LITR 4232 American Renaissance 2010 final exam—Answers to Question B2

Eric Cherrie

There is no Black America; there is no White America; There is Only a Grey America: Understanding American Morality Though the Lens of the American Renaissance

          Americans are taught early about right and wrong--Americans are right, and everyone else is wrong; there is no such thing as a contradiction. It is a comfortable notion to know that you are always on the right side of the great moral divide. It is as if Moses split the sea of moral uncertainty and brought all of America safely to the correct side. However, what happens to a country desperately searching for the Promised Land? 50 years of wandering around in a post-revolutionary America for the promise of its Declaration and Constitution wears on its citizens' souls. However, some great writing and the worst war ever fought on American soil will help correct America's moral compass, at least for awhile.

           America is a moral absolutist; that fact cannot be argue or debated. The very Declaration of Independence states: "We hold the truths to be self-evident." Those truths are not self-evident only on condition of the society they are in. Or are they? Jefferson wrote that "all men were created equal." However, everyone knows that Jefferson and his contemporaries owned slaves. The practice of slavery continued until the end of the American Renaissance. Jefferson and other white men of the time at least believed that some part of his writing and the issue of slavery were somewhat morally relative, or they simply did not mind breaking laws from a higher power. Modern Americans would say that slavery was always wrong. That Jefferson was wrong. They hold true to their moral absolutism, and in a way they have to. The issue of moral absolutism and relativism is that you have to pick one side or the other. There is no between. If you believe one absolute truth, then you have to accept that moral absolutism exists--slavery is wrong, and it was always wrong. If you believe in moral relativism, then you believe all things are relative. Of course, believing all things are relative is an absolute statement; hence, you still believe in absolutism, and you are just a morally confused individual (nothing wrong with that; it is better to know that you do not know, then to think you are absolutely correct).

          One of the most morally absolute writers of the American Renaissance has to be Henry David Thoreau. His essay the Resistance to Civil Government is a perfect depiction of the American spirit as it relates to morality. Thoreau believes that slavery and the Mexican-American War are morally wrong. There is no confusing Thoreau with any other feelings about the subject. In fact, Thoreau uses a very common appeal for American society--the duty appeal--this appeal is a common form from any of the Abrahamic religions. It is basically an extension of the "obey your father and mother" command. You have a duty to follow God's law. However, Thoreau is sort of hard to read because he is so heavy on the responsibility thing. He is so self-assured that he becomes a somewhat divisive writer.

          Abraham Lincoln, on the other hand, is also a moral absolutist; however, there is a sense in his writings that he is trying to understand the other side. He knows that slavery is morally wrong; however, he desperately tries to find common ground with southern slave owners. Lincoln states in his Second Inaugural Address: "Neither party expected for the war the magnitude or the duration which it has already attained. Neither anticipated that the cause of the conflict might cease with or even before the conflict itself should cease. Each looked for an easier triumph, and a result less fundamental and astounding." He is saying that both sides made mistakes. This is an interesting approach for someone in the moral right. Lincoln is obviously more concerned with keeping the nation together than showing them who was right.

          In a 2008 final essay, Martin Bidegaray writes: that Whitman’s “'There was a Child that went Forth” discusses how the bits and pieces of our surroundings shape the whole, from playing children to quarrelsome children without skipping a beat. All of this is an acknowledgement of the unity between good and bad, how we all possess the seeds of greatness and trouble, and life itself as a whole is simply beautiful." This was a great example and analysis of Whitman's work. Whitman is saying that there is good and evil in us all. The passage definitely reflects the complex moral makeup of humanity.

          America has a complex morality. The truth is that all Americans are morally absolute; however, Americans are also in constant conflict with each other. Our ability to try and see each other's point of view is a testament to the writing of the American Renaissance and the Civil War.