The First American Devolution

We are in our first American Devolution, not a second American Revolution.

Americans must decide whether to curb our further freefall toward fascism, in an effort to keep democracy based in an evolving constitutional republic, not a devolving one.

This alarming message occurred to me after observing the convergence of three factors: Long-past and recent United States Supreme Court decisions, especially since 2021; reemergence of Donald J. Trump as the presumptive presidential nominee for the Republican party; and a 2023 playbook to end our democracy, published under the ominous title, “Mandate for Leadership: The Conservative Promise: Project 2025: PRESIDENTIAL TRANSITION PROJECT.”

The democracy destruction playbook was authored by 29 writers and two editors associated with the politically conservative organization known as the Heritage Foundation. As reported March 13, 2024, by the Washington Spectator—a non-profit news organization—the playbook “was bought and paid for with funding from the Koch Network and Leonard Leo.”

During a July 2, 2024, podcast of Real America’s Voice’s War Room, Kevin Roberts, the Heritage Foundation’s president, asserted the United States is undergoing “the second American Revolution.”

This assertion is a grotesque mischaracterization because the convergence is more accurately described as our first American Devolution when previously hard-won rights and protections are taken from us. Abortion rights for women is one example. A second example is the U.S. president is now above the law, given both presumptive and absolute immunities from criminal prosecution. That can now be enjoyed by all presidents, including former President Trump, according to the Supreme Court. In a final example, the Supreme Court decided that courts cannot simply defer to a governmental agency for interpretation of an ambiguous law, which is likely to result in more expensive consumers goods and services. The obvious problem is courts are experts in law, not other topics.

Readers should be aware the Koch network is led by oil billionaire Charles Koch while fellow conservative activist and wealthy attorney, Leonard Leo, is the longtime executive vice president of the Federalist Society, backed by billionaire Chicago industrialist Barre Seid who transferred more than $1.6 billion into the control of Leo, according to a New York Times report on Aug. 22, 2022. Together, groups linked to Koch and Leo spent more than $55 million to fund creating the playbook, according to a March 21, 2024, NBC news report. The NBC report was made possible by working with Accountable.US, a progressive advocacy group.

Caroline Ciccone, president of Accountable.US, said dark-money groups linked to Leo, influenced shaping the current Supreme Court’s conservative supermajority made possible under Trump.

Tips for identifying fascism come from the remarkable Rod Serling who fought in the Philippines during World War II but hoped to fight Nazis in the European theatre. He was also the writer for the “Twilight Zone” television episode titled, “He Lives,” in season four. According to Serling, to appeal to a group you must first join them by speaking to them in their language at their level. Make their fears your fears; make their hate your hate. If they are poor, talk to them about poverty. If they are afraid, talk to them about their fears. And if they are angry, give them objects for their anger. But most of all, make this group an extension of yourself.

The tactics are blatant to anyone who has been closely observing Trump since June 2015.

In the tradition of influential American writer Henry David Thoreau who inspired the great Indian political ethicist, spiritual leader and lawyer, Mohandas K. Gandhi and our own great American Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr., I argue when a governmental body interprets and creates laws that are above the power of justice and accountability, the law itself has devolved to the status of being an unjust law.

Published in 1849, Thoreau wrote on page 11 of his book “Civil Disobedience” that “Unjust laws exist; shall we be content to obey them, or shall we endeavor to amend them, and obey them until we have succeeded, or shall we transgress them at once?

“Men generally, under such a government as this, think that they ought to wait until they have persuaded the majority to alter them. They think that, if they should resist, the remedy would be worse than the evil.

“But it is the fault of the government itself that the remedy is worse than the evil. It makes it worse.”

Gandhi and King’s answers were unambiguous non-violence movements that were successful through active resistance and civil disobedience.

All citizens and voters have a choice: Support democracy or embrace devolution.