Political Enmity in Our Civil Structure

I was reading a book about the life of Abraham Lincoln this week. There are great parallels between the crises that America faced in the middle of the nineteenth century and the crises our country faces today.

            The issue of slavery was the dividing line back in Lincoln’s time. Today immigration and institutional mistrust seem to be the defining issues that separate us.

            You may recall the famous Lincoln-Douglas debates from your high school or college history classes. The debates occurring in the early 1850s between Illinois U.S. Senate candidates Stephen Douglas and Lincoln were hours-long affairs that drew great crowds as each man talked about the slavery issue. Douglas was a supporter of expansion of slavery into the western territories of the U.S. while Lincoln opposed expansion.

            Lincoln’s biographers John Nicolay and John Hay characterized the debates as “intense.” One of their insights on the debates caught my attention because I think there are parallels to today’s fraught debates and political disagreements that pit neighbors and friends against each other politically.

            They wrote “As the ruder athletic sports faded out, as shooting-matches, wrestling matches, horse-races, and kindred games fell into disuse, political debate became, in a certain degree, their substitute.”

            The statement got me thinking about whether the dramatically changing sports landscape in America has helped fuel political rivalry and tribalism in America today.

            When I was a kid, I hardly ever recall the general public being interested in politics or political personalities. There certainly was a hangover from Watergate, but mostly everybody was on the same page that Richard Nixon was a crook and had to go. And then President Ford did the right thing by pardoning him and the country moved on.

            Rather than have our attention taken over by politics and political fights, we focused on the Yankees vs. the Red Sox, the Lakers vs. the Celtics, and U.S. hockey vs. Soviet hockey. There were boxing matches of the century twice a year with fighters like Ali, Holmes, Frazier, Hearns, Hagler, Leonard, and Duran becoming household names. We marveled at the racing intensity of Affirmed vs. Alydar, and the spectacle of Secretariat, Seattle Slew, and Spectacular Bid on the horse track.

            Our attention was grabbed by sport and people assembled in their tribes and rooted for their teams.

            Sports were accessible back then. A family could afford to go to the ballpark. A trip to Municipal Stadium to watch the local minor league ballclub would cost a family ten bucks. Today a trip to the Yard Goats will be closer to 200 bucks after parking, souvenirs, and food is purchased.   

            I think there is a relationship between the hostile takeover of sports by massive corporate and media money, and betting partnerships and gravitation of the general public toward political tribalism. Sports looks more and more like a vice rather than a diversion these days.

            But the entertainment from politics is free and everyone can have an opinion. In the old days we would wear our Yankees cap or our Red Sox cap. Today you wear your MAGA cap or your Biden aviators. The effect is the same. But the destructive impact on our communities is far worse.

            I wish sports could once again assume its place in society as the depository of our passions and rooting interests and community gatherings. Its replacement by political enmity is rotting our civil structure.