Margaret Chase Smith might right a bell if Margaret Smith does not? Anyone? Hello? She is a member of that entirely extinct sub-species once known as ‘moderate Republicans’, a Congressperson from Maine, and one of the first women to run for President of the U.S., which she did in1964. She is also worth remembering – and honoring – because she was a strong, determined, public voice against the evils of Senator Joe McCarthy, a voice we need in the GOP of today re: our own current fascist, authoritarian wanna-be, Donnie Dump, whose cult of personality is running the GQP, leading a death cult not entirely unlike that of Jim Jones (and if you’re wondering who the heck Jim Jones was, please watch this space).
Margaret Chase was a Maine born daughter of English and French Canadian stock, the oldest of six children who, after high school, worked in a local paper among many other jobs before marrying, at thirty-three, a man twenty-one years her senior. He was her boss at the paper, Clyde Smith; eventually she would go on to win his congressional seat after Mr. Smith had served in D.C. for four years, and upon his unexpected death as the result of a heart attack. By that point, the Smiths had been married for a decade; Margaret had accompanied her husband to Washington, where she acted as his secretary, scheduler, and general assistant in all things legislative and otherwise. He endorsed her as the best alternative to himself from his sickbed, and, once in office, she never received less than sixty-percent of the vote.
A supporters of the majority of FDR’s New Deal policies, Smith often broke with her party to vote with Democrats, and, along with Eleanor Roosevelt, she was the first woman to appear on Face the Nation, which they jointly did in 1956. Among many other firsts, Margaret Chase Smith was the first member of the Senate to condemn McCarthy and his Communist witch-hunt, which she did after her inaugural year in the Senate, in 1950.
She is best known, deservedly so, for her Declaration of Conscience, the entire text of which is linked below. Although in it she does not name Joe McCarthy outright, there is no question he – and others who cowered in the face of his outrages – knew of whom she was speaking. Imagine if the GOP had one woman of conscience now? Of course, why does it have to be a woman! Imagine the GOP Senate had ONE MAN of conscience who would hit the Senate floor and Dump hard and then harder, and yeah, sure Mitt Romney has at least half a conscience but – c’mon. Slamming Dump in a tell-all book and interviews after you’ve announced you’re not running for office again – especially as a multi-millionaire who can afford private security – isn’t quite the same thing. No, no it’s not.
Here’s to Margaret Chase Smith.