What Is to Be Done?

Adapted from recent remarks.

George Washington, Pater Patriae, won American independence through a strategy that went against his own aggressive instincts. He avoided battles with superior British forces. Instead, he attacked isolated enemy forces (as he did at the Battle of Trenton), kept his army together, and always withdrew in good order following a defeat.

Although Washington had weaker forces, he projected strength by keeping the Continental Army in the field, even after the victory at Yorktown. “[F]or Washington, war was indeed the continuation of policy by other means,” wrote Patrick Garrity for The Claremont Review of Books, “and he made that difficult relationship stick in a way that few if any Great Captains have succeeded in doing.” Preserving the army was the important thing, not defending a city.

If we adopt the military analogy, in 2016 and 2017, white advocates did not follow Washington’s example. Unite the Right was the equivalent of throwing colonial militia against disciplined redcoats in a pitched battle. This isn’t because marchers were defeated physically by antifa. Antifa were not the problem. Instead, city and state police deliberately failed to keep the two sides apart and used the ensuing — and inevitable — violence as an excuse to shut down the rally. In the aftermath, leftists unleashed “lawfare” — a host of crippling lawsuits — against pro-white organizations, threatening their very existence. White advocates lack the legal infrastructure — pro bono lawyers, friendly judges — to fight back. Even organizations that had nothing to do with the rally, including VDARE.com and American Renaissance, lost platforms.

The mistake at Charlottesville was understandable; just weeks before, there was a peaceful and successful Free Speech Rally. No one could have predicted that the Charlottesville chief of police would say,“Let them fight; it will make it easier to declare an unlawful assembly.” No one imagined a woman on security would abandon her post at an intersection, so that James Fields could easily drive his car into demonstrators.

What no one imagined, we can now expect. Democrats have denounced white advocates in Congress; we weren’t invited to explain or defend ourselves. Most of the “free press” cheers deplatforming rather than defending free speech. Tennessee, a deep red state, tried to impose security costs on us for hosting a conference, as if we are the ones likely to cause violence. It took a court order to save the AmRen conference.

Just four years ago, I would roll my eyes at excitable activists predicting censorship, arrest, or imprisonment. Today, I’m happy I still have a bank account.

What is to be done? We should look to our Anglo-American traditions. In the English Civil War, the American Revolution, and the American Civil War, the civic order didn’t collapse into anarchy. There was no mob or revolutionary vanguard that enforced its will as happened in the French Revolution, the Bolshevik Revolution, or the March on Rome. Violence, coups, and even Yellow-Vest-style mass rallies are not part of our tradition. Instead, Anglo-American revolutionary movements proceed through legal or quasi-legal authorities, from the Rump Parliament, to the Continental Congress, to the Southern state legislatures that voted for secession.

Set aside apocalyptic fantasies. Instead, think of ways to gain control of state and local institutions. This includes supporting movements to break up and rearrange states, localities, and school boards. This may seem fanciful, but movements are already under way that would have sounded absurd just a few years ago.

Conservative Virginia counties are flirting with seceding from the Commonwealth and joining West Virginia. West Virginia state governor Jim Justice has encouraged them, as have some West Virginia state delegates and Liberty University president Jerry Falwell, Jr. There has not been much progress on this recently, but that’s because the catalyst, a proposed ban on “assault weapons,” unexpectedly failed. Secession threats and the massive (but peaceful) gun rights demonstration in Richmond may have given state legislators second thoughts.

There are secession movements in other states, too. In Illinois, activists want to force Chicago out of the state. In Oregon, some conservatives want the eastern counties to break away and join Idaho. Idaho governor Brad Little welcomed their efforts, making him the second governor essentially to make territorial claims on a neighboring state.

Conservative upstate New Yorkers have called for secession for decades. Former Republican congressman Randy Kuhl argues that New York’s “extreme diversity” makes it almost “ungovernable.” He probably meant the divide between New York City and rural upstate New York, but he may even be thinking about racial and political diversity. To describe any kind of “diversity” as a source of conflict is heresy.

Finally, there’s the “State of Jefferson” effort in Northern California, which has smoldered for decades.

None of these movements openly mentions race, but race is clearly below the surface. “Vexit” (Virginia exit) leader Rick Boyer told the Washington Times that population change requires secession.

“The demographics in Virginia are not good,” Mr. Boyer said. “The federal government employee base is more and more of our voting population in Virginia every year. Northern Virginia is more and more dominant every year, and the giant rest of red Virginia is overwhelmed by blue Northern Virginia. It’s a losing demographic war as Virginia is currently constituted.”

He’s right. What Mr. Boyer did not say, and probably could not say, is that Northern Virginia’s dominance isn’t just because of federal government employees, but also because of non-white immigrants.

There is also “secession” on a smaller scale. In Louisiana, mostly white communities are breaking away to form their own school districts or cities. In Georgia, white suburbs broke away from Atlanta. In Alabama, a federal judge ruled that the city of Gardenvale’s attempt to break away from a diverse school district was motivated by race. Still, she admitted it was legal.

Journalists say what conservatives dare not: This is about race.

• “The School Secession Movement Is Growing. That’s Bad News for Integration,” The New Republic, October 15, 2019
• “The new face of racial segregation: School ‘secession,’” CBS News, September 5, 2019
• “How a ‘New Secessionist’ Movement Is Threatening to Worsen School Segregation and Widen Inequalities,” The Nation, May 15, 2014

Some denounce the secession efforts in Oregon, Virginia, and Colorado. “Take it from us in SC [South Carolina] — if at first you don’t secede, don’t try again,” wrote Brian Hicks in the Charleston Post and Courier. He called the movement “a little silly” and said we should “chill out.” “Do you know what these myriad modern secession movements have in common?” he asked. “They are all led by conservatives who’ve been triggered because they aren’t getting everything they want.” In fact, the most prominent secessionist movement is “Calexit” — which would take California out of the Union — and it is led by liberals.

