National
Press Club
Alan
Keyes
February 7, 2000
Washington, D.C.
Thank you. Thank you very much.
I find myself called upon today, I think, to speak in two guises. I always
try to speak as an American, and I will also be speaking today a little bit
as a Republican, as we are in a primary season. And the choice that is facing
voters right now is a choice about who shall be the standard bearer of our
two major parties. As I am a little bit involved in one side of that race,
I've obviously done a little bit of thinking about the situation in which we
find ourselves politically today. And it is there that I wish to begin,
because I think that by reflecting on it a little bit, we will be able to
understand the real nature of the political challenge that faces the
Republican Party, but that also, then, brings us face to face with what I
think is the overall challenge facing our country.
One fact that probably hasn't gone unnoticed by anyone lately is that we are
in the midst of pretty good economic times. As a matter of fact, many would
dispute the term "pretty good." We are in the midst of great
economic times. I am not one of those people who goes into the back room and
wishes bad times on my country so that I or my political party may prosper.
And therefore, I have to take the good times we are in as good news. Even
though, realistically speaking, good times like this in a presidential
election year usually mean an advantage for the incumbent party in the White
House. That would, of course, be the Democrats. It would, of course, be Bill
Clinton. And I see no reason why this election year will be any different.
That being the case, the better the times, the harder the challenge for the
Republican Party. Despite exorbitant polls taken months out that showed G. W.
Bush or some other Republican beating the Democrats, I've never believed in
any of it. Since the underlying truth is that the American people, generally
speaking, don't kick you out when they think you have done a reasonably good
job. Unlike, say, the British at the end of World War II. You remember that.
After Churchill had led them through the war and inspired them against the
terrible threat of the Nazi menace, the first thing they did when the war was
over was kick him out.
Americans are more understanding than that. They actually need a reason to
kick you out. Usually that reason will consist of the fact that they think
that you have contributed somehow adversely to their economic well being.
They'll kick you out for that. If they get the impression that you have been
a poor steward of our national security interests, botched up a war, or
otherwise embarrassed us in terms of our ability to defend ourselves and our
interests--that's a good reason; they'll kick you out.
If you happen to be like Jimmy Carter, and you botch up the economy AND
embarrass us in national security, the American voter will go into the voting
booth--they will probably wish they could kick you out twice--but they'd only
kick you out once anyway. But they will still kick you out.
The point being, however, that if you haven't done those things; if you
happen to be a party that is holding on to the White House at a time when the
nation enjoys wonderful prosperity, and we are creating more millionaires
than usual, and the stock market is going through the roof, and the
prospects, materially, for most people in the country, seem pretty good--at
the very least I would suggest they are not going to hold that against you.
And at most they will probably even let you take a little credit for it, even
though somewhere in their heart of hearts they will understand that the
credit is actually due to them. But Americans have gotten used, I think, to
sharing the credit for their achievements with politicians, since that is the
way that politicians generally function, right?--"Where are my people
going, so that I may lead them?"
And the corollary of that, of course, is "What have my people
accomplished lately, so that I may take credit for it."
All things being equal, therefore, I think that you would have to be living
in another reality not to expect that the Democrats would have an advantage going
into the November election. Especially if folks go into the voting booth and
are voting on the basis of their sense of their economic well being. Even, by
the way, if they are voting on their perception of America' s position in the
world. And this comes from one who has been not a particular fan, and never
will be, of the Clinton administration. I actually think it has been an
administration that has been more ineffective, incompetent, and treacherous
with respect to our national security than any I have seen in our lifetime.
And as I was no big admirer of the Carter administration in that regard,
that's saying something.
But the thing about the national security issues,
in a world where we are no longer facing universal pressure from an adversary
who punishes us for our mistakes, is that it takes a while for those chickens
to come home to roost. And by November of this year, we will not be hearing
the clucking of those chickens. Not yet. Give it a few years, and we
certainly will, in ways that I think will greatly dismay our public. But not
by November. So if folks are going into the voting booth and sorting things
out on the basis of our present international position, or our national
security issues, I don't think that is going to hurt the Democrats either.
All things being equal, therefore--and I know that this will seem unbecoming,
coming from a Republican; but see, I have this bad habit. Partisan or no
partisan, when I look at a fact, I try to point it out. And the truth of the
matter is that right now all of those material factors cut in favor of the
Democrats, and the Republicans have an uphill battle in this election year
convincing the American people that a change is required on those grounds.
However, there is more than a little bit of hope for a Republican victory.
