“Yes, Dan'l Webster's dead ----- or, at least, they buried him. But every time there's a thunderstorm around Marshfield, they say you can hear his rolling voice in the hollows of the sky. And they say that if you go to his grave and speak loud and clear, "Dan'l Webster ----- Dan'l Webster!" the ground'll begin to shiver and the trees begin to shake. And after a while you'll hear a deep voice saying, "Neighbor, how stands the Union?" Then you better answer the Union stands as she stood, rock-bottomed and copper-sheathed, one and indivisible, or he's liable to rear right out of the ground. At least, that's what I was told when I was a youngster.”
Cassi Creek:
I recall reading this tale at a fairly young age, certainly before I was deemed mature enough by the local library or the school board to read anything with the word “Hell” in it. It was a fun encounter of the Faustian sort with Benet and with the political power house that was Webster.
It is entirely appropriate to revisit the tale today. Today Obama will deliver the “”State of the Union” address to both houses of Congress plus other officials and dignitaries. His constitutionally required report, delivered as a speech to a joint session by every POTUS since Woodrow Wilson began the tradition, will be less report than political speech. Following his speech the Republican party and the teavangelists will also deliver televised speeches purporting to be informational but which will be essentially carefully structured political ads based upon lies and misinformation intended to discredit a sitting POTUS.
The rebuttal speeches began in 1966. They’ve continued every year since then and in no instance are they anything but denunciations of the party in control of the White House.
Tonight, Obama will deliver a carefully crafted speech, trying to lift his abilities as an orator to higher levels than they merit. Daniel Webster’s oratory was never recorded. I have been, however, privileged to hear either live or via recording, many gifted orators: Winston Churchill, Franklin Roosevelt, Theodore Roosevelt, and John and Robert Kennedy. Obama, and every President who held office after JFK are not gifted orators or even gifted at reading speeches. Certainly the format that the State of the Union address has assumed is not conducive to finely tuned oratory. But the quality of the product seems greatly dimished from what we once were privileged to hear.
Tonight I see the GOP\teavangelists collectively playing the role of Mr. Scratch, arguing to a jury of their choosing, preaching a pseudo-patriotism that costs the lives of our soldiers while selling their own souls to the devil for financial backing and re-election. That must place Obama and his writers in the role of Daniel Webster. I’m sorry to relate that the role is poorly cast. Were it my soul in jeopardy of repossession I’d be truly worried. Obama is no JFK, no Daniel Webster either in words or in deeds.
In Benet’s short story, patriotism and honor triumph over evil, the Union stands strong. Unfortunately, in our reality the jury remains corrupt, the Union is yet again at risk of fighting the same Civil War against the same causes of greed, racism, and intolerance that led to the first Civil War.
For years I’ve been misquoting Webster concerning Dartmouth College. He said,” It is, sir, as I have said, a small college. And yet there are those who love it!"
I learned this, erroneously, as “It is a small place and I love it dearly!” With all due apologies to Daniel Webster, It is, I do, and shall so continue.
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