By Edwin Cooney
Since all of us in one way or another consider time an
important factor in our lives, every January 1st can be “a new
beginning!” Although our well-being or
fate is never entirely in our personal control, we do invariably have the power
to set the right course every day of our lives. Each January 1st, we all recognize, sometimes
with grudging resistance, that this would be a good time to take stock of the
past and present for the sake of our immediate future. In that spirit, I offer a few historical/political
New Year’s perspectives for your consideration and entertainment.
By Monday, January 1st, 1759, 26-year-old George Washington
had decided to take two risks. The first
was a career change. He’d already
resigned his commission in the British army even though Britain and the
colonists were in the midst of war with France for territorial supremacy and
colonial security against the French and their marauding Indian allies. The
previous July, he’d been elected as one of two Frederick County delegates to
the House of Burgesses. Five days later,
he would take another huge step by marrying 27-year-old Martha Dandridge Custis,
the richest widow in all Virginia. Would
politics and marriage be good choices for young George? He couldn’t know; he could only guess. He would just have to work at it with
sufficient tenacity to maximize the distance his choices might take him!
The first of January occurred on a Tuesday in 1850. Vice
President Millard Fillmore was nearly as high and dry politically as any
previous vice president had ever been.
His old friend, New York Senator William H. Seward, who was politically
ambitious and perhaps a little envious of Fillmore’s vice presidential prominence,
had gone from friendly to cool.
President Taylor wasn’t in the least consulting him. Nor were his other old abolitionist friends
paying him much heed. What he couldn’t
know was that his time was coming. On
July 10th of that year, on the death of President Taylor, he would
inherit the presidential mantle but fall short of the opportunity for success
it offered. Against the advice of his
wife Abigail, he would exchange morality for political expediency by signing
the Compromise of 1850 which included the infamous fugitive slave law. The year of 1850 would make him president,
but it would fall short of making him great!
One can hardly write of New Year’s personal political
potential without citing three January firsts in the life of Richard Nixon. On Thursday, January 1st 1953, Nixon, who was
just 39-years-old, would turn forty in eight more days. Yet he was about to take the oath of office
as the second highest officer in the land under one of the most revered men of
his time, President-elect Dwight David Eisenhower. His youthful success was arranged by others
on the basis of his political appeal and potential usefulness to his party and
his country. He was to be one of the youngest
vice presidents in American history, second only to 37-year-old John C. Breckenridge
of Tennessee, James Buchanan’s vice president between 1857 and 1861.
Ten years later, by Tuesday, January 1st, 1963 -- largely due
to too many scotches on a losing election night in California -- 49-year-old
Richard Nixon had declared his political career over at his “...last press
conference.” Even more, due to
circumstances beyond Nixon’s control, Jack Kennedy, so opposite to Nixon in so
many ways, was the president and appeared to be a cinch for re-election in 1964. Just two months before, as Nixon sought to
become governor of California (a position he was only strategically interested
in for political advantage), JFK had, in the public mind, bested Soviet leader
Nikita Khrushchev during the Cuban missile crisis. Kennedy was youthful. Nixon was stiff and formal. Kennedy was vigorous. Nixon was generally
emotionally restrained. Kennedy was
relaxed and funny where Nixon was often piously self-conscious. Then came November 22nd, 1963 and JFK’s
fortune was forever fixed. Nixon’s
future was hardly secure, but it was his for the taking.
As for Monday, January 1st, 1973, Richard Nixon appeared to
be at the pinnacle of his political career, this time due to circumstances over
which he had total control. Elected overwhelmingly to a second presidential
term, Nixon’s downfall was almost inevitable.
Nixon, who prided himself on his ability to handle America’s toughest
totalitarian opponents, couldn’t effectively master his own political
resentments whether justifiable or otherwise, so he largely destroyed himself.
Only you and I can make 2014 a good year. We can be sure that many things that will
happen will not only be beyond our control, but on occasion outrageously
so. Occasionally events will be within
our grasp but our timing or judgment will prevent them from coming to fruition.
Hopefully, many more times, we’ll be
farsighted, able, and lucky enough to attain our goals and desires beyond our
wildest expectations.
Of course, every new day and every new year is in many
important ways a clean slate. If the
past is prologue, as many will insist, the future beckons you and me to make it
better than anyone dreamed it could ever be.
Happy New Year!
RESPECTFULLY SUBMITTED,
EDWIN COONEY
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