Because looking back over the last several years--and I, of course, have the
advantage of doing this from a position where I had spent several years prior
to that talking about the issues of moral concern to the country--I think back
over the last several years, and lo and behold, I have been going around this
time talking, of course, to Republican audiences and others and guess what? I
have no problem whatsoever now convincing people that America is in the midst
of a great moral crisis that affects our institutions at the highest levels.
I wonder why?
Actually, I think all of you could guess why. We have but to say two words
and most Americans are put in mind of that moral crisis, and of the impact
that it has had on our national institutions, on our national pride. We have
been through a degrading and shameful period, and for most Americans the pain
of it was far more substantive than I think, generally speaking, we give
credit for.
Because most Americans love their country. And I think most of us are kind of
proud of it too. We look back on our heritage, particularly in the course of
the 20th century, and we see a nation that in many ways has answered the call
of decency and of justice, has fought the great battles against tyranny and
oppression, has stood in the world for something that--with some blemishes
here and there, but nonetheless, on balance--moved things in the right
direction. And was something that, when you mention it to your children, or
show them the flag, or talk about the role that you may have played in it,
you can do so with pride.
I think that sense of a justifiable, not overweening, but still clear pride,
is precisely what has been challenged in the course of the last several
years. And what I have found is that many Americans actually grieved deeply
because of the perception that we have somehow lost the luster of that moral
dignity for which this nation has stood, and has deservedly stood, in the
course of the 20th century. It's not a good feeling when we have to be
ashamed of the President of the United States. It's a painful feeling when
there are aspects of his tenure we feel loath to speak of in front of our
minor children. It is a painful experience when we know that on that account,
the aspiration to serve the nation, even at the highest level, has been
dulled. For what dulls that aspiration is a symptom of what dulls citizenship
in general in this society, and the loss of a sense of commitment to that
citizenship actually is one of the things that portends the end of our
republic.
And that's why I think that, all things being equal, the Republicans could
actually look at this upcoming election with a sense of confidence. Because
there has, in fact, been an egregious failure of moral stewardship on the part
not only of the President, but on the part of the party that circled the
wagons around his lies, his corruption, his betrayal of oath and conscience.
If the American people go into the voting booth thinking about that failure
of moral stewardship, then the Democrats--in spite of economy and everything
else--will be tossed out of the White House on their ear. And they will
deserve, and have indeed deserved, to be tossed out.
And I think that that is at least in part because Americans are not as stupid
as some people think we are. We know that the great prosperity, the strength,
the victory in wars, the overcoming of enemies--all of it was the result of
the moral heritage, the moral strength, the moral foundations, that allowed
this country to persevere when the material factors were not in our favor; to
get through depressions, and wars for which we were not readily prepared, to
fight enemies that, at times, seemed already to have engrossed the earth with
their power. We did not give up, we were able to persevere, because we looked
back upon a moral heritage that gave us strength: a moral heritage that gave
us the confidence, in the end, to understand that though in a general kind of
way we are probably no better or worse than most human beings, in terms of
our national identity, and our national aspirations, there is much that this
nation has stood for, and much that it has achieved, to help mankind both
articulate and reach toward the better aspiration of its moral nature.
If, as a party, you squander that moral heritage; if, as a party, you show no
regard for that true basis of our strength--then that too becomes an
egregious reason for the American people to toss you out. The question,
therefore, that faces the Republicans right now is whether they are going to
be able to articulate for the American people the nature and significance of
the moral challenge that faces us, so that by the time folks go into that
voting booth there will be a sufficient number of them convinced that the
moral crisis is relevant, and that its political consequences are
intolerable, and that therefore the Democrat stewardship of the White House
must be rejected.
That's going to require, by the way, something that you don't ordinarily see
in politics. It is going to require that someone stand forward and, with a
kind of boldness that has been egregiously lacking in dealing with these
issues up to know, is able to present them, both in terms of principle and
application, in a way that makes them relevant to the conscience and choice
of the people. On this hinges the prospect for victory of the Republican
Party, in my view.
And that means that the folks who are part of the electorate choosing the
Republican standard bearer had better wake up from their delusions. Those
people who are trotting out folks with big names, and this kind of money and
that, and yet who have nothing in their background or experience that
prepares them to meet the moral challenge of this election year, and to
articulate it in a way that the American people understand. As a matter of
fact, they are so far from understanding it that some, in spite of their
record and background, have no sense whatsoever of the relevance of these
issues.
