Mr. Smith Goes To Washington
"Liberty's too precious a thing to be buried in books, Miss Saunders" Jefferson Smith
The 1939 movie Mr. Smith Goes to Washington tells the story of Jefferson Smith, an idealistic leader of a youth group, who gets appointed to the U.S. Senate in a surprise move by his state's governor.
Assuming Smith is naive, the politicians expect him to be a pushover. But Smith quickly clashes with the corruption he finds in Washington, especially when his plans to build a national park for youth programs threaten a land deal involving the very Senator who was supposed to be his mentor.
Disillusioned but determined, Smith fights back against the machine. With the help of a sympathetic secretary, he uses a filibuster, a lengthy speech meant to block legislation, to expose the corruption.
The film is a classic Capraesque tale of an underdog taking on a powerful system, leaving viewers with a message of hope and the importance of staying true to one's ideals.
The first time I saw the film I cried. Cried…because I felt the pain Jefferson Smith felt when he experienced the corruption that is the political system. Today the apathy of the American Public to the graft and inept leadership of our leaders is systemic. We have become complacent and accepting of what we know to be wrong and accept poor leaders and clear corruption as “just how it is”.
But I have hope. I know that the genius of our Republic is the wisdom of our founders to create a system by which the people can if they have the courage right the wrong. We must cease to elect amoral politicians. We must elect moral leaders with a vision not for the now but for the future and recognize that in the immediate we will pay for the errors of our decisions.
Compromise, think of “your country” and “what you can do for it”. For in so doing We The People will get the leadership we deserve. A moral leadership, one that stewards the nation in a manor that elongates and drives us forward to a “ever more perfect union.”