Mr. Hicks also mentioned that secession has nasty consequences: The Yankees bombed Charleston and burned Columbia to the ground. Of course, this is silly, because there’s a big difference between seceding from a state and seceding from the Union. Besides, would today’s federal government really start slaughtering secessionists to keep them from leaving?

It’s true that some Americans are “triggered” because they want local control and self-government. That’s what this country was built on. The Left wants to limit states’ rights and local control. Several liberal states have passed laws to force their electors to vote for whomever wins the popular vote. That is a denial of local authority.

If the Electoral College remains part of the system, Democrats could make the District of Columbia and Puerto Rico into states, which would consistently support Democrat candidates. Republicans could counter by splitting Texas into several states, even though that could wound Texan pride.

The Left is right that rural areas and certain states have disproportionate power under the current system. The Constitution was written that way. Even when America was white, it was a vast country that had to accommodate sectional differences. It wasn’t just slavery; there were different economic interests between the protectionist North and free-trade South that almost led to secession in the 1830s. If America is to hold together, local communities and states need disproportionate power. The Founders never believed in “One man, one vote,” for fear it would lead to mob tyranny. America should be made up of diverse regional, state, and local cultures, and government functions should be pushed down to the lowest level possible.

What does this mean for white advocates? We should take advantage of the existing political system. Rural America is losing population and is plagued by opioids. That’s where we should be, building institutions and businesses, concentrating geographically, working openly for our people, helping our neighbors, and building local political power. We may not be able to form a mini-ethnostate like Orania, but we can build something close. We can build communities where we can be safe, survive economically, and use the American constitutional system to our advantage. Secession efforts show that white Americans want self-determination, even if they aren’t willing to be explicitly racial about it yet.

There is no chance of seizing national power now. President Trump has done many good things, but he has so far missed a historic opportunity to stop immigration and save the nation. Perhaps another candidate — Matt Gaetz, Kris Kobach, Ron DeSantis, or even Tucker Carlson — will be someone we can support. However, for now, we need to go among our people — learning trades, making money, running for local elections, building tribes and Bible study groups — working to build real communities. The Mormons did this, just like our pioneers ancestors.

What is to be done? It’s not trying to “take over” the GOP — the rise of Bernie Sanders and President Trump show that candidates can run strong campaigns without support from the party establishment, but we don’t have the power or the reach to champion a national candidate.

However, we do have the power to build non-political institutions in conservative, rural communities. We don’t want to “take over” towns. We should just be friendly citizens and be good at our jobs, just as Douglas Hyde’s Dedication and Leadership recommends. We need nursing homes to care for our elderly, gyms to strengthen our young, drug treatment plans to support addicts, credit unions for financial services, and group medical insurance. These things are all possible. With that foundation, we can survive and help struggling whites who need our help.

“White nationalism,” which is now a slur, once had a real meaning. It meant our people living free in our own communities, celebrating our heritage and undertaking great tasks. It’s utterly different from the “white supremacy” of ruling over groups or asserting that we are better than everyone. Perhaps we’ve been so focused on Washington D.C. and the electoral circus that we’ve neglected our nation. The people — not the government — is the nation. My nation is my people: white Americans.

Let’s face reality: America’s white majority has no voice in Washington. We can write, march, and post stickers all over the country. None of this matters if we don’t have a strong home base where we are building real communities based on peace and productivity, not fantasy and rhetoric.

Wherever you are in life, whether you’re a father like me or a college student, examine the path you’re on. If we really want a safe white community and ultimately a proud, productive white country, we need to take risks and make sacrifices. Build networks, concentrate in rural areas, create businesses that can support friends and fend off any attempt to get us fired. Let’s build the world we want from that ground up by uniting and building peaceful, effective systems that will improve our lives individually and strengthen us collectively.

In the second-best speech I ever heard Jared Taylor give (the best being the one in Budapest), he said that one day we will have a place on this continent that is ours, and only ours. Many are willing to suffer or die for this, but I’m asking you to live and work for it. Treat other races with respect, fulfill your obligations as citizens, obey the law. Yet every day, act as if our true homeland already exists. We achieve our homeland by building it from the ground up, within the existing system. Let’s show the millions of whites who already agree with us that it’s not just possible, but a reality. If they shut us down with violence, our example will only inspire others.

Like the Mormon pioneers, let’s be willing to move to the places where we can do what needs to be done. Like George Washington, we must avoid suicidal charges and instead build strong points (strong institutions) that will sustain us. Let’s project strength, like the Continental Army of our forefathers, representing the cause in the face of all obstacles. Let’s keep an army in the field, not armed with guns and artillery, but with knowledge, bravery, and the determination to defend our identity and rights against all opponents.

In the past, there have been times where I wanted to quit and be “normal.” Today, such thoughts make me sick. How can we say that we are afraid when we see what our ancestors achieved? How can I, or any of us, shirk duty?

We must possess an unshakeable faith that our cause is moral, our victory inevitable, and our future glorious. In the name of the best within us, let’s show the world what People of Light can do, not online, not in Washington D.C., but in the places where our people need our help and need a voice to speak for them. I hope I will see you out there soon. The opportunity is here. Let’s seize it before we lose this race against time.