august 5–18, 2019 | new york 77every news cycle is dominated by him,
every conversation is befouled, if you are
not careful. And this saps the republican
spirit. It engenders a kind of passivity. It
makes submission feel like a kind of relief.Is recovery possible? The
Roman lesson is that it is in the
short term, but that recovery is frag-
ile because norms are so much easier
to break than to build, let alone rebuild,
and that the longer republican norms are
trashed, the weaker they subsequently
become. And much depends, of course,
on what comes immediately after,
whether these compounding trends can
be nipped or reversed before they
entrench themselves.
In the Democratic presidential field, we
already have 24 previews; on the Repub-
lican side, there are distressingly few
glimmers of any future for the party other
than compounding Trumpism through a
second term and beyond. There are those
on the left who worry about just what
could be achieved by an actually compe-
tent Trump, but while Republicans have
done the lion’s share of damage to the
institutions and norms of government
consecrated over centuries, the ultimate
extent of the destruction wrought by
Trump will be determined by the other
party—and how it responds to the prece-
dents when empowered.
Some signs are not that encouraging. “As
president, I will give Congress 100 days to
get their act together and pass reasonable
gun safety laws,” presidential candidate
Kamala Harris recently tweeted. “If they
don’t, I will take executive action. Thoughts
and prayers are not enough. We need
action.” This 100-days rubric is one of which
she seems particularly fond: “As president,
I will give Congress 100 days to send legisla-
tion to my desk to stop Big Pharma from
raking in massive profits at the expense of
Americans. If Congress won’t act, I will.” In
the Democratic debates in June, Harris
even declared that “on day one, I will repeal
that tax bill that benefits the top one percent
and the biggest corporations in America.” In
fact, Biden recently echoed her.
Candidates often exaggerate their pow-
ers to get things done when elected presi-
dent. But I’m not dunking on the senator
from California or the former vice-presi-
dent to say there are no constitutional
mechanisms in a republic for Harris to do
any of this, and it is remarkable that these
comments had any traction at all. And yet
ask Democratic candidates more realisti-
cally how they intend to enact their
agenda and they also talk about removing
existing barriers to executive success. The
filibuster will be on the chopping block ifit impedes wider health-insurance cover-
age or a much more ambitious climate
agenda pursued by a Democratic presi-
dent. It has now disappeared from Senate
votes on Supreme Court justices, weaken-
ing the credibility of judicial indepen-
dence, as justices appear to be entirely
creatures of the president and party that
elevated them.
And the wider agenda, completely
understandable in response to Trump’s and
McConnell’s ruthlessness, is to go on the
offensive on both policy and process. Since
McConnell prevented a sitting president
from filling a vacant Supreme Court seat, so
should they. Big populist plans—Medicare
for All, a Green New Deal—are now accom-
panied by proposals to overhaul the
Supreme Court to prevent Republican judi-
cial sabotage of progressive reform, to abol-
ish the Electoral College to empower
majoritarianism behind a future Demo-
cratic president, and to give statehood to
D.C. and Puerto Rico to blunt the Republi-
can advantage in the Senate. All these
involve the kind of tit-for-tat political war-
fare that also broke out in Rome, for equally
understandable reasons, but which, in
time, brought autocracy closer.
But Rome wasn’t lost in a day. Its repub-
lic took the better part of a century and a
half to lose its practices and its soul. Neither
will the United States suddenly succumb to
a new fascist party. There is space for popu-
list reform—and it may be essential to
restore the legitimacy of both capitalism
and democracy—but if it is spearheaded by
a charismatic cultish leader instead of a
more traditional president, if it runs rough-
shod over republican norms and proce-
dural compromise, if it responds to Trump’s
rhetoric and methods by mimicking them,
it may compound the problem.
Republics do not suddenly evaporate.
The institutions they establish tend to
continue— but, over time, in a deeply polar-
ized and increasingly unequal society, they
can become less and less potent, as various
leaders and their followings fight zero-sum
games using the rhetoric of power rather
than the dialogue of deliberation. Prece-
dents are broken; habits of mind and behav-
ior erode; the advance of executive power
ebbs and flows; but relentlessly, the water
line of what is an acceptable level of autoc-
racy rises. In Rome, it took a long while, but
there were periods of much quicker erosion,
as charismatic figures established a space for
authoritarianism that came to be perma-
nent. And then, of course, a sudden and
unexpected collapse. In America, the ques-
tion of whether this history will repeat itself
hangs ominously in the air. But that sound
you hear in the distance is of future Caesars
preparing to make their move. ■reach, the judiciary, is being methodically
co-opted for the cause of executive power.
