In summer of 2019, I traveled to our nation’s capitol in Washington, D.C., for the first time in in my life. It was a whirlwind, 24-hour trip to testify to the House Committee on Oversight and Reform, and the combination of the shortness of the short stay and the packed schedule left me with almost no time for sightseeing.
I only had time to see one of the famous sites of D.C., and while many people had their suggestion, for me it was an automatic choice: The Lincoln Memorial, the monument to my lifelong hero.
To me, Abraham Lincoln has always represented the very best in American politics. His honesty and empathy are legendary. And this is why, more than ever, as we celebrate the 211th birthday of the Great Emancipator and consider the state of contemporary politics, I find it offensive beyond words when people refer to the modern Republican Party as “The Party of Lincoln.”
How can you possibly be the party of “Honest Abe” while demonstrating such blind loyalty to a president who (according to The Washington Post) has been caught in over 16,000 demonstrable falsehoods since his inauguration? While making a pariah of Sen. Mitt Romney, the one member of your party who showed the moral courage to vote both for a legitimate trial with witnesses and to follow the evidence and convict President Trump of the actions even many other Republican members of congress admit he committed?
Lincoln, as chronicled in the excellent book by eminent historian Doris Kearns Goodwin, made his cabinet into a “Team of Rivals,” moving past petty differences to form a body of the best people to serve the nation.
Trump can’t let any real or imagined slight pass, and is so consumed by petty revenge that he followed his acquittal (which was certainly not an exoneration) by firing patriotic American heroes like Lt. Col. Alexander Vindman simply for testifying against him.
Romney demonstrated ideals and integrity worthy of comparison to Lincoln. Will any other Republicans in Utah follow suit? Or will they support disgraceful plans to censure Romney in the Utah Legislature? Or to make a similar resolution declaring Utah’s support of the anti-Lincoln?
It was disheartening to see even the most moderate of Utah’s Republican gubernatorial candidates state in a recent debate that despite their differences with him, they would stand behind Trump as their party’s nominee.
These are not normal times, and party loyalty cannot excuse even passively support the attack on America’s institutions and ideals being perpetrated by the current administration.
I do not ask Utah Republicans to endorse a Democrat. But is it too much to ask that they follow Romney’s previous positions and offer no endorsement at all? If they wish to claim they belong to Lincoln’s party, this is actually asking very little.
There are good, admirable people in the Utah Republican Party. I’ve seen it this legislative session, as even some legislators who I have strongly disagreed and clashed with in the past do good things for the benefit of the people of Utah. These people are too good to remain silent now and let Romney be vilified for standing up to a dishonest bully.
It is not enough to simply state that they disagree with Romney but support him voting his conscience. I truly believe the majority of Utah’s Republican officials know that Romney was right and Trump was wrong. Romney had the courage to do what was right. Lincoln certainly would have. If other Republicans will not, they disrespect the name of Honest Abe whenever they invoke it.
Paul Gibbs
Paul Gibbs, West Valley City, is a filmmaker and health care activist who has lived in Utah most of his life and believes country and simple morality are more important than party loyalty.