Trump's Election Fraud Speech and the Illusion of Proof, Part Two

Donald Trump

In his July 16, 2026 speech about election security, United States President Donald Trump made several startling claims about the nation’s elections. Furthermore, he simultaneously released documents in an attempt to prove them. Among his claims, he asserted that noncitizens are illegally voting: 

“According to the DHS review, state voter rolls and public records, they identified approximately 278,000 non-citizens who are registered to vote in federal elections.” 

As I pointed out in yesterday’s post, Trump’s speech created the illusion that he was proving things that he did not, in fact, prove. Instead of stating the proof during his actual speech, Trump referred listeners to the White House website. Note to readers: when a speaker promises to prove something, but instead refers the audience to an outside source for proof, you need to get suspicious right away. That tactic raises a giant red flag. 

Trump's Election Fraud Speech and the Illusion of Proof, Part One

Anyway, I accordingly browsed the White House website. I found a note, which did not prove election fraud as promised. Instead, it said that the White House was “addressing key areas of election integrity.” Basic government-speak. Typical Deep State hedging. I then looked at the link that said, “Noncitizens on State Voter Rolls.”  Curiously, only one page in that link (and by page, I mean, literally, one printed page) dealt with noncitizens on state voter rolls (the only other page on that link was on a different topic, pointing out that the Chinese government has been accessing American voter rolls, which is apparently legal, albeit extremely disturbing). Here it is. 

White House Document on Alien Voters

Thus, now that we have browsed through several confusing links, we finally find Trump’s supposed evidence that 

“OVER 250,000 NON-CITIZENS ARE ILLEGALLY REGISTERED TO VOTE IN JUST THE FOUR STATES FOR WHICH PUBLIC DATA FILES HAVE BEEN REVIEWED.” [italics added]

This page then petulantly lists 10 states (far short of 50 but more than 4, which makes me curious about the White House’s editing team) that have been “proactive” to scan their voter rolls for alien voters. Worse, even if we count all 10 states from the White House chart, the number of non-citizens registered to vote only adds up to 11,485. If that turns out to be true, it is 11,485 too many, but it is nowhere near 250,000, as the pages headline claims. Now, I am no math genius, but evidently I can out-count the White House’s wizards. 

The document conspiratorially concludes by claiming:  

“There is an undeniable pattern emerging as DHS begins to unravel the horrific damage done by the open border policies of the Biden administration. States that have adopted alien-first policies instead of American-first policies have a disproportionate number of non-citizens on their voter rolls.”  

Okay, as the old hamburger advertisement asked, “where’s the beef?”  

First, where is the valid evidence proving that these thousands of noncitizens are (1) registered to vote as noncitizens and (2) actually voting? A chart, by itself, proves nothing. Since I have been trained in social science research methods, I immediately want to know the methodology by which the chart was created. Unfortunately, that methodology is not given. This matters, for legal actions have claimed that the supposed list of noncitizen voters includes legal immigrants who obtained a driver’s license while non-citizens, but subsequently became naturalized and are therefore now legally allowed to vote. In one such lawsuit, the State of Texas backed down on its claim! Analyzing Texas’ actions, David Becker of the Center for Election Innovation & Research commented that, “Their claims would likely be dismissed [in court] until they could come up with something that actually documents how they got to those numbers.” 

Since the one-page document – the only evidence that Trump presented – fails to address this well-publicized criticism, what, if anything, has been established?  

Second, if there are, indeed, thousands of noncitizens illegally registered to vote, why have these supposedly patriotic, data-driven states not prosecuted them – by the thousands? The evidence does not support Trump’s claim. That is not just a logical gap; it is a logical cavern. 

Trump made a simple, but vital, claim about election security. He presented no evidence in his speech, instead referring listeners to his website. The website provides only pathetic documentation. This reduces his claim to mere political posturing. It was easy for him to make false claims, but making such a claim in a speech does not prove it to be true. The speaker either has proof or does not have proof. In this case, Trump did not present the promised proof. Making a wild accusation proves nothing! 

Smoke, mirrors, and misdirection! A magician's classic tricks. Trump’s speech directed me to a website. I plowed through the website, link after confusing link, only to find that any proof is doubtful. It is easy to make accusations. It is much harder to discover and present proof. It was easy for Trump to make his accusations. I, however, needed to do a lot of work to discover that he had not proven anything. Throwing out a puff of smoke in front of a mirror? That’s easy. Digging into the facts? That requires effort. That, in fact, underlies Trump’s real trick. 