The main example of that, in my opinion, at the
moment, is the fellow who was sort of vaulted into the lead, they tell me--I
don't know, because these polls have been so wrong about who is leading
what--John McCain. Apparently he got real comfortable on a bus trip in New
Hampshire with his buddies in the press, and some of the folks there made him
feel so much at ease that when he was asked a question about abortion--he was
asked what he would say if his 15 year old daughter came to him and said that
she was pregnant, and she was going to have an abortion. And his
response--now verified, apparently, by the transcript; he did try to pretend
for a while it was taken out of context. Not a good pretense for this
"straight-talking" Senator, but what can I say?--his answer was
that he would try to counsel her, and he would tell her that he thought that
this wasn't such a great idea, and it was wrong, and all of this. But at the
end of the day, it was her decision, her choice.
Now that, as we would all recognize who understand the nature of this debate,
is the classic so-called "pro-choice" position. It is the one
rejected, in principle and practice, by the platform and the majority of
people in the Republican Party. But he took that stand, and when he was sort
of beat up about it for a little while, he decided that it would be a family
conference instead of his daughter's decision. I don't know which was more
ironic and amusing to me. I mean, after all, if your daughter comes to you,
as I pointed out to him in one of the debates, and says, "Dad, I want to
kill grandma for the inheritance," I doubt that you would counsel her
that this was not really the world's best idea, and that personally you
oppose the idea of murdering grandma for the inheritance, but if when it came
right down to it, she felt inclined that way, it was her decision.
I don't know how your daughter would feel about that way of approaching the
issue, but I'm pretty sure how grandma would feel. And if you then went on,
when you were caught out a little bit, to suggest that, "Oh, yeah, she's
a minor child; therefore we have a family conference about it," I'm not
sure that would be terribly helpful. So you gather the family together, and
what are you going to do, take a vote? Shall we vote it up or down, that we
kill grandma for the inheritance.
The reason that you are laughing, of course, is that the very idea is absurd.
You are laughing because you understand that there are certain issues of
moral choice where you don't look at people and pretend that they in fact
have a choice. You look at them and you say--particularly to your
children--and you just say, "No; you don't do that. Not allowed. Not
done. You step across the line in a way that is totally unacceptable."
Now, there are folks, I guess--I call them the pro-abortion folks--who
wouldn't agree with that. There is no one truly pro-life, however, who would
not agree with what I just said. Because the pro-life principle is clear:
that child's life in the womb is not a matter for human choice, because as a
matter of American principle it is understood that the right to life, along
with our other unalienable rights, is based not on human choice, but on the
choice of our Creator, God. A power beyond our power, a will beyond our will.
And you will excuse me, I guess, if I take that very seriously. I understand
that for some people it is just a rhetorical thing--"Weren't those nice
words that Jefferson penned?" Any black American who thinks that is
apparently unfamiliar with the history of both oppression and deliverance of
black people in America. The oppression done in disregard of that great
Declaration principle, and the deliverance coming about when the conscience
of the nation was moved to understand that those are not just words, and that
they must be applied in such a way that we understand that whether the
Constitution is interpreted by some court, or the law is passed by some
majority, in a way that denies to any human being their God-given rights,
that is not lawful; that is not right; that is not just; and it should not
stand.
And if I, or anyone else, would claim that that had to be the case with
respect to black folks who were enslaved, I surely think we must stand today
and make the same argument on behalf of the vulnerable, the voiceless, the
helpless babes in the womb.
It is that kind of understanding of principle, that application, if you like,
of the great principles of America's moral heritage, that must be the key to
approaching this election year. So that Americans understand that the moral
component of our way of life is not incidental; it is essential. Lose it, and
we lose the only common ground for the American identity.
We are an enormously diverse people, of every race, color, creed and kind. We
have gathered folks here from all the four corners of the globe. We cannot
claim a common ethnic stock, a common racial heritage; even, these days, it
is unclear that common language will bind us. But one thing is clear--that we
stand on common ground of our moral aspiration, that we stand on common
ground of our claim to human rights and dignity, which we have offered to all
those people, from every corner of the globe. Not because it is our choice,
but because it was understood by our Founders to be God's will.
If we back away now from that moral heritage, we lose the ground both of our
moral identity, our common ground as a people, but we also lose the ground of
our discipline as a people. For in the end, our confidence that our rights
will not be abused comes about, at least in part, because the same authority
on the basis of which we claim those rights must be respected in our exercise
of those rights. If we lose that sense, then we rightly lose confidence in
principle in the ability of this free people to sustain freedom without
terrible and hurtful consequences.
For at the end of the day, freedom is a curse if it means the ability to do
whatever you please, whatever you like. If it is unbridled greed, and lust,
and passion, and interest without check, it is a curse. The blessings of
liberty are to be derived from an understanding of freedom constrained and disciplined
by the knowledge that the same higher power and authority on the basis of
which we claim our rights and dignity must be respected as we use them, in
such a way that we respect in others what we claim for ourselves, that we
grant to others what we would seek for ourselves, that we do not deny to
others what, by the grant of that Creator, God, we may lay claim to for
ourselves.
