Stubbornness counts.

• Author: Rothschild, Matthew
• Position: Editor's Note - Writer Wendell Berry - Brief Article - Editorial

As the great Molly Ivins points out, Republicans are trying their damnedest to muffle criticism of Bush's runaway warmaking (what my dad calls Pox Americana).

Trent Lott and Tom DeLay will brook no dissent; they quickly reached for the gag and the tar brush when Majority Leader Tom Daschle dared to raise a tepid objection.

In so doing, they betrayed their lack of appreciation for free speech and for their own Congressional war powers as spelled out in the Constitution.

Article 1, Section 8, gives Congress the sole power "to declare war" and "to raise and support armies" and "to make rules for the government and regulation of the land and naval forces."

Lott and DeLay ought to listen to a fellow Republican, Wisconsin Senator Robert M. La Follette, the founder of this magazine, who warned about the perils of what he called "the war party" some eighty-five years ago in a speech called "The Right of the Citizen to Oppose War and the Right of Congress to Shape the War Policy." Said La Follette:

"Every nation has its war party. It is not the party of democracy. It is the party of autocracy. It seeks to dominate absolutely. It is commercial, imperialistic, ruthless. It tolerates no opposition....

"In times of peace, the war party insists on making preparation for war. As soon as prepared for war, it insists on making war. If there is no sufficient reason for war, the party will make war on one pretext, then invent another, possibly more effective pretext after war is on.

"Before war is ended, the war party assumes the divine right to denounce and silence all opposition to war as unpatriotic and cowardly."

Sound familiar?

With the Afghan war just about over, and the Iraq war not quite on, we wanted to pause this month to appreciate one of our favorite writers, Wendell Berry. For four decades now, Berry has graced the page with poems...