The authoritarian strain in conservative
thought has, since Watergate appeared to
cut a malign presidency down to size,
come to define judicial philosophy on the
right. The notion that the president con-
trols the executive branch, that his auton-
omy is essential for expeditious govern-
ment, and that his decisions are
empowered by being the sole figure
nationally elected by the people as a whole
is now close to a litmus test for any judge
or justice seeking a career on the right. It is
what defines countless judicial nominees
and appointments and is the common
denominator between Justices Gorsuch
and Kavanaugh. With a chance for a third
such appointment, the powers of an
authoritarian president, with enough pub-
lic backing to override congressional pas-
sivity or demand its support, could reach
heights not seen before.
And the third is precedent. If republican
virtues and liberal democratic values are a
forest of traditions and norms, Trump has
created a vast and expanding clearing.
What Rome’s experience definitively
shows is that once this space is cleared,
even if it is not immediately filled, some
day it will be. Someone shrewder, more
ruthless, focused, and competent, can eas-
ily exploit the wider vista for authoritari-
anism. Or Trump himself, more liberated
than ever in a second term, huffing the
fumes of his own power, could cross a
Rubicon for which he has prepared us all.
A republican president respects how the
system works, treats power as if it is always
temporarily held, interacts with other
agents with civility, however strained, and
feels responsible, for a while, for keeping
the system alive. Trump simply has no
understanding of any of this. His very
psyche—his staggering vanity, narcissism,
and selfishness—is far more compatible
with monarchical government than a
republican one. He takes no responsibility
for failures on his watch and every single
credit for anything successful, whatever its
provenance. The idea that he would put
the system’s interest above his own makes
no sense to him. It is only ever about him.
And the public has so internalized this
fact it can sometimes seem like a natural
feature of the political landscape, not the
insidiously horrifying turn in American
political history and culture that it is. If
there is a conflict between his and others’
interests, his must always win decisively.
If he doesn’t win, he has to lie to insist that
he did. Everything in strongman rule is
related to the strongman, as we are all
sucked into the vortex of his malignant,
clinical narcissism. You never escape him,Y ___ DD ___ AD ___ PD ___ EICTRANSMITTED________ COPY ___ DD ___ AD ___ PD ___ EIC1619FEA_AndrewSullivan_lay [Print]_35565047.indd 77 8/2/19 7:36 PMaugust 5–18, 2019 | new york 77every news cycle is dominated by him,
every conversation is befouled, if you are
not careful. And this saps the republican
spirit. It engenders a kind of passivity. It
makes submission feel like a kind of relief.Is recovery possible? The
Roman lesson is that it is in the
short term, but that recovery is frag-
ile because norms are so much easier
to break than to build, let alone rebuild,
and that the longer republican norms are
trashed, the weaker they subsequently
become.Andmuchdepends,ofcourse,
on what comes immediately after,
whether these compounding trends can
be nipped or reversed before they
entrench themselves.
In the Democratic presidential field, we
already have 24 previews; on theRepub-
lican side, there are distressingly few
glimmers of any future for the party other
than compounding Trumpism through a
second term and beyond. There are those
on the left who worry about just what
could be achieved by an actuallycompe-
tent Trump, but while Republicans have
done the lion’s share of damage to the
institutions and norms of government
consecrated over centuries, the ultimate
extent of the destruction wrought by
Trump will be determined by the other
party—and how it responds to the prece-
dents when empowered.
Some signs are not that encouraging. “As
president, I will give Congress 100 days to
get their act together and pass reasonable
gun safety laws,” presidential candidate
Kamala Harris recently tweeted.“If they
don’t, I will take executive action. Thoughts
and prayers are not enough. We need
action.” This 100-days rubric is one of which
she seems particularly fond: “As president,
I will give Congress 100 days to send legisla-
tion to my desk to stop Big Pharma from
raking in massive profits at the expense of
Americans. If Congress won’t act, I will.” In
the Democratic debates in June, Harris
even declared that “on day one, I will repeal
that tax bill that benefits the top one percent
and the biggest corporations in America.” In
fact, Biden recently echoed her.
Candidates often exaggerate their pow-
ers to get things done when elected presi-
dent. But I’m not dunking on thesenator
from California or the former vice-presi-
dent to say there are no constitutional
mechanisms in a republic for Harris to do
any of this, and it is remarkable that these
comments had any traction at all.And yet
ask Democratic candidates morerealisti-
cally how they intend to enact their
agenda and they also talk about removing
existing barriers to executive success. The
filibuster will be on the choppingblock ifit impedes wider health-insurance cover-
age or a much more ambitious climate
agenda pursued by a Democratic presi-
dent. It has now disappeared from Senate
votes on Supreme Court justices, weaken-
ing the credibility of judicial indepen-
dence, as justices appear to be entirely
creatures of the president and party that
elevated them.