This is the great crisis, I believe, of our nation's life today. Not an
economic one, not an international one. It is the crisis of heart and spirit
which Lincoln and our Founders predicted would be the crisis of our
republic's survival. We either get back to the ground of that moral principle
on which the republic is based, or we shall lose it ALL.
And that doesn't mean, by the way, that we won't be prosperous, and America
won't be strong, and all of this. I keep trying to remind people that some of
the most prosperous periods in the history of the world were presided over by
some of the worst despotisms in the history of mankind. Like the Roman
Empire, which strung together several prosperous centuries, in fact, for the
part of the world that it dominated. Only at the sacrifice of human decency,
dignity, and so forth.
This is not supposed to be our goal. We Americans are supposed to offer the
world an understanding that, yes, incidentally has meant strength, and wealth
and prosperity--but at its heart is about achieving the better moral destiny
of the human race. The knowledge that it is possible, in spite of all our differences,
to come together, under a constitution of moral principle, to respect the
rights and dignity of human beings, and to build a society that, because it
is founded on that just foundation, offers hope that mankind, in spite of all
our frailties, will yet achieve the better destiny marked out for us by the
Creator, when first He said, "Let Us make man."
It is this hopeful future into which we can proceed, but only if we are
willing, now, to turn back to the moral ground that offers us that hope. If
we do not, then we shall, as Lincoln feared, meanly lose this last, best
hope. But if we do, then we can enter the new millenium
with the confidence that the same light of hope which has beaten back the
shadow of tyranny once, twice and thrice in this century will still be there
to encourage and enspirit the forces of dignity
around the world in the millenium to come.
Thank you very much.
Q &
A session
Question: We have enough questions here to last until after the last
exit poll of the year 2000. The first one, given that we have students in the
audience, I always prefer to give to a student. A ninth grade student at
Alice Deal Junior High School in Washington, DC, asks, "In what ways
would you help me, and students in general, to improve our education?"
Keyes: I think the most important thing that I would seek to do is put
the control of that education back in the hands of your parents, who ought to
have the first responsibility for deciding where you go to school, and what
faith and values and aspirations are reflected in the substance of what that
school offers. I believe that we have made a great error in the course of the
last forty and fifty years in America, allowing education to be dominated by
professional educrats and government bureaucrats.
It is the parents who stand before God with the first responsibility for
their children, and we ought to rely on their sense of that responsibility,
and their love for their offspring, in order to assure quality in education.
But that also means, of course, that they have to be empowered in order to
make the choices that can reflect that sense of responsibility. That's why I
am a strong supporter of school choice, the idea that the money we spend on
education ought to follow the choice of parents, not the choice of educrats and bureaucrats and politicians. Once we have
followed that road, I think we will reestablish the connection that ought to
exist between home, and school, and faith, if a child is to go to school in a
cohesive environment that helps to build both character and knowledge. That
connection has been broken in our present system, and I do not believe we
will see a real restoration of both security and quality in all our schools
until it has been restored.
Question: I'd like to lump together a large number of hypothetical
questions that came up, which all started, "If you don't get the
Republican nomination . . . " Would you accept the nomination for vice
president? Would you endorse whoever the Republican Party nominated? Would
you endorse a candidate who had a pro-choice vice-president? Or what roll
would you like to play in a future Republican administration?
Keyes: Well, people say that I very often answer questions by
questioning the premise of the question. I would certainly question the
premise of that question, since we are in the midst of a primary season to
determine that very fact. So I don't have to contemplate choices about vice
president.
I do have to say this, though. Because I think that it is important to make
clear my position, and also I feel it incumbent on me now. I have said
repeatedly, and I will say again here, that if the Republican Party abandons
the moral principles that are its heart--if it abandons the pro-life plank;
if it puts some pro-abortion candidate on its ticket--then of course, I will
not abandon my principles in order to keep some partisan label.
The parties are to serve certain purposes. I know that for some they are just
coalitions meant to obtain power, because that's what they were taught in
Yale someplace. But I do not believe, in fact, that that is the decent
purpose of politics. The decent purpose of politics ought to be to do our
business as citizens--that is to say, to do what is best for our country. So
if I think the party has abandoned its moral heart, and with it the moral
identity of our people, I could not stay in the party. If it chose a
pro-abortion nominee; if it chose a pro-abortion vice-president; if it gets
rid of the pro-life plank--it will leave me; I will not leave it. But I will
certainly not follow it down the road that leads to America's perdition. Step
number one.
