There’ll always be an England, a point reinforced last week by the Conservative Party revolt against Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s attempt to make an end-run around Parliament and leave the European Union on Oct. 31 on his own terms — without a deal to manage future relations between Britain and the European trade and customs union.
Enough of Johnson’s fellow Conservatives rebelled to block that plan, which many economists and others predict would be a disaster for Great Britain, perhaps leading to shortages of food, fuel and medicine as well as devastating some manufacturers. Johnson blithely dismisses this analysis as fear-mongering, but reports by his own government do not sustain that rosy view, according to The New York Times.
But perhaps more than the prospect of a catastrophic Brexit, what enraged the score of Conservatives who defected was Johnson’s attempt to circumvent consideration of the issue by suspending sittings of Parliament for five weeks before the end-of-October deadline. That amounted, in their view, to trampling on England’s unwritten constitution and overturning political norms, something they were unwilling to countenance, even from a Conservative government.
Johnson, who bears a striking political resemblance to President Donald Trump, retaliated by purging the rebels from the party for disloyalty. Nonetheless, they have apparently thwarted his Brexit machinations for the time being, and he has called for a general election to determine the country’s future course in — or out of — Europe.
The terms on which Britain leaves the European Union are certainly important, but the most significant effect of this revolt, the ringleaders of which included several of the party’s longest-serving and most distinguished members, may be that it draws a line in the sand against attempts to subvert the democratic process. It represents the most stinging rebuke yet to the bully-boy tactics of right-wing populism since the global return of the nativists began a few years ago.
The contrast with the United States could not be starker. Here, craven Republican officeholders have swallowed the Trump administration’s worse excesses without even gagging. We do not refer to issues such as the ruinous trade war with China; that’s squarely within the realm of partisan politics. But the president’s overt and covert courting of white supremacists; his Twitter attacks on people of color; his denial of Russian election interference; his attempts to destroy confidence in the courts, the election system and the free press all directly target the democratic process itself. Conservatives of good conscience are obliged to stand up and speak the truth. So far they have shown no inclination to do so.
That brings us New Hampshire, where Corey Lewandowski, the president’s former campaign manager, is thinking about seeking the Republican nomination for the U.S. Senate seat now held by Jeanne Shaheen, a Democrat of decidedly moderate outlook. Lewandowski’s slash-and-burn persona has been aptly captured in a single word by former U.S. Sen. Judd Gregg: “thug.”
Gov. Chris Sununu, who himself has showed distinct signs of quietly knuckling under to the Trump brand of thuggery while attempting to burnish his image as a moderate, is said to worry that a Republican ticket headed by Lewandowski could result in an electoral debacle for Republicans in New Hampshire next year, a view that many party leaders in the state are thought to share. Maybe if their own political hides are at risk, they will see the light and repudiate Trumpism and the threat it poses to the political norms that the state has traditionally embraced.