. The war between the North and the South occurred because of the Southern industry’s reliance on the physical labor of slaves, particularly in the cotton industry. The North wanted the wealth from this industry for itself, and for this reason they politicized slavery, which was the backbone of Southern industry and agriculture. The Emancipation Proclamation thereby mobilized Black Americans against the South and put a stop to the South’s industrial power. For years after the Civil War, the American people, their leaders and their society were caught up in its aftershocks.

After the North took control of the defeated South, the North offered the South certain concessions in order to avoid future threats of secession, one of which was the Corwin Amendment. This amendment would have prevented Congress from interfering in state institutions, including slavery. In reality, this amendment attempted to preserve the union by legitimizing slavery and preventing the total dissolution of the U.S. However, in 1869, the U.S. Supreme Court officially ruled that no state has the right to secede from the Union. Despite the important challenges currently threatening the U.S., one cannot claim that the U.S. is being destroyed. The contagious disease of separatism is not unique to the U.S. It is similar to that which most countries across the globe face, but in times of political, cultural and societal strife, this trend becomes more prominent. Much of the commotion is caused by the exaggeration of the media and domestic political strife.

Nevertheless, more than ever before, the U.S. is showing a tendency toward disintegration, which is seen clearly in how Americans feel about their flag. American attitudes about their state flags and their national flag differ significantly. Rather than being a simple emblem of the states and the federal government, the state flags are often a sign of friction between states and between states and the federal government. Here, one can still see the footprints of the old South and the old North. Trump only made these domestic conflicts more obvious. From the years following the Civil War up until today, Southerners have maintained deep emotional ties to the Confederate Army. Civil War cemeteries are still greatly respected, Confederate uniforms are sold in many Southern cities, and many still attend ceremonies at these cemeteries while dressed in those uniforms. The tremendous difference between the economies of the North and the South still remains. The results of the recent U.S. presidential election left a destructive mark on the American psyche regarding the concepts of government, freedom and the people. This mark was so powerful that it seems a large portion of voters considered leaving the Republican Party. Trump has been a significant factor in this chaos, a man who signaled the final death knell of a dream that many Republicans still maintained.

We are not facing a new occurrence in U.S. history, but rather the continuation of a powerful force that has long been suppressed. For this reason, the elite say that we must rally the people around the torch of democracy, whose light shined so dimly in the recent election. Despite what many wish to believe, most Republican members of Congress and senators support Trump. This was shown by the Democrats’ defeat and the defeat of Republican leaders when Trump appeared on the political scene. In practice, however, the Republican Party is facing a serious split. In order to compete with the Democrats, the party needs the votes of both Trump’s supporters and those who oppose him. The party cannot expect to remain a part of America’s political future without a united electorate. This has in turn bolstered the Democrats’ position in the country.

Upheaval within the Republican Party could put Trump’s wing of the party in power or increase his influence. There is also the small possibility of him forming an “America” party. Trump has been able to shift the political conversation in the country and create challenges of identity for an established political party, as well as the larger political and security structure of the U.S. This only goes to show the vulnerability caused by America’s inconsistent political structure, the people’s dissatisfaction with the current definition of unity and the lack of a fair distribution of wealth among the states.

Predicting the future is a difficult task, but if the U.S. is unable to ease this inter-state tension, it is possible that it will face a serious security crisis and that we will witness permanent changes in the structure of the U.S., or even the formation of individual state republics, similar to what is being seen in Europe. For many years now the concept of nation-states has been gradually fading due to local nationalism, party conflict and armed conflict in the form of guerrilla and conventional warfare. In the past, such trends led to the defeat of great empires such as those of Persia, Greece, Rome, the Ottomans, China, and even Japan, Napoleonic France, the kingdoms of Britain, Spain, Portugal and the Soviet Union. Each of these events also led to upheaval in the world balance of power. For years now, the bells of separatism have been ringing in parts of the U.K., Spain, Italy and Germany, and the Russian Federation is currently facing the threat of new republics forming within its borders. Considering the construct of the states that make up the U.S., this trend could continue there as well. The makeup of each state’s population determines how its inhabitants view many different issues. Many state inhabitants trace their roots back to European countries both prior to and following America’s independence from England, and given the conflict between these peoples before their migration to the U.S., disagreement over sensitive issues such as security and national unity could arise and lead to an increase in tensions between the states.

Let me illustrate for you the fault lines that still remain in U.S. society from the Civil War. During the 2020 presidential election between Trump and Joe Biden, 17 states supported a Texas lawsuit asking the Supreme Court to annul Biden’s victory, nearly all of which were Southern states that seceded during the Civil War. Add to that the fact that all of these states voted for Trump, states such as South Carolina, Texas, Mississippi, Louisiana, Florida, Alabama and West Virginia. Coincidentally, these are also the seven states whose flags take inspiration from the Confederate banner. To the same degree that countries such as Russia, Spain, Turkey, China and India face ethnic and regional concerns, the U.S. is facing serious problems of regional nationalism and a desire to leave the union.