The logic of that, in terms of the present field of candidates, means this.
There is one candidate whom, as I just pointed out, whatever his record--I
know, there are these phonies who like to stand on their record, like Al Gore
did for a long time, convincing pro-life voters to cast their vote for
somebody who in his heart was not pro-life. I will say unequivocally: In his
heart, John McCain is not pro-life.
"Alan, how can you profess to believe . . . you can't see into
somebody's heart . . ." No, I can hear what he says to his children,
though. And unless he is some kind of unnatural parent, what we say to our
children reflects the deep-seated convictions of our heart. And if he is
going to give a pro-abortion, pro-choice answer to his daughter, he has given
that answer to the rest of the country.
And that being the case, the logic is very clear. I will never again cast my
vote, consciously and knowingly, for anyone who betrays the fundamental moral
principles without which neither I, nor any of my forebears, would have
obtained their freedom. And that ought to be pretty clear, in terms of what
happens to Alan Keyes in the event of a John McCain candidacy. He is not--and
I say this for the benefit of any pro-life people out there; there are a few
who look to me occasionally to see what I think; I'll tell you right now what
I think about that--John McCain is not pro-life. Anyone who votes for John
McCain betrays the pro-life cause.
Question: We don't identify our questioners here, but I just have to
say, this woman got up this morning at 4 am in Nashville, and she also says
even though she is from Tennessee, she is not a Gore fan. The question that
she asks is, "What is your view on the relationship between the PLO and
Israel?"
Keyes: I think that there is a tendency in American policy, and there
has been for quite some time, to put too much stock both in the promises and
the ability, I believe, of the PLO. I say in the promises because the record
over the course of many years does not suggest that there is, in fact, a real
and strong will for peace in Yassar Arafat and his
PLO brethren. But of course, that remains to be seen, in terms of actions and
things that are done.
But on the other hand, there is an even more serious question. Because, as
our Founders recognized--if you read the Federalist Papers, they talk about
what can lead to war amongst nations. And one of the things that can lead to
war is the inability of a party to control the actions of those who are
putatively on its side, so that they then act in ways that give cause and
occasion to war. And one of the things that has always struck me about the
PLO is regardless of what may be the will of their leadership and so forth,
they don't seem to have the ability to restrain all the various elements of
the Arab world who are in various ways anxious and eager to attack Israel,
and to kill Israelis, and to destroy Israeli assets. That has raised a
question for me continually, of whether or not the PLO is in fact a valid
interlocutor for a peace process. Because in order to be a valid
interlocutor, you must not only have a will to peace, you must be able to
enforce the peace, throughout the realm of those who are putatively on your
side or under your influence.
I don't think that the PLO has ever demonstrated an ability to exert that
kind of control. Which means what? Which means Israel sits down, makes
concessions, does various things, and at the end of the day gets an agreement
that even if there is a will to respect it on the PLO side, there is not the
means to enforce it.
That's why I always thought it a little bit wishful thinking to believe that
one can reach a secure and permanent peace in a situation where the interlocutors
are so unequal as they are in the case of the PLO and Israel. What do I mean?
Israel is a state. And the PLO is not. Does that mean I am in favor of a
Palestinian state? I am in favor, though, of recognizing a reality, and I
have been throughout. The division of the old Palestinian mandate resulted in
two states. One that was given over to the Israelis, and the other that was
given over to the Hashemite kings of Jordan, though it does not represent, in
that guise, the majority of people who live under their rule. If we in fact
were dealing with a situation where the state of Jordan and the state of
Israel were sitting down to work out their differences over the West Bank and
other things, you would at least have some assurance that on both sides there
would be an ability to enforce a peace once made.
For various reasons, American policy has never been willing to accept, look
at, and pursue this reality. In a Keyes Administration, we would.
Question: Do
you support New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani in his race for the Senate? If so,
why? And if not, why not?
Keyes: As I do not live in New York, I have no particular reason to
impose upon myself the necessity of making that choice. And you know, the
other day a reporter asked me what I would do if I were a Democrat having to
choose between Bradley and Gore, and I said I hoped I would never be in that
position, because it would sort of be like choosing between Satan and
Beelzebub, as far as I am concerned.
In the case of Giuliani and Hillary Clinton, though, I think the choice would
be somewhat easier. At least if you really had to make it. Because obviously
Rudy Giuliani at least has the virtue and advantage of being somebody who
has, in his tenure in New York City, accomplished some things that actually
made sense, in terms of crime, in terms of his reform of the administration
of the city, and so forth.
