After the election: Lessons from history

This column was written the day before the 2024 Presidential Election, so therefore your old columnist has no clue who will be chosen as our political leaders for the next two, four or six years. Like you, dear readers I have my favorite picks but only the counted votes, in a couple of days, will determine the winners.

It has been interesting this election season to observe the rancor of the two major parties. Each seems to be of the opinion that theirs is the only way forward and that if the other party wins, our country is headed for disaster.

Our major news outlets can be partially to blame for one-sided reporting. Mainly Grannie and I watch FOX News which mostly is favorable to the Republican viewpoint and is comfortable to us because that is how our local population seems to lean. I’m sure that FOX is not so popular in the Blue States that lean toward the Democrat viewpoint and undecided people will probably listen to their news outlets that favor that line when it comes to marking their ballots.

One thing about it is that the old guy, Former President Trump has been an indefatigable campaigner. It seems that he is holding rallies non-stop and will meet with newscasters and reporters to answer questions endlessly.

The younger of the two has spent a lot of time hiding from the press, hasn’t really done much campaigning in front of audiences and seems quite hesitant to answer any questions that aren’t preplanned. No matter, her supporters are eagerly filling in the blanks.

Also, we are supposed to be swayed by the polls. Sadly their past history in predicting the outcome of elections proves them to be not very reliable. I suspect that a lot of people don’t answer poll inquiries because like me they object to the constant request for more funds whenever you state your opinion.

My real concern is what will happen when the ballots are counted, and the new President is sworn into office. Will the winning party make changes to the purposely divided government created by those who adopted our Constitution? Will they change the Supreme Court so that it will become a political body rather than one that strictly interprets the Constitution? Border enforcement?

I have been reading Bill O’Reilly and Martin Dugard’s latest book “Confronting the Presidents.” Our country has been in turmoil before, much worse and torn apart by the Civil War.

At the end of that war, Abraham Lincoln was sworn into a second term. His language differs from today’s, but the meaning comes through. Perhaps his greatest words are from the Second Inaugural:

“With malice toward none, with charity for all, with firmness in the right as God gives us to see the right, let us strive on to finish the work we are in, to bind up the nation’s wounds, to care for him who shall have borne the battle, and for his widow and his orphan, to do all which may achieve and cherish a just and lasting peace among ourselves and with all nations.”

Sadly, President Lincoln was assassinated a short time after that address so was not able to lead our country in the direction that was in his heart.

His Vice President Andrew Johnson made a disaster of the recovery from the civil war and the effects still linger today.

There may be a lesson for our country today if one or the other of our presidential candidates is assassinated after being sworn in. Somehow I am not too proud of the Vice Presidential candidate that came from our beloved state of Nebraska.

Rather than the unthinkable I believe in my heart that our country will heal and the future will be wonderful for our children, grandchildren, great grands and beyond. Vote wisely and may God Bless!

That is the way I saw it.