Thanks to Carl Krieg for permission to republish “The Rule of Law, No More” from Progressive Christianity. Information about Carl follows the commentary.

The Rule of Law, No More

As the American public reels in the face of the many trials of Donald Trump, delayed again and again by rules only a lawyer could ever know, we are consoled again and again by the analysts who assure us that this only proves that we are a nation wherein the rule of law is supreme and applied equally to all. Baffled though we may be, we Americans want to believe that in drafting the Constitution, the “Founding Fathers” exhibited unparalleled wisdom in creating the bedrock of our society, our law and our democracy. The problem they could not anticipate, and therefore could not adequately prevent, was the possibility that a definitive proportion of that society would ever reject the freedom they were offered and instead choose a dictator. The bedrock of our society, however, is not the Constitution itself, but the public consensus that grants validity to it. Without the mutual agreement that we all accept the rule of law with the Constitution as the foundation, – without that consensus, democracy becomes untenable. And we have lost that consensus.

The Supreme Court interprets the Constitution as it chooses, searching for ways to make the Constitution say what the Court wants it to say. The Republican Party refuses to guarantee that it will accept and support results of future elections. And the Leader of this Party mocks courts every chance he gets, encouraging his disciples to chaos, disruption, and violence. Meanwhile, dictators around the world, fearful that successful democracy elsewhere might loosen their own grip on power, also work to destroy our consensus, covertly undermining the helpful discussion and dissent that characterizes democracy and replacing it with diatribe and demonization. Achieving consensus in a nation of immigrants, such as the US, was never an easy proposition. But maintaining consensus when one of the two major parties refuses to abide by majority decision, is impossible.

That is the situation we now face. Trump and the Republicans will of course accept the results of an election “if it is fair”. But if they lose, by definition the election was not fair. And they will not accept it. As we gather steam toward November, Republicans, please think long and hard about your party’s refusal to abide by election results. We went that route once before and wound up shooting each other as the nation was thrown into civil war. And to all you evangelical Christians, without whom the Republican party could not exist, is this really what you believe God wants of you?

About the Author

Carl Krieg, Ph.D. received his BA from Dartmouth College, MDiv from Union Theological Seminary in NYC, and Ph.D. from the University of Chicago Divinity School. He is the author of What to Believe? the Questions of Christian Faith,   The Void and the Vision and  The New Matrix: How the World We Live In Impacts Our Thinking About Self and God. As professor and pastor, Dr. Krieg has taught innumerable classes and led many discussion groups. He lives with his wife Margaret in Norwich, VT.

Thanks for coming by, Gordon C. Stewart, public theologian, host of Views from the Edge; author of Be Still! Departures from Collective Madness (2017 Wipf and Stock), Brooklyn Park, MN, May 20, 2024.