Social science explains why Trump’s trick works. RAND Corporation researchers introduced the concept of the “Firehose of Falsehood.” The idea is that dishonest speakers, like Donald Trump, can spew out vast numbers of false charges. A firehose of false charges. One false charge after another. Their gullible audience doesn’t expect them to prove anything. However, to disprove even one charge is a lot of work. Look at how much effort I needed to create this blog post just to disprove one questionable claim. It’s easy for a speaker to spew out a false accusation, but hard for a careful listener to prove that it’s false. Listeners eventually get overwhelmed. Trump’s speech made a great many claims. He proved none of them. I suspect that most of them are false. Do I, however, want to spend the next week or two parsing the speech, point by point, to prove that every single claim was false? No, of course not. I have other things to do with my life. 

Trump's Speech of January 6, 2021: A "Firehose of Falsehood"

One flaw in Trump’s documentation is absolutely fascinating: although the United States government is stuffed with skilled web designers, Trump’s team made his election documents hard to access and even harder to link. Why? Well, maybe Trump just hired the worst web designers in the government. I wouldn’t doubt that. Or, maybe, he and his team just schemed to make the documents hard to access. I lean toward the former, because of the old slogan that we should never accuse somebody of dishonesty when incompetence explains things perfectly well.   

I hope, in a future post, to explain the ancient concept of Burden of Proof. Ultimately, Trump’s success as a rhetorician, and his failure as a leader, is that he asserts things that he cannot prove. His loyal supporters’ biggest weakness may be their gullible eagerness to accept Trump’s dubious, unproven claims. Next time around, when Trump makes outrageous claims, our simple response needs to be: “you made the claim, now you need to prove it!”  

by William D. Harpine

Copyright ©2026 by William D. Harpine

Image of Donald Trump: official portrait, public domain

Image of Homeland Security Document, White House website, public domain

Trump's Election Fraud Speech and the Illusion of Proof, Part One

Magician Pretending to Saw a Woman in Half

As a child, I used to watch magicians on the Ed Sullivan Show put a pretty young woman into a box, saw the box in half, and then reassemble the woman, quite unharmed. As an adult, I know perfectly well that nothing happened to the woman. The magician just created an illusion. He made me think that I was seeing something that I was not seeing at all.

President Donald Trump is good at that kind of thing. In his White House speech of July 16, 2026, Donald Trump created the illusion that he was proving something, but it was mostly smoke and mirrors. A magicians’ trick. Now, Trump did not promise to saw a woman in half and put her back together. He did, however, promise this:

“Tonight, I'm announcing the immediate declassification and release of critical intelligence, revealing shocking vulnerabilities in our election infrastructure.”

Trump promised to expose “vulnerabilities” in our election system. However, did he prove his point? I contend that he did not, for he failed to live up to his own standards. A reasoned argument has three essential parts: (1) the evidence, (2) the conclusion, and (3) a link that connects the evidence to the conclusion.

Trump then emphasized that he was going to present wonderful evidence, a “declassification and release of critical intelligence,” evidence that the powers that be, the mysterious Deep State, had covered up for years:

“This vital information has for many years been covered up and hidden from you, the American people — our beautiful, our great American people.”

Sadly, Trump’s argument failed because the evidence that the White House subsequently published on its official website continued to cover up much of the information that the American people might want to see. He gave the illusion that he had proved something, but the evidence he cited did not prove his conclusions.

Here is Trump’s claim, and here is his reference:

“You can see these documents for yourself at whitehouse.gov, that's whitehouse.gov, go check it out. Our purpose in disclosing this information is not to weaken confidence in elections, but to earn that confidence by confronting vulnerabilities and correcting them very, very quickly, and that's what we're doing.” [italics added]

Trump never described this information in any detail during his actual speech. That always makes me suspicious. Instead, he told us to look at a website. So, I looked at WhiteHouse.gov, where I quickly found that a number of the cited documents did not open on my computer. Hmm. What about the ones that did open? Well, it just seems to me that if the speaker’s idea is “disclosing” information, that well, information should be disclosed. Alas! When I opened one of the White House links to information about alleged problems with our election systems, I uncovered this glorious page: 

And this one!

