Should we embrace interesting times?

On Pete Buttigieg and Adam Goodheart's "1861."

I’ve been writing a little less here lately while absorbed in my latest book project, about which I will have more to tell you in the months to come. You’ll likely read more from me in this space in the fall, too.

I also have been reading, and finally found the time to read 1861 by Adam Goodheart. To be more precise I listened to it on long drives or while doing dishes; it’s poetically written, a beautiful story to hear. I’m not sure I would have experienced it as richly and fully through a conventional read. It’s a long book, and someone or something would have distracted me. It’s worth every word.

The book is about the United States’ moral awakening at the start of the Civil War—the decision of many ordinary people, after a period of great confusion, to stand with their country, which also turned them against slavery. There is only a little combat in the book. It’s more about society, democracy, parades, public meetings, private debates, dinners and walks through gardens, even a conversation in a rowboat.

Sometimes the most awful people did wonderful things. Benjamin F. Butler, a race-baiting politician before the war, worked his way into the expanding U.S. Army and got in a situation that called upon him to take an important step against slavery. Butler liked the reaction he received, did more of it, and emerged as a radical antislavery man. This aspect of the war in particular and humanity in general is often on my mind, the amazing results that sometimes come from people we would be tempted to write off.

This reality about people seems also to apply to certain moments in history. The year 1861 was a terrible period, the whole country coming apart, unspeakable death and destruction just over the horizon—yet Goodheart quotes several people saying in their letters and journals, What an incredible time to be alive, or How lucky we are to be alive at this moment.

Goodheart’s book comes to mind when watching Jonathan Martin’s recent video interview with Pete Buttigieg. It’s part of Martin’s Politico series of interviews with leaders over lunch. Martin asks: Do you ever reflect that you were born too late? That maybe your politics would have worked better in an earlier time, a “less pugilistic moment” of greater consensus?

Martin notes how Buttigieg did all the right things, went to Harvard, served in the military, only to emerge at a moment when all the old standards seemed to unravel.

Buttigieg gives two replies. First, he says, I am a gay man from Indiana. Had I been born even two years earlier I might have had trouble winning an election.

More to the point, he says that he might have been bored in a more placid time. “There are different seasons in the history of this country,” he says. “It’s precisely when the house is on fire that you wind up having the most interesting and exciting changes.”

At another moment, Buttigieg tips his hat to Stephen Miller, President Trump’s advisor. Buttigieg considers his politics abhorrent, but says of Miler, “At least he understands what the stakes are.” At stake are many of the principles that have guided civilization for hundreds of years since the Enlightenment. Now we fight them out. Surely not everyone is happy to be here; but there can be no doubt that it’s a compelling time to be alive.