Personally, would I cast a vote for him? I think I just made that clear. Rudy
Giuliani is a pro-choice, pro-abortion person. I will never again cast a vote
for anyone who takes that position. And so, personally, I'd be kind of left
out, even though I understand there is usually a right-to-life line in New
York State that one could vote, or some other line. But I personally will not
envisage that possibility, not again.
And you might say that is terrible. No, it is not terrible. The Democrats are
proud of being the pro-abortion party; I don't see any reason on earth why
the Republicans are so ashamed of taking the RIGHT position on the most
important moral issue of our time. If they don't stop playing games with it,
they will lose the majority that has in fact been forged on the basis of
their moral commitment to the principles of the country.
That doesn't mean that I would seek to drive out of the party every
pro-abortion person, or pro-choice person. That's not my point. I have to
govern my own vote, at a personal level. I would certainly, as I will do in
the New York State race, do my fellow Republican Rudy Giuliani no harm. And I
certainly would, in light of his opponent, probably doubly restrain from
doing him any harm. But as I don't have to face that choice, I will not have
to "struggle" with my conscience when it comes time to cast a
ballot in New York.
Though I would have to congratulate the court in New York, because apparently
there are a lot of good hearted moral conservatives in New York who will now
be able to vote their conscience in the presidential primary, because we have
overcome the rigging of that ballot, and all the names of the presidential
candidates will now be on offer in New York State for their suffrage.
Question: When the Pope speaks out against the death penalty, and in
particular in the United States, is he right?
Keyes: You have to understand, at least as I understand, how the Pope
has spoken out against the death penalty. Because there is no moral objection
in principle to this authority of the state. That has been true throughout
the history of the Catholic Church; it is true if you look at the Catechism
today.
The Pope makes his stand on the issue now based, as I understand it, on an
assessment of the current state of affairs in our judicial system, and in our
penal system, and so forth. On those grounds, which have to do not with faith
or morals, but with an assessment of the current empirical state of our
penology, and our social situation, and so forth, I feel quite at liberty to
disagree with the Pope.
And with respect to the death penalty, I believe deeply that two things are
true. A society cannot afford to send the wrong message to those who, in a
cold-blooded and egregious way target and take human life because it is in
the way of their purposes. Now, when folks are motivated by passion, when
there are other things going on, there is a mitigating element that might
lead us to back away from imposing the ultimate penalty. But when, in the
absence of that passion, they are--like some of the drug lords and other
people--just motivated by their own profit and interest, and cold-bloodedly
slaughter whoever happens to stand in the way of that interest, then I think,
that kind of heart being hard to understand, and hard for us to perceive the
mercy in it, I think we have to dispatch those people to the God Who is the
judge of us all, and can see into their hearts, and understand what might be their for redemption, since we cannot.
I also think that the law is, among other things, one of the principal
educators in a society. And if you mean for your citizens to take seriously
the injunction, "Thou shalt not kill," then you had best reserve
the ultimate penalty for those who do so in an egregious, cold-blooded way
that assaults not only the life of another, but in many instances also the
structures of the society put in place--law enforcement officials, courts--to
protect that life.
For all those reasons, I believe it is an imperative of the respect for life
that we retain as an element of law, in certain limited cases, the death
penalty. And that if we do not, then we risk applying an egregious relativism
to the business of our respect for life. Why do I say that? Well, I say that
for this very reason. Some people say, "Well, that's in contradiction of
your pro-life stance with abortion." No, it's not. Not unless we see no
moral difference between the innocent and the guilty, a moral difference that
is clear in scripture, and has been clear throughout the moral history of
human kind. And that is why it has been considered particularly abominable
when one assaults the innocent life of babes, dashes their heads against a
stone, and does other things that sometimes characterize the most heinous
brutality in war. Those assaults against the innocent are precisely the
undoing of all decent moral conscience. And that would mean that we must
reserve for them the kind of penalties that are required in order to show our
respect for life. So again, I see a major difference. If you can distinguish
between guilt and innocence, then you can distinguish between the abortion
case and the death penalty case.
Final point. It does behoove us, though--and I think here, out of respect for
the very concern that is raised by the Pontiff--to look at our justice
system. And I would say that, in and of itself, in principle, the death
penalty has a moral basis. If you carry it out in a way that is careless and
discriminatory, and that in fact does not take care that we are making the
most conscientious effort to ascertain guilt or innocence according to due
process and the law, that then becomes a reason for suspending or opposing
it. But this is not an argument in principle to remove the death penalty.
It's actually an argument to improve the integrity of that judicial process.