The recent winter weather crisis that struck many states, especially Texas, and the inability to supply water to more than 1 million Americans, illustrated how wide the gap among the states truly is. Let us remember that Texas was the brains behind the South’s war against the North. It might even seem that, as a political policy to preserve the union and maintain Northern dominance after the war, the North has kept Southern states in a weakened state, and that is why Southerners continue to suffer from poverty even now, all these years after the war.

In 1860, one year before the outbreak of the Civil War, the 12 richest states in the U.S. were in the South. Mississippi, which in that year was the richest state in the Union according to the data, was the poorest state in the U.S. between 2010 and 2014. One could say that the main reason for the Civil War was competition among the states, as Northerners took steps to place tariffs of up to 40% on Southern imports from Europe. These wounds have never healed, and although the states are now united under the banner of 50 stars, within the country, many Southerners continue to fly the old Confederate flag. The South and the North disagree even in school textbooks, and lessons on the Civil War are based on the viewpoint of the two separate sides that print and teach them. According to current Southerners and those of the past, the Civil War was about the South defending the “freedom of commerce” and struggling against the “War of Northern Aggression.” It was a “war between the states”; you will never hear it called the Civil War. In the Civil War, 20% of Southern white men were killed, and 90% of the South’s factories, industries, economy and agriculture were destroyed, fostering a deep-seated grudge against the North.

In 1961, on the 100th anniversary of the outbreak of the Civil War, Southerners set up a massive show of support for the ideals and symbol of their ancestors, and South Carolina officially declared its desire to reinstate the old charter of independence, demonstrating that it still maintained a wish to leave the Union. In truth, the people of the South wanted to secede from the U.S. shortly after American independence from England, and threats of secession go back to 1850 or earlier. Social concessions to Black Americans were more of a way for Northern leaders to weaken the South rather than part of any genuine belief in combating racial discrimination, and legislation that granted rights to Black Americans caused political and societal unrest in the South and led to martial law in the South following the war. It is important to note that, to the same degree Northerners believed that control over the South’s wealth was more important than slavery, the South believed that its slaves were more important than the nation’s unity.

Lincoln said, “A house divided against itself cannot stand,” and that warning still persists today. While the American people fear their country’s collapse, American historians believe that with the 13th Amendment and 14th Amendment to the Constitution in 1865 and 1868 respectively, the possibility of any state seceding and the possibility of the nation’s destruction was eliminated. The nation that came into being in 1776 became an indivisible nation in 1865. But the American people’s natural concern is based on their familiarity with a conflict that has persisted from independence in 1776 up until today. In reality, only 70 years after independence, the South began to show signs of open disobedience with respect to the federal government, and just 15 years later, in 1861, it resorted to war. Now, 159 years later in the 2020 presidential election, the South proved that the wound of the Civil War has still not healed, and that it will use any opportunity to flee from its union with Washington. Trump was just such an opportunity.

Lincoln’s question in his speech at Gettysburg is the same question that many Americans and experts on American issues are asking themselves. Lincoln said, “Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation ... can long endure.” He called into question the security of the U.S., stating his belief that the union must live on. American leaders then were fearful of the destruction of the country, and today, U.S. leaders continue to fear this possibility.

I believe that Lyndon Johnson’s speech on Nov. 27, 1963 can serve as the marker of the relationship between America’s slow death and the issue of the South and the North. Johnson said before Congress, “We will serve all the nation, not one section or one sector, or one group, but all Americans. These are the United States – a united people with a united purpose. Our American unity does not depend upon unanimity. We have differences; but now, as in the past, we can derive from those differences strength, not weakness, wisdom, not despair.” Biden’s inauguration speech expressed this same concern, one that he shares with all the leaders who came before him. The world is watching as America grapples with issues of domestic security, but the American union seriously benefits from its position as a superpower in foreign relations. Despite the internal tug-of-war taking place between American leaders, which often causes issues for America’s international standing, analysts believe that American capabilities continue to grow, mostly due to the strength of its economic and military infrastructure.

Today, unlike during the election, world media are not focused on U.S. society or those issues that highlight the divisions within the U.S. American institutions are trying to quickly push aside the sensitive topics that could threaten the unity of the U.S. and pit Americans against each other. Nonetheless, the states that, 160 years ago, fought for four years to leave the union, are now dangerous powder kegs that still have the potential to explode after all these years, and which could destroy the U.S. from within. The power of racism in the U.S. cannot be ignored. Despite this, the U.S. tries to keep this old, but powerful, challenge out of sight in order to minimize any vulnerability its enemies might exploit. In all of this, I see the natural cycle of the birth and death of nations, and the shifting of power as the ancient wheel turns.