I wrote a column last year where I questioned whether Barry Goldwater would recognize today's Republican Party. It seems his granddaughter, CC Goldwater, has made a documentary that has affirmed my previous notions.
In "Mr. Conservative: Goldwater on Goldwater," Goldwater the granddaughter provides us with hindsight that creates the type of 20/20 vision that one may not have in the moment.
She uses interviews with family members, friends, politicians and media including U.S. Sens. Edward Kennedy,
D-Mass., and Hillary Rodham Clinton, D-N.Y.; former Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O'Connor; and former Washington Post editor Ben Bradlee along with footage of the 1950s-60s to put the Goldwater brand of libertarian conservatism into perspective.
Like CC Goldwater, I, too, was 5 in 1964 when Lyndon Johnson defeated Goldwater for president in a landslide. I grew up in a house that taught me that Goldwater's opposition to the Civil Rights Act of 1964 made him a de facto racist.
My uncle used to say, "For black people, Goldwater today meant bread and water tomorrow."
Time, however, has a way of toning down hyperbole and, with the upheaval of the 1960s behind us, it is easier to see Goldwater in a somewhat different light.
One thing is certain: Goldwater's deeply held libertarian convictions, along with his brutal honesty, would not play well in today's political climate. The documentary revealed before his assassination, John F. Kennedy toyed with the idea of leasing a plane during the 1964 election and travel with Goldwater to various spots for debates.
It seems that Goldwater and JFK, in spite of their varying political viewpoints, actually liked each other. In our partisan political climate that melds philosophical difference with personal dislike, it seems unlikely that anything of that nature could happen today.
We are also reminded of the limitations when one embraces a strict set of beliefs. Though it is difficult not to respect such convictions, they can also blind one to reality.
While I understand Goldwater's libertarian reasoning for opposing the Civil Rights Act of 1964 -- I would even argue that it was courageous -- his desire for federalism fell miserably short of the needs of 25 million American citizens.
It is one thing to believe states should defer to the federal government on certain issues such as defense and foreign affairs while retaining self-government in principle; it is another to ignore that black citizens, particularly in the South, were systematically denied access to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. This doesn't make Goldwater racist, it does enslave him to his ideology.
Though he lost the 1964 election decisively, Goldwater has been acknowledged, and rightfully so, as laying the foundation for the current dominance of conservative orthodoxy, which has lasted for more than a quarter-century.
Columnist George Will noted that while most believed Goldwater had lost in 1964, he actually won; it just took 16 years to count the votes. If it took 16 years, as Will suggests, for Goldwater to be validated, it has taken 26 years to show just how far today's conservatism has gone astray.
How many pro-choice, pro-gays-in-the-military conservatives are there today? This may be the one area where the so-called moderate or "Rockefeller Republican" still holds a majority.
Goldwater conservatism had justifiable distrust for the Jerry Falwell-type morality that is pervasive in contemporary GOP dogma. I can't see Goldwater supporting the abusive manner that the Republican Congress interjected itself into the Terri Schiavo case. Moreover, he displayed the type of self-reflection that led him to rethink certain positions -- unheard of in this White House.
Goldwater may be to conservatism what Karl Marx is to communism -- interesting ideas but never fully attempted. Today's conservatism represents the 180-degree antitheses of what Goldwater articulated throughout his political career.
It is doubtful given the current administration's preoccupation with wars, torture and record deficits that it has the time to watch CC Goldwater's HBO documentary. Too bad, the administration might learn what conservatism is meant to be.
Note: In my last column, I wrote that Maher Arar had been tortured in Jordan. He was actually tortured in Syria.
Byron Williams is an Oakland pastor and syndicated columnist. E-mail him at byron@byronspeaks.com or leave a message at (510) 208-6417. Send a letter to the editor to soundoff@angnewspapers.com.