Why George McGovern mattered then and why he matters now

Despite his recent passing, many Americans probably do not really remember former presidential candidate and Sen. George McGovern.

You might remember that McGovern, a Democrat from South Dakota, suffered one of the worst presidential electoral defeats in American history at the hands of Richard Nixon in 1972.

Even fewer might recall his disastrous vice presidential pick, Thomas Eagleton, a hasty choice unfairly maligned for receiving electrotherapy for depression and exhaustion.

Few can recall much about McGovern, but the respected statesman, liberal standard bearer and candidate of “amnesty, abortion and acid” — as conservative muckrakers unkindly painted him — is just as relevant now as he was during the protests of the late 1960s.

McGovern’s contributions to American society, especially progressive politics, still ring true today.

He was one of the first national politicians to condemn the Vietnam War, opposing it as early as 1963, before the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution.

Though he voted for the resolution, he later regretted his vote.

One of his main platforms during his 1972 run for president was complete withdrawal from Vietnam.

This opposition to military intervention strongly influenced the progressive wing of the Democratic Party throughout the 1970s and into the 1990s until the Third Way and the later War on Terror weakened that resolve.

McGovern also changed the way politics worked in the Democratic Party and, later, the Republican Party.

His McGovern-Fraser Commission curbed the secret choosing of delegates to presidential conventions and expanded Democratic primaries in many states.

These changes allowed people to participate more directly in American democracy.
In a time when fewer and wealthier people are gaining an unfairly large amount of influence in national politics, perhaps we should follow McGovern’s example.

McGovern’s changes controversially allowed grassroots activists to more strongly influence the direction of national parties.

This, along with his support for immigrant workers, including a 1972 visit with Cesar Chavez, and the impoverished helped build the coalition that anchors the Democratic Party to this day.

“We are the party that believes we can’t let the strong kick aside the weak,” he wrote in one of his books.

McGovern’s electoral failure in 1972 highlights the need for progressive unity. The aforementioned “amnesty, abortion and acid” comment was suspected to actually have been coined by Eagleton, his running mate.

As a side note, most of today’s progressives, including me, have few problems with the first two items on that list.

To me, McGovern’s most important contribution is simple.

When, in an interview with Connecticut’s Record-Journal newspaper, he was asked about the famous Serenity Prayer that includes the words, “Grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change.”

McGovern replied, “No. I keep trying to change them.”

In today’s political climate of pessimism and doubt about the future, especially on college campuses, McGovern’s simple message of progressive change is one to keep close.

­— estahr@indiana.edu