I went over quite a few of the documents, finding that many of them were heavily redacted, and that the ones that were not redacted were, for the most part, uninformative procedural comments. I am no expert in foreign intelligence or election systems, but it does not seem to me that these pages disclosed useful information. Nor do I feel that I now, as Trump had promised, “can see these documents” in any useful way. What do you think?

The reader is surely thinking, maybe there is secret information in those documents that needs to stay private. I don’t doubt that for a moment. Still, Trump said that his purpose was to disclose secret information for the public to examine, information that had been hidden by the Deep State, and yet that information was not disclosed. I see no way to think that Trump kept his promise.

  

To me, as a somewhat critical listener, it seems obvious that anyone who looks at these blanked out pages is going to say, well, these are just blanked out pages. Blanked out pages don’t show anything, do they? So what purpose do they accomplish?

Those questions are easy to answer. Trump’s bizarre semi-disclosure proved little but accomplished plenty. After all, neither Trump nor his team showed even the slightest interest in proving anything that a careful listener or reader would care about. No! They presented what communication professionals call “the illusion of proof.” Trump claimed that our elections are in danger. He seemed to present enormous amounts of evidence, not in his speech, but on a website. That evidence, if we trouble ourselves to navigate to the website and look at it, which some people will and some people will not, proved little, but an uncritical listener could – and probably will – imagine that Trump had now proved something important, that Democrats should be ashamed of themselves, and that Trump had now established that the Democrats and the Chinese and who knows who else have cheated in our elections. After all, Trump made an important claim, and then gave evidence, and, if one doesn’t look into too much detail, one might think that Trump had established his claim. One might even think that he had disclosed something useful to know.

Donald Trump Created the "Illusion of Proof" in His April 13, 2020 Coronavirus Task Force Press Conference

In a Rose Garden Speech, Trump Pretended to Have a Healthcare Plan

Yet, even a casual glance shows that Trump failed to prove his claim. Unfortunately, he failed to live up to his own standard, which was to disclose secret documents. Instead, we got smoke and mirrors. An illusion worthy of a great magician. But proof? No. Magicians do not saw young women in half and put them back together. That is only an illusion. Neither did Trump prove that anything big was wrong with our elections. He only created an illusion. 

by William D. Harpine

________________   

N.B.: Note that mainstream news media have, with great care, gone over all of the released documents so far, and generally concluded that Trump, at best, overstated his case. They are obviously right. What I add is that Trump created an illusion, a pretense, a dramatic and convincing demonstration that he had proved something, while proving little.

Research Note: The concept of the “illusion of proof” comes from a landmark article by an important communication professor, the late Barnet Baskerville, "The Illusion of Proof," Western Speech, 25 (1961): 236-242. The journal is now called Western Journal of Communication. Although this invaluable article is not readily available online, a large research library should be able to find you a copy. 

To understand the structure of reasoned arguments, there is still no better source than Stephen Toulmin, The Uses of Argument. 

Note: Here is the follow-up post, Part Two

Copyright ©2026 by William D. Harpine

Images of redacted pages are public domain, from WhiteHouse.gov

Image of magician is public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

Liberty or Bread? Herbert Hoover's Ode to Freedom during the Great Depression

Herbert Hoover

“Freedom does not die from frontal attack. It dies because men in power no longer believe in a system based upon Liberty.” [italics added]

So said former President Herbert Hoover in Denver Colorado, on October 20, 1936 on behalf of Republican candidate Alf Landon’s presidential campaign. Hoover used the god term “freedom” to override the practical economic failures of the Republican Party’s attempts to overcome the Great Depression.

The God Term

Widely considered to have been one of the United States of America’s worst presidents, Hoover asserted a stark disconnection between conservatives and liberals. Ardently pounding on the god term “freedom,” Hoover ignored the disastrous consequences of the conservative economic policies, tight money and protective tariffs, which aggravated the Great Depression’s horrors. Instead, he reframed the debate with the word “freedom.” While Democrats cast the debate in terms of Hoover’s failed policies versus Roosevelt’s New Deal, Hoover debated on national values. The great conservative rhetorical theorist Richard Weaver explains god terms in, The Ethics of Rhetoric: “By “god term” we mean that expression about which all other expressions are ranked as subordinate and serving dominations and powers.”

