Opinion: Was Barack Obama’s overseas path paved by the ‘Great Commoner’?
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He was the spellbinder of his generation, able to mesmerize enthusiastic crowds at home and abroad with hon
eyed words spoken by a charismatic politician.
Barack Obama? Maybe.
But more than a century before Obama embarked on his current trip abroad to enhance his foreign policy credentials, another prominent Democrat embarked on an overseas voyage with presidential politics as a backdrop.
In 1906, William Jennings Bryan visited London and gave a widely noted speech in which he presented a plan for peacefully settling international disputes.
He also famously spoke about the responsibilities of more developed nations to aid less-developed countries.
His speech was delivered at the Independence Day banquet of the American Society of London in 1906. Having lost two presidential contests, the Great Commoner, as he was known, was preparing....
...for a third run in 1908. Intriguingly, he was invited to headline the July 4 gathering in England by U.S. Ambassador Whitelaw Reid, a longtime mover and shaker in Republican politics.
Perhaps the courtesy was part of a GOP strategy to help propel a candidate it knew how to beat to another Democratic nomination. Whatever, Bryan again claimed his party’s nod and proceeded to get crushed by outgoing President Theodore Roosevelt’s handpicked successor, William Howard Taft.
John McCain previously has invoked Bryan when discussing Obama, though he wasn’t referring to overseas travel.
‘I believe that people are interested very much in substance,’ McCain told USA Today. ‘If it was simply style, William Jennings Bryan would have been president.’
Another notable foreign sojourn by a presidential contender featured a politician who could make the trip as part of his official duties. In 1958, then-Vice President Richard Nixon went on a ‘goodwill’ tour of Latin America with the idea of raising his standing for the 1960 general election (he already was the clear favorite to win the Republican nomination).
What was supposed to be an uneventful journey erupted into anti-American violence -- including the Caracas, Venezuela, incident in which an angry mob surrounded his car and began rocking it, shouting ‘Death to Nixon.’
The trip proved political gold at home. Upon his return, Nixon was greeted by 15,000 people at the airport, including President Eisenhower and the entire Cabinet. Politicians of both parties praised his courage.
In this election cycle, Republican presidential contenders Rudolph W. Giuliani and Fred Thompson last year popped over the pond to highlight their diplomatic chops (as well as to raise money). Their stops included visits with former British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher, photo-ops they hoped would polish their credentials with American conservatives (see Giuliani’s visit here and Thompson’s venture here).
Buddying-up to foreign leaders who are visiting America is another time-honored tactic. McCain, Obama and Hillary Clinton met with Gordon Brown, the British prime minister, when he came to Washington.
Foreign politicians generally don’t use America as a backdrop for campaigning, but there are exceptions. Israeli politicians of all persuasions are common visitors to New York, Florida and other states with large Jewish populations, in part to keep support for their country strong in the U.S.
In Mexico’s 2000 presidential election, Vincente Fox of the PAN and Cuauhtemoc Cardenas of the PRD brought their campaigns to selected communities in California and other states with large Latino populations. With absentee balloting not an option, expatriates were urged to either return home to vote or exert their influence with relatives who could vote. Fox won the race, unseating the ruling PRI.
-- Michael Muskal
