New Hampshire's Peculiar Institution

By Thomas Gangale
California Progress Report
Oakland, California
13 October 2007

Two centuries ago, when southern statesmen wanted to defend the indefensible and mention the unmentionable, they referred to their states' enslavement of African Americans as their "peculiar institution;" peculiar in the sense that it was specific to the economic needs of the agrarian South and to the historical development of its culture. It was perfectly legitimate. After all, slavery had been practiced all over the world at one time or another.

However, in the late 18th and early 19th centuries, moral norms were changing. The Enlightenment had brought forth the concept of human dignity, and the founders of the American republic, being children of that Enlightenment, had brought forth a government dedicated to human equality. In this changing world, any argument in favor of privilege based on history and ancestry was increasingly indefensible.

Today, the white homeland of New Hampshire argues for its continued privilege of holding the first presidential primary of the campaign season. It argues for keeping the rest of the nation in political second-class status. It clings to this position on the basis of tradition in the face of a changing America, a more diverse America that legitimately calls for opening the political process to broader participation, broader both ethnically and geographically.

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