As he began this speech, Hoover warned against the growth of federal government power, which he called “illegal invasions of the Constitution.” Ignoring the economy’s wholesale decline, the 16.9% unemployment rate, and the banking industry’s collapse, Hoover instead focused on the god term:

“I gave the warning against this philosophy of government four years ago from a heart heavy with anxiety for the future of our country. It was born from many years’ experience of the forces moving in the world which would weaken the vitality of American freedom. It grew in four years of battle as President to uphold the banner of free men.” [italics added]

Hoover then railed, albeit in abstract terms, against President Franklin Roosevelt’s New Deal policies. Again, ignoring his own policies’ abject failure, Hoover attacked “economic planning,” “attempts to centralize relief in Washington,” and “attempts at currency inflation and repudiation of government obligation.” He histrionically called the latter policy “robbery of insurance-policy holders, savings-banks depositors and wage earners.” Hoover omitted that people who held financial instruments like insurance policies and savings accounts ranked among society’s more successful members.

Donald Trump's Tariff Speech: "Liberation" as a God Term

Continuing, Hoover used inexact terms about policies while deriding Roosevelt’s supposed assault against freedom. Thus, when Hoover criticized “Marxists,” “Brain Trusters,” and “American radicals,” he may have felt that the god term overrode point by point details. Instead, consistent with conservatives’ habitual opposition to government spending, 

Hoover boasted that:

“I vetoed the idea of recovery through stupendous spending to prime the pump. That was born of a British professor.”

One presumes that the British professor was Lord John Maynard Keynes, the economist who founded the modern science of macroeconomics. Interestingly, Hoover never said what was wrong with priming the pump. By this point, the influence of the god term rendered details needless. Going further, Hoover literally condemned macroeconomic stimulus in biblical terms:

“The New Deal repudiation of Democracy has left the Republican Party alone the guardian of the Ark of the Covenant with its charter of freedom.” [italics added]

The Ark of the Covenant is found in the Hebrew scriptures (e.g., Deut. 31:9) Hoover thundered that the New Deal, with its vastly increased governmental power, would destroy national freedom and spread suffering:

“Let me say to you that any measure which breaks our dykes of freedom will flood the land with misery.” [italics added]

Indeed, continuing to slight the practical pros and cons of economics, Hoover instead emphasized the god term of freedom:

“I am proud to have carried the banner of free men to the last hour of the term my countrymen entrusted it to me.” [italics added]

Mystical Power Overrides Economic Details

Soup Kitchen Feeding the Hungry, 1936

Since Hoover was using “freedom” as a god term, a term that had by now achieved almost mystical power, he implied that freedom overrode mere economic considerations. Nearing his conclusion, Hoover marked a line between economic welfare (which he said he supported!) and moral principles. He did not, however, rank economics and moral principles equally: instead, his first and foremost principle was freedom. Without freedom, he asked, what good could material success do for us? Why, he wondered, would we sacrifice our freedom at the cost of moral collapse? Offering another biblical allusion, Hoover said:

“There are things far more important to a nation than material welfare. It is possible to have a prosperous country under a dictatorship. It is not possible to have a free country. No great question will ever be settled in dollars and cents. Great questions must be settled on moral grounds and the tests of what makes free men. What is the nation profited if it shall gain the whole world and lose its own soul?” [italics added]

That last question recalls Mark 8:36 from the Christian Bible: “For what shall it profit a man, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul?”

The reader will have noted by now that Hoover discussed freedom in an entirely negative sense. That is, freedom meant the absence of government restraint. Hoover never mentioned restraints that business conglomerates and trusts might impose upon their workers or customers, nor did he consider the kind of freedom that means nothing more than the freedom to do without. In contrast, a few years later, Franklin Roosevelt’s Four Freedoms speech would include Freedom from Want. Freedom from Want placed freedom in a more positive sense – not merely the absence of restraint, but the positive freedom to live a fruitful life. Thus, Hoover repudiated not just Roosevelt’s policies, but also the value structure that Roosevelt was still developing.

Franklin Roosevelt’s “Four Freedoms” Speech, a Lesson in Positive Justice

Eleanor Roosevelt's Speech about the Struggle for Freedom

Conclusion

Hoover asked an important question, and we should not underestimate it. His lofty reification of the moral issue of freedom deserves our respect. At the same time, his casual dismissal of the economy’s nearly total collapse, like his stubborn review of his own failed policies, gives us pause. His attempt to equate the New Deal with Marxism and dictatorship was hyperbolic enough to weaken his credibility. For him to equate the free enterprise system with biblical values seemed to me like quite a stretch. Still, when lofty moral goals conflict with a harsh economic disaster, we need to wonder what kind of freedom Hoover was talking about. People enjoy liberty, yes, but no one wants to starve free while other people thrive.