And the wider agenda, completely
understandable in response to Trump’s and
McConnell’s ruthlessness, is to go on the
offensive on both policy and process. Since
McConnellpreventeda sittingpresident
from filling a vacant Supreme Court seat, so
should they. Big populist plans—Medicare
for All, a Green New Deal—are now accom-
panied by proposals to overhaul the
Supreme Court to prevent Republican judi-
cial sabotage of progressive reform, to abol-
ish the Electoral College to empower
majoritarianism behind a futureDemo-
cratic president, and to give statehood to
D.C. and Puerto Rico to blunt the Republi-
can advantage in the Senate. All these
involve the kind of tit-for-tat political war-
fare that also broke out in Rome, for equally
understandable reasons, but which, in
time, brought autocracy closer.
But Rome wasn’t lost in a day. Its repub-
lic took the better part of a century and a
half to lose its practices and its soul.Neither
will the United States suddenly succumb to
a new fascist party. There is space for popu-
list reform—and it may be essential to
restore the legitimacy of both capitalism
and democracy—but if it is spearheaded by
a charismatic cultish leader instead of a
more traditional president, if it runs rough-
shod over republican norms and proce-
dural compromise, if it responds toTrump’s
rhetoric and methods by mimicking them,
it may compound the problem.
Republics do not suddenly evaporate.
The institutions they establishtend to
continue— but, over time, in a deeply polar-
ized and increasingly unequal society, they
can become less and less potent, as various
leaders and their followings fight zero-sum
games using the rhetoric of power rather
than the dialogue of deliberation. Prece-
dents are broken; habits of mind and behav-
ior erode; the advance of executive power
ebbs and flows; but relentlessly, the water
line of what is an acceptable level of autoc-
racy rises. In Rome, it took a long while, but
there were periods of much quickererosion,
as charismatic figures established a space for
authoritarianism that came to beperma-
nent. And then, of course, a sudden and
unexpected collapse. In America, the ques-
tion of whether this history will repeat itself
hangs ominously in the air. But that sound
you hear in the distance is of futureCaesars
preparing to make their move. ■reach, the judiciary, is being methodically
co-opted for the cause of executive power.
The authoritarian strain in conservative
thought has, since Watergate appeared to
cut a malign presidency down to size,
come to define judicial philosophy on the
right. The notion that the president con-
trols the executive branch, that his auton-
omy is essential for expeditious govern-
ment, and that his decisions are
empowered by being the sole figure
nationally elected by the people as a whole
is now close to a litmus test for any judge
or justice seeking a career on the right. It is
what defines countless judicial nominees
and appointments and is the common
denominator between Justices Gorsuch
and Kavanaugh. With a chance for a third
such appointment, the powers of an
authoritarian president, with enough pub-
lic backing to override congressional pas-
sivity or demand its support, could reach
heights not seen before.
And the third is precedent. If republican
virtues and liberal democratic values are a
forest of traditions and norms, Trump has
created a vast and expanding clearing.
What Rome’s experience definitively
shows is that once this space is cleared,
even if it is not immediately filled, some
day it will be. Someone shrewder, more
ruthless, focused, and competent, can eas-
ily exploit the wider vista for authoritari-
anism. Or Trump himself, more liberated
than ever in a second term, huffing the
fumes of his own power, could cross a
Rubicon for which he has prepared us all.
A republican president respects how the
system works, treats power as if it is always
temporarily held, interacts with other
agents with civility, however strained, and
feels responsible, for a while, for keeping
the system alive. Trump simply has no
understanding of any of this. His very
psyche—his staggering vanity, narcissism,
and selfishness—is far more compatible
with monarchical government than a
republican one. He takes no responsibility
for failures on his watch and every single
credit for anything successful, whatever its
provenance. The idea that he would put
the system’s interest above his own makes
no sense to him. It is only ever about him.
And the public has so internalized this
fact it can sometimes seem like a natural
feature of the political landscape, not the
insidiously horrifying turn in American
political history and culture that it is. If
there is a conflict between his and others’
interests, his must always win decisively.
If he doesn’t win, he has to lie to insist that
he did. Everything in strongman rule is
related to the strongman, as we are all
sucked into the vortex of his malignant,
clinical narcissism. You never escape him,