Queen Elizabeth showed how to unite people
The life of Queen Elizabeth II, who died last week at the age of 96, illustrated the extraordinary skill, effort and integrity needed to unify a nation.
At the age of 14, she gave a radio address together with her sister to calm and reassure children who were evacuated during the dark days of World War II. Many decades later she was equally calm and reassuring in a public address during the COVID-19 lockdown.
“Together we are tackling this disease,” she said on April 5, 2020, “and I want to reassure you that if we remain united and resolute, then we will overcome it. I hope in the years to come everyone will be able to take pride in how they responded to this challenge, and those who come after us will say the Britons of this generation were as strong as any, that the attributes of self-discipline, of quiet, good-humored resolve, and of fellow feeling still characterize this country. The pride in who we are is not a part of our past, it defines our present and our future.”
By law, Britain’s monarch is above politics, and no incumbent American president could be exactly the same kind of unifying force, even if gifted with Queen Elizabeth’s hard-earned wisdom and judgment.
However, other American presidents have been a lot better at it than Joe Biden, who seems to have decided to wage war on half the population of the United States.
In a prime-time address to the nation from historic Independence Hall in Philadelphia, Biden declared, “the Republican Party today is dominated, driven and intimidated by Donald Trump and the MAGA Republicans. And that is a threat to this country.”
To be clear, what he means by “dominated” is that many Americans are choosing to vote for Republicans endorsed by the former president, creating a certain wariness among incumbent Republicans who are considering their own positions in relation to a potential Trump candidacy in 2024.
Biden portrayed himself as the defender of “democracy,” but his clear implication was that voters’ choices are both illegitimate and a threat to the country unless they align with his own choices.
“Too much of what’s happening in our country today is not normal,” Biden asserted. “Donald Trump and the MAGA Republicans represent an extremism that threatens the very foundations of our Republic.”
It didn’t help that the
White House team had chosen to bathe Independence Hall in solid red light and frame the president with two U.S. Marines, as if he was threatening disobedient voters with military force.
“MAGA Republicans are destroying American democracy,” Biden declared. He didn’t define “MAGA Republicans” other than to imply that it includes anyone who supports former President Trump. Given that more than 74 million Americans voted for Trump in 2020, Biden is accusing roughly half the voters in America of threatening the Republic.
While an American president cannot duplicate the “above politics” aura of the British monarch, there are occasions of national unity at which presidents have risen above the fray to speak for all Americans. Queen Elizabeth’s funeral will be one such occasion. If President Biden invites former presidents to join him in the official U.S. delegation, he would be wise to invite former President Trump. To exclude him would be a particularly small and divisive gesture, even more so in the shadow of the queen’s memory.