Question: And
what is your view of the current state of the American judicial process, in
the way that it imposes the death penalty?
Keyes: I think that is going to vary from place to place. I would have
to say it looks as if, in Illinois at the moment, it's in pretty bad shape.
Whether that is true in the rest of the country, I don't know. I'm sure that
G.W. Bush would suggest that in Texas it is not, even though they have had a
number of executions there. Some people like to cite statistics that go to
show that there is some disproportionate impact on folks in the black
community, and so forth. I'm always a little suspicious of those statistics,
though, I have to tell you. One of the things that I would suggest that
people who indulge in that sort of thing do, side by side with the statistics
about who is on death row and what their race is, I would like them to put
the statistics of who is in the grave, and who the victims were. And I think
that one would discover from that juxtaposition that if you send a soft
signal to some of the folks who are in jail for killing people, you will find
that there has been a lot of black on black violence out there. And that what
you are actually doing is offering a license to the killers to prey on
innocent, helpless people in their community. And I don't think that that
ought to be the outcome.
So I think we have to be reasonably tough. And that includes, by the way,
another issue, which I will just throw out there pro forma. I've been
watching all this to-ing and fro-ing about racial profiling, right? In and of itself,
people want to suggest there is something awful and horrible about this. I
think that if you find that it is motivated by racism and discrimination,
that is one thing. And that is obviously bad.
But I put it to you, if I am a taxi driver--that's going on right here in DC
right now, among black taxi drivers too, by the way--or if I am a policeman,
and I find over the course of my long experience that certain kinds of crimes
seem to be committed disproportionately by individuals who are young black
males, we shall now put a law on the books forbidding me to act according to
my experience, forcing me to put myself in greater danger than my experience
would suggest I ought to? Something in me revolts against this.
And I am reminded of the way I was brought up. And the way I was brought up by
my parents was to remember, at all times, that yes I was out there, I was
doing stuff for Alan Keyes, and this and that. But everywhere I went, I
represented family, and I represented my race. When are we going to stop
making excuses for some of the folks out there who don't want to remember
that? Who don't want to remember that in everything they say, in everything
they do, they are either building or destroying the reputation of the black
community. I am SICK to DEATH of people making excuses--"they're poor;
they're this; they're that."
So was my father! So were his relatives! That poverty did not excuse
depravity, and they never took it for an excuse. Instead, they took it upon
themselves to understand that whatever your condition, you can still have the
moral decency to care about what your actions say to and about your
community. And I wish we would get THAT message out there. Because I'll tell
you--I would feel badly thinking that some racists out there were targeting
black folks disproportionately without ground or experience or foundation.
But on the other hand, if there is ground and experience and foundation, do
you know the people I feel badly about? The people who are out there behaving
in such a way as to destroy the reputation of my race. I am sick to death of
them, and I call on them to examine their conscience and stop what they are
doing.
Question: Do you find, after your experiences in states like Iowa and
New Hampshire, or in the reception that you get from a largely white
audience, that racism is dead in the presidential campaigns?
Keyes: No, no. I wouldn't go that far. It's not even entirely clear to
me, sometimes, whether racism has taken a nap. But I certainly don't think
that it is dead.
I would say this, though. And this is something that I feel badly about,
because I think that the response to the Keyes campaign in different parts of
the country--including, by the way, say, Alabama, which is a state in the
deep south, supposedly representing intransigent resistance against civil rights
during the civil rights movement. The famous images of "Bull"
Connor and the dogs, and so forth and so on. Well, it turned out--we went
down to take part in the straw poll there. And contrary to what some people
in the media lyingly portrayed, that straw poll
wasn't something were people came desultorily together, and Alan Keyes got
some votes because he showed up.
That was a nonsensical lie. And sometimes I really do--and I'll get to this
in a minute--wonder what is going on with media folks who have no greater
respect for the truth than that. Is it laziness, or is it just a total
disregard for the facts?
In point of fact, the Alabama straw poll went on for weeks. All the campaigns
did their phone calling, sent their literature, lobbied the delegates who
were going to that convention. And at the end of the day, when the vote was
taken in the Alabama straw poll, Alan Keyes came in number one in the heart
of the deep south.
I think it time we started looking not just at the negative things. Sure,
there's a ways to go in terms of race relations. We all know this. There is
bigotry, and there is prejudice, and there is hate, and there is racism still
alive out there. But at the same time, don't we ever have the right to give
ourselves some credit? Not only for the progress we have made in law, but for
the change of heart that has occurred on the part of many folks, all over the
country, especially in the south.