Yet, to economic historians, it is entirely unclear that Roosevelt’s economic policies were actually much better than Hoover’s. Nevertheless, what made the rhetorical difference is that Roosevelt gave people hope by speaking as if he cared about the people, while Hoover only seemed to care about abstract values that somehow only seemed to support individuals who were already thriving. Perhaps that difference in attitude is what propelled Roosevelt to one landslide election victory after another.

The same harsh rhetorical contrast between liberty and prosperity marks our political discourse today. Both sides have a point. For example, Mike Johnson, the Republican Speaker of the House, told the Faith and Freedom Conference that:

“The danger that we have right now is the energy, the excitement, the grassroots operation, the money is on the side of the insurgent left and they are openly running as Marxists, communists, for Congress!”

Governments can, indeed, oppress our freedom. Yet, wise government can sometimes alleviate our suffering. As a god term, “freedom” carries great rhetorical power. Can the god term, however, fill an empty dinner table?

by William D. Harpine   

______________

Personal note: My parents both grew up during the Great Depression. My paternal grandfather left his family’s rocky farm in the Shenandoah Valley and made a good living as a wholesale grocery salesman. As a result, my father grew up in a large house that was decorated with glorious woodwork and equipped with modern appliances, and his childhood never knew poverty. My father later joked that his father’s business sense never passed down to his descendants, and, to my regret, he had a point. In contrast, my mother, the child of eastern European immigrants, grew up desperately poor. Her father was a carpenter in a steel mill but handled his money poorly, while her mother raised chickens and sold eggs. They still raised 12 successful children through the Great Depression.

Here Is My Family's Immigration Story

Research Note: The rhetorical theorist and literary critic Kenneth Burke wrote about “god terms” in his 1945 book, The Grammar of Motives. Richard M. Weaver later made god terms central to his theory of rhetoric in The Ethics of Rhetoric. 

Copyright ©2026 by William D. Harpine

Image of Herbert Hoover, Executive Office of the President, public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

Image of soup kitchen line, US government, public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

Crystal Eastman and the Right to Vote: "Now We Can Begin"

Crystal Eastman

“Freedom is a large word,” said Crystal Eastman, feminist lawyer and social reformer, in her groundbreaking speech, “Now We Can Begin.”

She published a text of her speech in December 1920 after ratification of the 19th Amendment to the United States Constitution, which gave women the equal right to vote. 

Her views, considered radical at the time, polarized her audience in sometimes bitter language. Stating seemingly radical values with stark word choice and isocolonic sentence structure, that is, using a balance and contrast formula like “there is this, and there is that.” Eastman accentuated two opposing viewpoints. Never one to be satisfied with mere victory, she said this ratification per se was no accomplishment at all, but merely a time to begin the real work.

She immediately polarized the response between presumably conservative men and enthusiastic women:

“Men are saying perhaps, ‘Thank God, this everlasting woman’s fight is over!’ But women, if I know them, are saying, ‘Now at last we can begin.’ Most women will agree that August 23, the day when the Tennessee legislature finally enacted the Federal suffrage amendment, is a day to begin with, not a day to end with.”

The balance-and-contrast language presented two opposing poles: “Men are saying...but women ... are saying.” She offered no middle ground, supported no status quo!

So, instead of seeking moderation, Eastman reminded women that getting the vote meant nothing more than the chance to vote for their own independence, opportunity, and freedom. She polarized the issues into opposing concepts. Freedom versus subservience. Men versus women. Freedom versus an oppressive economic system. Tradition versus progress.

The idea behind polarization is not to gain majority support for one’s opinions, but rather to force people into opposing attitudes, thus motivating one’s supporters. Radical speakers don’t expect to get a majority, nor do they look to gain milquetoast support from milquetoast supporters. Instead, they seek dedicated workers who commit themselves to the cause. A polarizing speaker does not mind offending people. She does, however, mind very much if an apathetic crowd stumbles out of the lecture hall, bored to a stupor.

Steve Bannon's Polarizing Value Voters Summit Speech

 
Turning to policy, Eastman equated women’s rights with the liberation of poverty-stricken countries:

“What they [women] are after, in common with all the rest of the struggling world, is freedom.” [italics added]

Eastman’s dramatic phrase “struggling world” sharply identified American women with the world’s oppressed people. “Struggling world” implied that American women were not living in the more advanced world that American men inhabited. Then, as it would now, to equate American women with the suffering poor of impoverished nations must have shocked people.

