Most of you reading this know of Nikki Haley’s answer at a town hall meeting in New Hampshire where she failed to mention slavery as a cause of the Civil War, and then seemed perplexed when pressed on the point. If you missed it:

She’s taken a lot of heat, with good cause. I suggested on Facebook that she needs to take one of those forbidden history classes or read one of those banned books, but in truth she has to know full well the role of slavery.

After all, South Carolina where she had served as governor seceded from the Union explicitly to preserve the “right of property in slaves.” In its Declaration of the Immediate Causes Which Induce and Justify the Secession of South Carolina from the Federal Union, the state wrote,

We affirm that these ends for which this Government [meaning the United States] was instituted have been defeated, and the Government itself has been made destructive of them by the action of the non-slaveholding States. Those States have assume the right of deciding upon the propriety of our domestic institutions; and have denied the rights of property established in fifteen of the States and recognized by the [U.S.] Constitution; they have denounced as sinful the institution of slavery; they have permitted open establishment among them of societies, whose avowed object is to disturb the peace and to eloign the property of the citizens of other States. They have encouraged and assisted thousands of our slaves to leave their homes; and those who remain, have been incited by emissaries, books and pictures to servile insurrection.

So Haley knew, but to acknowledge it would invite the wrath of the history-denying MAGA base.

Beyond the Glaring Omission

All the ruckus is about what Haley didn’t say. What I find interesting is what she did say:

It always comes down to the role of government and what the rights of the people are. And I will always stand by the fact that I think that government was intended to secure the rights and freedoms of the people. It was never meant to be all things to all people.

• Government doesn’t need to tell you how to live your life,
• They don’t need to tell you what you can and can’t do,
• They don’t need to be a part of your life,
• They need to make sure that you have freedom,
• We need to have capitalism,
• We need to have economic freedom,
• We need to make sure that we do all things so that individuals have the liberties so they can have freedom of speech, freedom of religion, and freedom to do or to be anything they want to be without government getting in the way.

I could do without the capitalism reference, but otherwise it sounds pretty good! She got it right — or could have but for the fact she and her party are actually doing everything possible…

• …to force government into our lives,
• …to tell us how we ought to live our lives,
• …to deny us our freedom of speech,
• …to deny us the right to do or to be anything we want to be.

Examples are abundant everywhere.

The right to abortion and contraception are being denied in states across the country. An Ohio woman is even facing a possible felony prosecution for having a miscarriage! Gerrymandering on steroids is embedding Republican majorities in state legislatures regardless of their competition and contrary to area demographics. These majority-Republican state legislatures have pushed over 500 anti-LGBTQ+ bills this year alone, mostly targeting the transgender community, with 84 becoming law. Book bans and “Don’t Say Gay” laws arespreading ever wider. Republican state legislatures are enacting blatant voter suppression laws.

All this, and more, in the name of “freedom.”

Haley almost had it right. If only she and the Republican Party could actually mean what they say about freedom. 

A person’s actions will tell you all that you need to know. Actions speak louder than words.

Title image is in the Public Domain.
Video is excerpted from an MSNBC clip on YouTube, intended as Fair Use.

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