Scott Gurvey's Public Offerings

Let me give you a piece of advice. If someone asks you what caused the Civil War, the answer is “Slavery.” Do not equivocate. Do not hesitate. Do not complain about being asked a “tough” question. Just say, “Slavery”.

If you think I’ve written something like this before you are correct. The last time I was talking about three women who were in charge at three of our top universities. Today I address one woman who wishes to be in charge of the whole nation.

Nikki Haley, former governor of South Carolina, former United Nations ambassador, current candidate for the Republican nomination for president of the United States, was recently asked about the Civil War during her campaign in New Hampshire. Looking befuddled, Haley hemmed and hawed, at first complaining about receiving a tough question. Then she went into a rambling answer that the Civil War had something to do with the debate over the structure of the government.

I first learned about slavery in social studies class at O’Keeffe Elementary School in Chicago. I was in the fifth grade. I have no idea what elementary school education was like in South Carolina when Haley was in school. But her failure to learn the most basic fact about slavery is significant. Some residents of the old states of the confederacy minimize or deny the horrible truth of slavery.

Teaching about it is one of those “woke” ideas today’s Republicans decry. They like to claim that the war was the result of many factors, including economic interests, cultural values, and the power of the federal government to control the states. But those answers are too cute by a mile. Sure, there were economic interests involved. The south relied on the free labor of its slaves to harvest its crops and provide the servants to maintain their privileged lifestyle. But to not mention the word slavery in answering the question is simply racist at best, and indicative of a perverse ignorance that undermines modern American society at its worst. The war itself began in 1861, after decades of simmering tensions between northern and southern states over slavery, states’ rights, and westward expansion. The election of Abraham Lincoln in 1860 caused seven southern states to secede and form the Confederate States of America; four more states soon joined them.

What is most surprising about Haley’s sidestepping of this key issue is that it was the answer one miught suspect from a southerner who traced their roots back to the Antebellum South. That does not include Nikki Haley. Haley is a first-generation American. She is the daughter of immigrants. Her father, Ajit Singh Randhawa, had worked as a professor at Punjab Agricultural University in the 1950s, and her mother, Raj Kaur Randhawa, received her law degree from the University of Delhi. They immigrated first to Canada in 1964 and then to the United States in 1969. Haley was born Nimarata Nikki Randhawa at Bamberg County Hospital in Bamberg, South Carolina.

With that background one might think that Haley would be more “woke” than other contenders for the Republican nomination. But Haley insists she is a hard-core conservative. And on other hot button issues, including immigation reform, Haley seems more concerned with answering tough questions in a way that will not make waves or offend the hard-core conservatives than with articulating a policy that will distinguish her from the crowd.

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