Yet, paradoxically, Eastman did not totally assume that American men were thriving. Consistent with her era’s version of socialism, she decried wage labor as tantamount to slavery:

“The vast majority of women as well as men are without property, and are of necessity bread and butter slaves.” [italics added]

“Slaves’ was obvious hyperbole, further encouraging polarization.

Next, pounding on issues that only voting might cure, Eastman decried laws and social customs that

1920 Poster

suppressed women and blocked their self-advancement. She attacked social norms that barred women from seeking success. Emphasizing that the vote, and only the vote, could achieve her goals, Eastman proposed particular solutions:

“How shall we approach this next feminist objective? First, by breaking down all remaining barriers, actual as well as legal, which make it difficult for women to enter or succeed in the various professions, to go into and get on in business, to learn trades and practice them, to join trades unions.” [italics added]

By this point, Eastman was speaking for social reform, not just legal changes: “actual as well as legal.”

We must recall that United States was industrializing rapidly in the early 20th century. The country was transforming from a farming society into an industrial nation. As factories sprang up, young people often sought the economic security that farm life no longer offered. In that changing economy, Eastman insisted that women could participate in the changing world only when traditional barriers were removed. In that light, her pro-women goals included legalizing birth control, equalizing education, and removing artificial barriers that blocked women’s progress:

“With all laws against voluntary motherhood and education in its methods repealed,… with all special barriers removed in every field of human activity, there is no reason why woman should not become almost a human thing.” [italics added]

“All special barriers” emphasized that women suffered, not because they were inferior, but because men had passed laws and adopted social customs that prevented women from advancing. The term “special” highlighted the division, the polarization, between men’s rights of men and women’s rights.

Industrial development had, inevitably, left many people behind. Old legal structures blocked women from entering the new economy. That is why Eastman insisted that only the right to vote could accomplish that goal.

Susan B. Anthony's Famous Speech about the Right to Vote

Sojourner Truth's Speech on Women's Rights

Eastman’s policies were shockingly liberal by her era’s standards. Yes, women had by 1920 advanced past the horrors of an Anne Brontë novel, but there was still much progress to make, and Eastman never hesitated to display her bitterness toward injustices. She knew that her opponents often derided women as inherently inferior. Indeed, only this year did Virgina fully legalize birth control. Abortion is often still forbidden, even when medically required. In my youth in the 1950s, the word spread around my school in conservative Virginia that the only professions available to women were nursing, teaching, and secretarial work. Furthermore, as late as the 1970s, women still sometimes had trouble getting credit from banks, buying a house in their own names, or even opening checking accounts.

For such considerations, Eastman used the two-pronged tactic of polarization. She identified problems, proposed solutions, and expressed outrage. Yes, a speech like hers would surely offend middle of the road people. So what? She was not talking to middle-of-the-road people. Instead, she energized people who would contend, work, and struggle for massive social and legal changes. Eastman’s forcefulness, sarcasm, and, let us be frank, bitterness coalesced to create her persuasive strategy.

Throughout this speech, Eastman ignored slanders against women, seeking their economic and moral advancement instead of giving moral reproach, until, seemingly out of nowhere, she reached her speech’s sudden, startlingly caustic, final words about women:

“It will be time enough then to consider whether she has a soul.”

by William D. Harpine 

_________

Historical Note: Eastman published her speech in The Liberator, a left-wing political magazine that she and her brother co-founded. Eastman also co-authored an early version of the Equal Rights [for women] Amendment that the United States has often debated but never ratified. Does that mean that Eastman’s rhetoric ranged too far, in too radical a direction? Or does it mean that her work is, a century later, still incomplete? Worse, does it mean that we are still too polarized to act?

Eastman co-founded the National Civil Liberties Bureau, which evolved into the American Civil Liberties Union.

Copyright ©2026 by William D. Harpine

Image of Crystal Eastman, public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

Image of voting poster, public domain, via Wikimedia Common

Abraham Lincoln's Cincinnati Speech Endorsed Immigration

Abraham Lincoln

On February 12, 1861, Abraham Lincoln told a group of German immigrants in Cincinnati that:

“While man [sic] exists, it is his duty to improve not only his own condition, but to assist in ameliorating mankind.”

