What Loyalty Can Do
lacking sense but yielding results
During the battle between George Washington’s two most important cabinet members, Alexander Hamilton and Thomas Jefferson, Hamilton came to feel betrayed by his Federalist Papers ally, James Madison—because ultimately, Madison sided with Jefferson, his fellow Virginian and old friend.
Looking back, it shouldn’t be too surprising that Madison’s loyalty to Jefferson trumped his former alliance with Hamilton. The two would become intertwined for years to come, a partnership that resulted in a more limited central government, the destruction of the Federalist Party, a 24-year Jeffersonian presidential reign (Jefferson-Madison-Monroe), and the eventual shutdown of the national bank under Andrew Jackson who, though distrusted by Jefferson himself, was still a continuation of Jeffersonian politics.
- Loyalty doesn't always have to make sense, but it is fundamental to acquiring power and yielding results -
Years down the road, FDR, in his first bid for the presidency, used Jefferson as his rallying symbol. The two would’ve been opposed to each other if they’d been contemporaries; one was for limited government, the other a centralizing force. But a d(D)emocratic-common man stranglehold had been set in place more than a 100 years before. Jefferson being the symbol of democratic politics, spoke for the common man in his day…and FDR positioned himself to do so in his. Perpetuating a loyalty between the one and the many that yielded results in the 19th century, and one that set in motion the New Deal-bureaucratic apparatus that controls much of present-day politics.
When former supporters whine about Trump betraying his base, they’re playing the game of politics backward. Because though they often subscribe to Elite Theory, they’re positioning themselves as disappointed and downtrodden populists. Power can only be acquired when loyalty flows upward, readying the populace for results.
- Nonsense and paradox are the cornerstones of American politics. How to tame such chaos? Upward loyalty—a process sometimes lacking in sense, but one that emboldens a sense of order for the next guy -