And I guess I am waiting hopefully, and praying, whether it is in South
Carolina or somewhere else, that in a way that the country can't ignore
voters will go to the polls and just vote heart and conscience, to cast
before the American people this reality, that there are many, many folks in
this country, of both races, who can put aside bigotry and simply vote for
what they believe to be right for America.
It's universal? No, it's not universal. But I think there are enough, now, so
that those folks in fact can be the determining element.
. . . in my experience, been egregiously guilty of this problem. And I don' t
mean it in some hateful, racist motivation. Nah. I don't know about that. I
do know, however, that the media tended to act according to their stereotype
of black Americans. And if you didn't fit that stereotype, they filtered you
out. They were unwilling to take seriously what you offered and presented,
because according to that stereotype you were supposed to be a liberal, and a
Democrat, and a pro-abort, and all these things.
Which, by the way, when you look at the surveys, do not track. Those things
do not track, necessarily--the issues part of it, on abortion and things like
that--with the real feelings of the black community. Many black folks are
conservative on these issues. And certainly, therefore, one isn't justified
in having some stereotype that acts as if those sentiments do not exist.
But the media did, and it does, act according to such a stereotype, in my
opinion. And it has been REALLY hard battling that.
Now, you say, "Alan, that's not racism." Yes, it is. Or at least
let's put it this way: it is bigotry. As a matter of fact, it was the
characteristic of bigotry in America. Contrary to what we try to convince
ourselves of these days, what made the American racial problem so
intransigent was not hatred. It was prejudice. It was the ability of decent
minded folks to act according to prejudicial stereotypes that would allow
them to have great relations with their black maid and their black gardener
and their black laborer in the field, but who just couldn't process the black
lawyer and the black doctor, and others who did not fit their bigoted
stereotypes. The heart of bigotry is prejudice, not hatred. The heart of
bigotry is the application of stereotypes, which allow you to impose upon
others what you think they ought to be.
The truth of the matter is that if we are to become what we ought to be, then
individuals ought to be allowed--in their actions, in their words, in their
conduct, in their views--to SPEAK FOR THEMSELVES. And folks ought to
understand, no matter what side they are on, that you don't know what it
means to be black in America until you have taken seriously what actual black
folks do. And even if that doesn't correspond to your stereotype, you have no
right to abuse and exclude it. And if you do, you are as guilty of bigotry
and prejudice as ANY of your racist forebears were.
So you can excuse it for yourselves if you like, but you haven't gotten THAT
far from the tree of prejudice and racism.
Question: How should news organizations behave in order to correct the
bigotry that you find. Is it a matter of affirmative action to hire more
black members of the press? What needs to be done?
Keyes: Well, no. Why is it that we always think we need some program,
this or that. No, I would say very simply. You know what ought to be done?
Just tell the truth. That's all. That's all I would ask. Just tell the truth.
No special favors, no special treatment of any kind. Just tell the truth.
Don't do what the Washington Post does in this town. No, I'm sorry; don't do
that. Because you can scour the pages of the Washington Post--and among my
supporters it's proverbial now that on the day that a primary occurs and the
Washington Post does not report to you who won, it means that I did. Their
bias in this regard has been egregious. It's sick.
So no special favors asked or required. No this or that. In terms of
affirmative action, the people all over the country who are responding to my
message of moral priority and moral renewal are taking all the affirming
action I need. And they will go out and continue, I hope, to take that action
on behalf of the country. But I would just suggest that maybe it would be
fairer if one didn't exclude the results, and if one was willing to report
them with some fairness and equanimity to people around the country.
We talk about all this stuff that McCain is raising--he's raising McCain,
right?--in terms of campaign finance reform and all of this. One last point.
All that stuff would probably not be necessary. There would be less reliance
on 60 second spots and all this garbage that everybody says is so awful in
politics, if the media in this country simply did your job. Instead of trying
to act as the censors and pre-selectors of the political process, just go out
there and pass through to the people the information about what is being
offered to them in the way of their political choice, and let them decide. Do
that job with integrity, do it with consistency, and you will be back to
making what ought to be, I think, your main contribution--and, by the way,
your vital contribution, to the success of our political system.
Right now it has become, not only with respect to me, race, whatever, it's
all too much about power now. And all too little about truth. I don't know
whether you are picking this up in the journalism schools now, where like the
law schools, the law is what the judge says it is. I suppose the news is what
you people say it is. That's not the attitude you are supposed to take. The
attitude you are supposed to take is that you are the servants of truth, not
its masters, not its creators. And in so far as you go down that other road,
you give in to the temptation of power in a way that will ultimately destroy
our political system.
http://www.keyesarchives.com/transcript.php?id=125