I have a dream!

[Adrian II]

Knock it off, Adrian, you’re not Martin Luther King. Oh alright… sit down, have a cup of coffee. We’ll grant you five minutes, but then it’s back to work, okay?

Mississippi flood, 1927. Courtesy NOAA/US Dept of Commerce

When the spring rains broke records in 1927, the Mississippi River pushed its own waters up the tributaries, breaking levees and causing floods as far up as Ihio. President Calvin Coolidge had his picture taken by the flood waters in the streets of New Orleans and promised to rebuild the town better than before. Then he went off to the golf course with his railroad magnate buddy.

That flood became a turning point in attitudes towards federal activism and relief because U.S. government did not step in. The Red Cross was made to pay rent for the Army tents they used. The Democratic Party, practically dead at the time, nodded and sat on its hands. Those were the Roaring twenties, when every man had to fend for himself and minimal government was all the rage.

Except for the rich, of course. In order to save their own property, the fat cats of New Orleans prevailed upon the Army Corps of Engineers to blow up the levee at Caernarvon, 13 miles to the south, with 39 tons of dynamite. The dirt-poor farmers in the flooded parishes were promised compensation by Commerce Secretary Herbert Hoover. Most of them never saw a single penny.

Louisiana, Louisiana, they're trying to wash us away
They're trying to wash us away
(Randy Newman)

A young politician named Huey Long was outraged: ‘Screw this! They're lying! The President's lying! The rich fat cats that are drowning you will do it again and again and again. They lead you into imperialist wars for profit, they take away your schools and your hope and when you complain, they blame Blacks and Jews and immigrants. Then they push your kids under. I say, Kick 'em in the ass and take your rightful share!’

The flood, its painful aftermath and the political reaction to it all boosted Long’s career, based on the notion that government had a responsibility to guarantee social justice, the common good and the cohesion of society. Long’s populist policies as a Governor (he was elected in 1928 by 92,941 to 3,733 votes) paved the way for Roosevelt’s New Deal, a set of social programs and economic projects that helped the nation weather the Depression years and sustain a sense of common purpose among Americans. Long was corrupt, he remained an outsider in the Democratic Party and was shot in 1935, quite possibly by his own dumb security guards.

As I watch the footage of Americans trapped in their cars along Texan highways, with no fuel, no shelter, no emergency plans in place like an ant colony in disarray, I can’t help thinking that the American way of ‘every man for himself’ is a dead end road. And I can’t help wondering if the aftermath of Katrina and Rita could be the start of a movement similar to that in the late 1920’s and early 1930’s, one that would serve as a wake-up call to the Democrats and result in a renewed effort to give American society a sense of common purpose again. I will leave it to Americans to define the termcommon purpose for their won society. But I would suggest that the definition starts from the notion that some people who had no cars to leave New Orleans must have had something else on their minds besides looting and raping.