Virginia Postrel writes a must-read review of a forthcoming book on racism in the Progressive movement.
restricting immigration was as central to the progressive agenda as regulating railroads. Indeed, in his five-volume History of the American People, Wilson lumped together in one long paragraph the 1882 Chinese Exclusion Act and the 1887 Interstate Commerce Act as “the first fruits of radical economic changes and the rapid developments of trade, industry, and transportation” — equal harbingers of the modern administrative state. With a literacy test and ban on most other Asian immigrants enacted in 1917 and national quotas established in 1924, the progressives bequeathed to America the concept of illegal immigration.
This would put Trump in the Progressive tradition. Perhaps he does not fit there. But he certainly does not fit in the libertarian tradition.
The book Postrel review in her essay (not the book by Wilson) is “Illiberal Reformers: Race, Eugenics and American Economics in the Progressive Era, by Thomas C. Leonard. Surely there will be a review by Jonah Goldberg in some future issue of the Claremont Review of Books.
Wilson is having his name removed from Princeton by 2015 progressives for being a racist.
By removing his name they hope to fool themselves that they have removed his influence.
In terms of the racism of the Progressive this is not news to anybody with any history knowledge. But when Democrat (and Dixiecrat at that) LBJ signed the Civil Rights Voting Act history broke in half on the issue. Remember LBJ believe the Democrats would probably lose the South.
Unfortunately for the Libertarian movement, Trump does not truly belong the true believers but any knowledge of Ron Paul supporters and newsletters shows historical supporters libertarians have believed in Trumpism. Anyway, how is Rand Paul and Trump position on immigration that much different.
I would say it originated in the constitution when it banned the importation of slaves after 1815, but maybe we should call that commerce. 😉
Does it make sense to use the phrase “progressive tradition” when the particular position under discussion has not been conserved and, indeed, was abandoned in a strongly bipartisan manner half a century ago? I don’t think so. There’s been way too much water under the bridge in the last 90-120 years.
Test – would a self-identifying contemporary progressive use the phrase ‘the progressive tradition’ non-ironically to include these old immigration policies? I doubt it. Also, it’s not like all major Libertarian intellectuals have always been in favor of open borders as a matter of principle. So what’s the Libertarian ‘tradition’ on immigration, exactly?
Using these kinds of continuous coalition labels to either applaud or smear someone based on a few overlaps with those very old positions – which were abandoned by the political inheritors long ago – is at least a little unkosher.
Of course the really funny thing is that prominent pundits have been telling us that Trump is either clearly a ‘fascist’ or – like Douthat has done three times now – almost-but-not-exactly-completely-a-total-fascist and maybe just a ‘proto-fascist’.