My simple thesis today is that Lincoln, the Republican Party’s first president, not only supported immigration, but regarded immigrants with goodwill, equality, and compassion.

Lincoln supported immigration in this brief speech in Cincinnati, Ohio. He stated that immigrants equaled everyone else in merit. That Lincoln’s welcoming position aroused controversy in 1861, just as it does today, should surprise no one. In the wry, chatty style at which he excelled, Lincoln assured the crowd that they, as immigrants, equaled everyone else:

“In regard to Germans and foreigners, I esteem foreigners no better than other people, nor any worse. [Laughter and cheers.] They are all of the great family of men, and if there is one shackle upon any of them, it would be far better to lift the load from them than to pile additional loads upon them. [Cheers.]” 

Lincoln continued that the United States had plenty of room to accommodate immigrants:

“And inasmuch as the continent of America is comparatively a new country, and the other countries of the world are old countries, there is more room here, comparatively speaking, than there is there; and if they can better their condition by leaving their old homes, there is nothing in my heart to forbid them coming; and I bid them all God speed. [Cheers.]”

Lincoln’s simple compassion, welcoming the immigrants to “better their condition by leaving their old homes,” represented the Republican Party’s sympathetic attitude.

We must clearly recall that immigrants in 1861 faced discrimination and prejudice just as they do today. As historian Laura Leddy Turner notes, “The German, Irish and Italian immigrants who arrived in America during the 1800s often faced prejudice and mistrust.” The same was true two generations later, when my Ukrainian grandparents and their offspring, including my mother, overcame discrimination in western Pennsylvania. Sadly, the same obstacles afflict Latina/Latino and Haitian immigrants today. Lincoln’s statement of equality did not merely represent political or economic wisdom; it demonstrated the compassion for which he and his political movement were becoming famous.

Trump and Vance Spread Lies about the Haitian Immigrants. But Here Is My Family's Story.

 
Yes, times have changed, but why should our values change? Lincoln had begun his speech, not with policy, but by stating a value: that we all share a duty to “assist in ameliorating” the suffering of others. Can today’s Republican Party emulate the wise attitudes and policies that its first great champion conveyed? As the Hebrew Scriptures assure us, there is nothing new under the sun, and prudent men and women can always learn from the past. When honorable people speak, judicious people listen!

Abraham Lincoln Raised the Flag: A Speech of Principle. A Speech for the Ages

Lincoln’s First Inaugural Address: “The Better Angels of Our Nature” 

I do hope that all my fellow Americans celebrated a wonderful Independence Day yesterday. God bless the United States of America. May we always be free, and may our freedom always be tempered by justice.

by William D. Harpine

Copyright ©2026 by William D. Harpine

Image of Abraham Lincoln, public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

Ronald Reagan Called for Unity on the Fourth of July

Ronald and Nancy Reagan, 1986

The United States of America stands for liberty, justice and equality for all. That is a values statement: a simple statement, radical in 1776, still radical today. On Independence Day, July 4, 1986, 40 years ago today, standing before the Statue of Liberty in New York Harbor, President Ronald Reagan praised America’s values. Recalling the signers of the Declaration of Independence, he remarked on “On the proposition that every man, woman, and child had a right to a future of freedom.” He reminded the audience that the Declaration of Independence affirmed that everyone is “endowed by their creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.” Those values, he insisted, must guide our nation. 

Thus, Reagan’s stirring speech reminded the United States that we all stand equal, in our diversity, and that immigrants from far and wide came past Liberty’s torch to seek the United States of America, the homeland of liberty:

“Last night, when we rededicated Ms. Liberty and lit her torch, we reflected on all the millions who came here in search of a dream of freedom, inaugurated in Independence Hall. We reflected, too, on their courage and coming great distances and settling in a foreign land, and then passing onto their children and their children's children. The hope symbolized in this statue here just behind us, the hope that is America.”

This led Reagan, brimming with hope, to affirm that neither religion, nor race, nor political affiliation could ever divide us:

“And so tonight we are for reaffirm, that Jew and Gentile, we are one nation under God. That black and white, we are one nation indivisible. That Republican and Democrat, we are all Americans.”

