The Silent Erosion of Freedom
Written by Will Wigginton (3/26/25)
November 8th, 1923: An upstart politician by the name of Adolf Hitler, hailing from the National Socialist German Workers' Party, otherwise known as the Nazi party, marched on Munich, Germany's beer hall on the Isar River. A coup d'état was to take place through the kidnapping and removal of the Social Democrats and Communist opposition parties in Germany. Hitler, flanked by his Shock Troopers, barreled into the beer hall, shocking those in attendance. He took his moment of opportunity and proclaimed that the ‘German revolution has broken out! This hall is surrounded.’ (The Third Reich, 55) He incorrectly assumed that the civilian and military leaders of the German government that were present at the meeting would allow this usurpation to take place. However, as was the case many more times during Hitler’s arrogantly-led life, he was wrong.
November 9th, 1923: Hitler, under arrest and facing trial following his “Beer Hall Putsch,” stood confidently before a crowd, a judge, and a state prosecutor who supported his views, with many protestors inside and outside the court house demanding his release. Adolf Hitler, utilizing his charismatic hatred, screeched that he and the others under trial were “Germans, who wanted and desired only the good of their people and fatherland; who wanted to fight and die. You may pronounce us guilty a thousand times over, the goddess of the eternal court of history will smile and tear to tatters the brief of the state’s attorney and the sentence of the court; for she acquits us.” (64-65)
April 1st, 1923: With all the necessary evidence in-hand to lock Hitler in prison and melt the key, he was essentially acquitted, as he predicted. Hitler ended up only having to serve a couple of months in a prison that was more akin to a comfortable hotel stay. This time allowed him to write his despicable manifesto, Mein Kampf. Instead of serving prison time for attempting to overthrow the German government, Hitler was allowed to roam free, and would take that chance to become the symbol of fascism. He was one of the cruelest absolute rulers in world history.
January 6th, 2021: The 2020 United States general election results were about to be certified in the halls of Congress. In every single election certification leading up to this point, this process has been a formality–almost an annoyance that the Founders carried out to ensure the peaceful and democratic transfer of power. On this day, however, it would be used as a vessel to carry out the most undemocratic act possible on American soil.
Donald Trump, the 45th President of the United States of America, lost his reelection bid to long-time D.C. politician and former Vice President, Joe Biden. Before, during, and after the election, Trump set up his conspiratorial claims regarding election fraud, and would beat the narrative to death. As a populist demagogue, Trump was an expert at molding Republican Congressmen to become his sycophants–to serve as an echo chamber of the “Big Lie.” This would culminate with an attempted coup on the U.S. government. On the date of the January 6th riots, Donald Trump was present, but far from the action, instead choosing to fan the flames and rally his supporters leading up to the coup, demanding that the crowd on-hand to hear him speak march on the Capitol and “fight.”
Although an event such as this should have been the proverbial nail in the coffin for Donald Trump’s days as a free man, he ultimately would receive a slap on the wrist, as did Adolf Hitler. Now, this is not to say that Trump will commit any acts nearly as despicable as Hitler (hopefully), but his plan to implement Project 2025 is chilling enough. As Hitler did 92 years ago, Trump would take the increased fame from his anti-democratic act, prey on an unpopular presidential administration, and rise to power with the help of a hateful political campaign. Instead of targeting Jews and Gypsies, Trump has his sights aimed on immigrants and the LGBTQ+ community.
October 28th, 1929: Following a desperate attempt by Wall Street financiers to maintain stability within the United States’ stock market, which was successful in the past by dumping loads of cash into depressed stocks, the ill-fated “Black Monday” occurred, in which the Dow Jones plummeted 13% by the day’s end, and another 12% the day after. Private bankers–no matter how large–couldn’t halt the momentum that was the oncoming Great Depression.
June 17th, 1930: Republican President, Herbert Hoover, with the help of a Republican-controlled Congress, signed the Smoot-Hawley Tariff Act into law. This would go down in history as one of the “most catastrophic acts in congressional history.” Paul Douglas, a Chicago economist and eventual senator, raised a petition endorsed by a thousand other economists to President Hoover, pleading with him to veto the bill that aimed to impose record-high tariffs on industrial materials. To make matters worse, American economic partners, in anticipation of the incoming law, raised their reciprocal tariffs on America, effectively freezing international trade in a world that had become increasingly reliant upon interdependency. Sound familiar?
President Hoover agreed with Douglas and his partners, but, fearing repercussions from his fellow Republicans in Congress, he eventually denied the petition and signed the bill into law.
Later on in Hoover’s presidency, he ordered the State Department to deny any immigrant from entering the country that could potentially not be able to be self-sufficient financially. Because of this, “throughout the 1930s, the majority of Americans opposed increasing immigration to the United States. Many cited economic concerns, fearing that immigrants would compete for jobs, which were scarce during the Depression.” Sound familiar?
The United States in 2025: Republican President, Donald J. Trump, without the help of a Republican-controlled Congress, unilaterally increased, imposed, and placed reciprocal tariffs on many of the United States’ most crucial allies. Although President Biden inexplicably kept in place many of the moronic tariffs during the first Trump administration, the second go-round has produced much steeper results. The amount of tariffs Trump will impose on the rest of the world will likely triple what was placed during his first four years. Key economic partners in Mexico, Canada, China, Australia, and European Union countries are the main targets of these tariffs. To make matters worse, many of these countries that the U.S. will be imposing increased tariffs upon have vowed to implement reciprocal tariffs on the United States. The American consumer will foot the bill and, ultimately, the United States economy will suffer. Economic forecasters and major banks, like JP Morgan predict the likelihood of an American recession to be increasingly likely as the tariffs continue. Sound familiar?
Besides the possibility of economic downturn, Trump recently defied a court order to prevent him from deporting alleged Venezuelan gang members from the United States, as they had not yet received due process under the law, which is guaranteed to anybody in the United States–citizen or not. Regardless of whether or not these people are gang members worthy of deportation, the principle of defying a court order and to violate constitutional rights without fear of repercussion sets the precedent that nobody is safe inside the United States of America. What was once called the arsenal of democracy by Franklin Delano Roosevelt is now a shell of its former self. What was once a country that defied dictators, that protected the individual liberties of the free world, now shines the shoes and licks the boots of absolute rulers. What was once the land of the free and home of the brave has become the land of the extreme and home of the afraid.
References:
Thomas Childers. The Third Reich: A History of Nazi Germany. Simon & Schuster Paperbacks, Toronto, Ontario, Canada, 2018.
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/trump-state-secrets-privilege-deportations-alien-enemies-act/
https://taxfoundation.org/research/all/federal/trump-tariffs-trade-war/
https://www.federalreservehistory.org/essays/stock-market-crash-of-1929
https://www.senate.gov/artandhistory/history/minute/Senate_Passes_Smoot_Hawley_Tariff.htm
https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cgr21jjwg4wo
https://encyclopedia.ushmm.org/content/en/article/the-great-depression