Although generally a hopeful document that democracy’s true potential will be fulfilled and realized in the future of America, one passage from Whitman’s Democratic Vistas stuck out to me: “…the fear of conflicting and irreconcilable interiors, and the lack of a common skeleton kitting all close, continually haunts me.” (762) On the surface level this phrase serves only to express a concern of the author, however it also answers questions from the very first day of AmCon, ‘Who are Americans?’ and ‘What is America?’ and introduces the greatest flaw of American democracy.
According to this quote Americans are currently conflicted, disunited, fearful, and unrelated. The rest of Whitman’s essay around this passage encourages who he thinks American’s should be as a people: united, optimistic, passionate, and interconnected. “…Nothing is plainer than the need…of a fusion of the states into the only reliable identity, the moral and artistic one.” (762) This makes sense, after all we are the United States of America. Unity seems to be a condition of our existence. He puts great stock in artistic literature, such as poetry, to get us to that point, although maybe we can expand, “literature” to encompass all of education. However, for Whitman the power of literature transcended the purpose of education. Although he uses the strong emphasis on literature in education to support his claim, he attributes the greatest power of literature to it’s unifying potential. He says, “American poets…would give more compaction and more moral identity to these States than all it’s Constitution, legislative, and judicial ties, and all it’s hitherto political, warlike, or materialistic experiences” (762) Not only does literature bring people together, but it unifies them in a moral way and lends them identity. I think these two components are equally important because it shows that being unified is not enough, or that until people are united on a moral level, they are not really united at all and thus have no collective identity. This is what Whitman feels the American people are really lacking, and that until this enlightened level of unity is achieved we aren’t the democratic Americans we claim to be.
This united moral identity, which Whitman claims will one day come from literature, will serve as the justification for our political system. Whitman says, “…a great original literature is surely to become the justification and reliance…of American democracy.” (760) It seems that in order for democracy to work it requires unity and a collective moral conscience. I think a common misconception about democracy is that it emphasizes the power of the individual. I disagree to some extent. Democracy is and isn’t about the participation of the individual. Democracy maybe give more voice to the individuals participating, however the purpose of giving the individual a greater voice is to find a sense of unity. I also think that finding a new sense of unity requires a prior sense of unity. The way we practice democracy in America doesn’t necessarily start with the individual and work it’s way up towards unity. It starts with an existing sense of unity that may oppose another, so we as individuals, united in these causes, vote to reach a unity which brings together both sides. Democracy seems to also be the ‘poster political system’ for structured fairness, but I think the ‘fair’ aspect of a democracy doesn’t come from the system itself, but from the people who practice it. This is why a certain united moral conscience is required in order for a democracy to work and perhaps the relationship between political system and people is reciprocal. Perhaps the united morality of the people prove that democracy can work, and the success of such a political system can in tern prove the dignity of human nature, because the people of a democracy and the democracy itself are so closely intertwined. Perhaps this is the piece that is missing, which makes Americans disunited. The moral piece is lacking, as of yet, which causes internal conflict. Whitman seems to have hope that one day literature will unite Americans in this way and we will finally be able to live up to the potential of our democracy.
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