The New Way

In my first blog post, I talked about the three ways of presidential use of rhetoric. The old way, the middle way and the new way.   In this post, I will give an overview of how the new way came into being and some ideas about how it compares to the system that the founders envisioned. One of the main goals of the founders was to avoid having a demagogue be in power but over time presidents have increasingly used their voice to sway the public.  First look to William Jennings Bryan and his failed 1896 campaign for president he used the power of the train to campaign all across the country.  In one instance he gave 36 speeches in one day. This allowed him to reach many more people than any candidate could have done before.  This shows the start of the new way presidential rhetoric.  Although he did not ultimately win the presidency, his aggressive style proved to be effective and would set the tone for future leaders.  Woodrow Wilson is really the first president to start using he voice to enact legislative change. Before presidents had mostly done dealings with the Congress to get the bills that they wanted.  But when Wilson wanted to have the League of Nations, and Congress was non-compliant, he went to the people.  His goal here was to go above Congress and sway the opinion of the people so that Congress would support his ideas.  The involved him going on a massive tour across the country.  If you click this link, you can see just how many addressing he was giving to help get his cause through.  His speeches only ceased when he suffered from a stroke and was no longer able to perform them. This new style from Wilson shows a massive shift from the founders who did not want someone to be able to sway the people so quickly.  They had seen many examples in the past like Alciabides where demagogues could mess up democracy.  The New Way was going nowhere though.  The next great example of a president using rhetoric effectively is FDR his fireside chats via radio helped him to connect with the public as no other president had been able to.  He would use these chats to help sway public opinion and get the people on his side when the Congress or the courts disagreed with him.  Public opinion can be the most powerful tool in government, and through his fireside chats, FDR was able to manipulate it very effectively. By swaying public opinion in these chats, he was able to achieve more of his goals because the Congress realized that if they did do what he wanted they would the support of the people.  FDR, although he was not doing anything terrible, was able to use public opinion to go over the heads of the other branches of government. The Nixon-Kennedy debates are another great example of how technology and has affected how rhetoric works.  Nixon who looked sick during the debate appeared to lose to most TV viewers even though a large margin of radio listeners thought he had won.  This big debate win helped JFK win the election of 1960.  It is a big change from what the founders envisioned from having electors carefully choose and vet people. To having the candidate who looks better win the election (this wasn't the only factor, but it did help).  Overall the perceptions of candidates and how they talk has become increasingly important.  In many ways, this is not the system of democracy that was envisioned by the founders at the constitutional convention.  Social media with things like Twitter is able to sway opinion in an instant and misinformation can change people views. None of these problems were even imaginable 250 years ago.  That's why I think that although the US has a pretty good system lots of things are unaccounted for and people should be taking a look at the system that was orignally created and what we have now.  There may be some changes needed in order to avoid another Alcibiades type figure like the founders feared.