Ceremonial (or epideictic) speeches like this one are about praise and blame. Reagan excelled in ceremonies Praising America, he cited historical values for us to live by, values that can guide our great nation's policies. It is no accident that Reagan spoke with the Statue of Liberty his backdrop. That great statue had welcomed millions of immigrants. The torch signaled the safe harbor of liberty. The setting became part of the message. Reagan expressed a simple theme, a theme that hearkens back to the nation’s origins, to that great day when we proclaimed our independence and dedicated ourselves to values of freedom, equality, and justice. Those values were even more radical in 1776 than they are today. Holding to the vision, Reagan remembered that our nation was built on a foundation of great ideas. Reagan’s wise words should remind us of who we are, while inspiring us to support our American virtues. For, after all, those virtues are eternal. To forsake those values is to forsake our sacred flag.

Happy 250th birthday, United States of America! Let freedom ring!

by William D. Harpine

 
Mark Twain's 1886 Fourth of July Speech

Frederick Douglass’ 1852 Fourth of July Speech

Ronald Reagan Spoke about Freedom, Friendship, and Hope at Moscow State University

_________

S.S. Pretoria, which took my grandfather to Ellis Island

Personal Note: More than a century ago, my maternal grandparents sailed past that same Statue of Liberty and landed at nearby Ellis Island (in an era when the United States welcomed immigrants with open arms), settled in the United States, found work, and raised a family of patriots. My grandmother was only 16 years old, traveling alone, desperately hoping to escape famine and conflict in her native land. They raised an extended family of engineers, nurses, physicians, lawyers, homemakers, professors, and war heroes. My grandmother became a Gold Star mother. Please, America, let us not smash the good things our forebears built. To be a patriot means to honor our values, our heritage, and our honor. May it ever be so. 

Trump and Vance Spread Lies about Immigrants. But Here Is My Family's Story.

Copyright ©2026 by William D. Harpine

Image of Ronald and Nancy Reagan, US government, public domain,

via Wikimedia Commons

Image of SS Pretoria, Detroit Publishing Company, public domain,

via Wikimedia Commons

Justice Samuel Alito's Confirmation Speech and the USA's Forgotten Values

Samuel Alito

One must be careful what one says. Oh, wait, never mind, for public officials are rarely held to account. That is because much of American government, the protection of our liberties, depends as much on our cultural values as on the Constitution’s written text. 

In his opening statement to the Senate Judiciary Committee on January 9, 2006, Judge Samuel Alito reiterated a basic legal principle every school child in the United States of America has heard:

“No person in this country, no matter how high or powerful, is above the law, and no person in—in this country is beneath the law.”

Judge Alito obviously needed to say that; otherwise, no one would have voted to confirm him to the Supreme Court. Sadly, that principle appears nowhere in the Constitution of the United States; its power depends entirely on whether we, as a people, believe it. 

Eighteen years later, securely in power, holder of a lifetime appointment, Alito who voted for the majority opinion in Trump v. United States. In that case, President Donald Trump protested that he should be immune from criminal charges. As they resolved that case, the six conservative judges all voted to provide the president of the United States with absolute immunity when conducting his or her constitutional powers, a degree of immunity (“presumptive immunity”) for other official acts, and no immunity for private actions.

The more conservative judges disagreed a bit about the extent of the presidential immunity that they invented, while the more liberal Justice Sotomayor argued that the court’s decision created a “law-free zone around the President.” That “law-free zone” places one person – the President of the United States – above the law – at least some of the time.

Supreme Court Justice Stephen Breyer Reminded Us That the United States Is an Experiment

No doubt, many people believe that the president does require legal protection against harassing criminal charges.  Criminal charges might, they think, distract the president from his duties.  Nevertheless, we have the principle that I learned in high school, and which Judge Alito affirmed during his confirmation speech: “No person in this country, no matter how high or powerful, is above the law.” Regardless of the decision’s debatable merits, the decision to offer any kind of presidential immunity crushes that great moral principle to dust.

Judge Alito’s 2006 speech presaged the danger of living in a nation’s whose cultural norms slowly crumble, step-by-step, as an apathetic nation worries about the price of gasoline or the supply of eggs in the grocery store’s dairy section. It is one thing for public figures to pledge to follow our ideals of liberty, freedom, and equality. Those ideals mean nothing unless government officials are, at the least, held open to massive public shame when they destroy our most precious values. Unfortunately, the nation seems to have forgotten what Judge Alito affirmed so many years ago, and never held either him, or his colleagues, to account.

To understand the present, we must remember the past.

by William D. Harpine

Copyright ©2026 by William D. Harpine

Image: United States Supreme Court, public domain, via Wikimedia Commons