Political News and Conservative Analysis About Congress, the President, and the Federal Government
The astonishing political events of the last four weeks make plain, once again, how much of America’s history depends on what voters have come to accept as the choice of one person: eachcandidate. Even as the nomination process was expanded, half a century ago, to include millions of primary voters, the choice of the vice presidential nominee has devolved from smoke-filled rooms of bosses who represented large constituencies to the choice of a single person.
Roosevelt’s choice, through behind-the-scenes manipulation in the 1940 and 1944 national conventions, was himself — a wise decision in my view given his brilliance as a war leader. Similarly, Roosevelt’s behind-the-scenes choice in the 1944 Democratic convention of Harry Truman over the pro-Soviet Union incumbent Henry Wallace had enormous consequences after the 63-year-old Roosevelt’s death in April 1945.
Opponents of that war elected to Congress in 1846 included the 80-year-old former President John Quincy Adams and the 38-year-old future President Abraham Lincoln. But despite their efforts, the United States obtained from Mexico the then-mostly unpopulated New Mexico, Arizona, and California plus Mormon Utah. Had Polk, Andrew Jackson’s choice, not prevailed, would the U.S. have obtained California after gold was discovered at Sutter’s mill in 1848? No one knows.
Presidents have more leeway to set policy on our borders and beyond, as Polk and Roosevelt did to great effect. I find it difficult to predict what Trump or Harris would do about Ukraine or Taiwan, but prediction seems easier on two other issues.
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