Commentary
The idiom “there is nothing new under the sun” comes from Ecclesiastes 1:9. That has proven to be true for individuals, groups, and also nations over the centuries. Technology might change, but not the underlying human nature and the impact of the Seven Deadly Sins on each generation.
Consider the factors that contributed to the downfall of the Roman Empire in contrast to what has been happening in the United States of America in recent decades. The United States is following the Romans’ script for destruction almost as if it’s part of a plan.
Let us examine some of the parallels.
Weak Leadership
Many of the Roman Caesars (or “emperors”) in the later years of the Empire were weak and indecisive and consumed with factional political struggles among the Roman elite. Thirteen emperors were assassinated by their own Praetorian guard. Frequent leadership changes resulted in inconsistent long-term policies, a waste of resources, and the exacerbation of political factions. Factional partisanship led to military dictatorships to restore order from chaos due to a lack of compromise. The Romans taught the world that weak leadership emboldens adversaries and leads directly to the demise of empires.The United States is on the same glide path to destruction. Except for the Trump years, the United States has experienced weak presidential leadership throughout the entirety of the 21st century. The North Koreans were emboldened to launch missiles with impunity, and the communist Chinese were similarly emboldened to threaten India and Taiwan. The Biden administration’s Afghanistan withdrawal debacle was watched by friend and foe alike and probably contributed to Russian President Vladimir Putin’s calculus to escalate the years-long Russo-Ukrainian war in February 2022. And the political divisions in the United States flowing directly from President Joe Biden’s weakness are contributing directly to the rising political factionalism and divisions in America. This is eerily similar to what happened in Rome.
Centralization of Power
A key contributing factor to the downfall of the Roman Empire was the centralization of power in Rome, particularly in the latter years. Decentralization of power to Roman governors in the provinces is what allowed the Romans to expand and yet control ever more territory and peoples over the years, as it provided checks and balances on the politically ambitious through limited government and divided political power.The centralization of Roman power began under Julius Caesar, who acted decisively to transform the Roman republic “from a fragmented series of provinces into a single, unitary state,” as described on Mises Wire. Among his actions included the appointing of corrupt cronies to wield power at his direction, the appointing of all magistrates, the outlawing of Rome’s professional guilds, the passing of a sumptuary law to control buying and selling of goods, and the establishment of a national police force.
America’s Founders were wise in passing the 10th Amendment, which reserved all power not specifically delegated to the federal government to the states and the people of the United States. Just as for Rome, a divided government served Americans well as the country grew to be the greatest superpower in the world. However, the American left (motivated by Marxist ideology) has been working to consolidate federal power for decades. One example is the passage of gargantuan omnibus spending bills with “strings attached” that force desired behaviors/actions in the states as a condition of receiving federal funds. Another is the continuing rise of the federal administrative state, which has accrued the power to create, adjudicate, and enforce its own rules over time, without regard to oversight by the people or their elected representatives.
Multiculturalism
Like the modern Democratic Party, the Romans practiced multiculturalism as a means of running their empire (the Democrats’ variation is called “diversity”). The Romans attempted to absorb the nations they conquered into their Empire without changing their fundamental cultures and philosophies. Their strategy included letting vassal states maintain their own cultural heritages as long as they acknowledged Roman rule and paid their taxes on time. They didn’t press assimilation, which left the cultural divides, resentments, and political frictions in place, which ultimately worked to undermine and fracture the Empire. This also led to degeneracy and a gradual erosion of the traditional Roman republican values of simplicity, discipline, dignity, and virtue, which corrupted Roman society and government over time.In the United States, the Christian values of patience, humility, kindness, and thrift have been purposely set aside by the American left, who have effectively turned the United States into a secular state over the last 80 or so years. We are seeing the rise of multiculturalism and retreat of assimilation in the United States in favor of the Marxist principles of diversity, equity, and inclusion, as well as race-based federal policies that purposely engender division, suspicion, and cynicism among Americans.
Open Borders
A companion to multiculturalism and diversity is the policy of open borders. From the beginning of the Empire, the Romans admitted immigrants only when they could control the process militarily, with sufficient forces to overwhelm those granted entry. As noted by the Wynnewood Institute, beginning in the 5th century AD, “the Romans lost control of the immigration process,” particularly in the western part of the Empire. “[The new entrants] retained their cultural and political identities, eventually combining to form armies within its borders that the Romans could no longer overcome.”The Democrats in the United States are repeating the Romans’ mistakes by pushing for an open U.S.–Mexico border. Just like the Romans, the Biden administration has effectively lost control of the immigration process—purposely by refusing to enforce existing U.S. immigration policies. Over the past two years alone, nearly 6 million illegal immigrants have entered the United States along with a flood of fentanyl and unchecked human and narco-trafficking that’s destroying the United States from within. The financial burdens placed on social welfare, public education, medical, and law enforcement entities by the dispersal of these illegal migrants throughout the United States are pushing local and state governments into bankruptcy.
Corruption
Roman politicians appeared to have had difficulty in separating public and private responsibility and the resources associated with each. Public resources were reallocated into the pockets of the politicians, and public services subsequently declined, leading to dissent among average Romans and riots from time to time. From Julius Caesar onward, the corruption of Roman bureaucrats accelerated in favor of the ruling elite. Emperors themselves frequently “bought” their positions through corruption, contributing to public cynicism and distrust of various rulers.The last few years in the United States have seen a marked rise in political corruption similar to ancient Rome. Lack of accountability for any of it has bred extensive cynicism while further dividing the country.
Collapse of the Middle Class
The Roman middle class was crushed by cheap overseas slave labor brought in from all of the nations conquered as the Empire expanded its boundaries over the centuries. It was cheaper to own and use slaves than pay middle-class Romans to work.In the United States, two policies foisted by the political class on the country have had a similar effect in depressing the American middle class. The first was the “free trade” incentives provided to offshore U.S. manufacturing, especially to communist China. This helped create the Rust Belt in the Upper Midwest and destroyed thousands of middle-class jobs.
The second policy was open borders, which has led to a flood of illegal immigrants competing with Americans for low-wage jobs and depressing wages in general. Add to that the massive Democrat-instigated spending over the last two years that has resulted in persistent 7-plus percent inflation, and the middle and lower classes in the United States are in dire economic straits as they struggle to pay for food, gas, rent/mortgages, and other basic living expenses.
From Volunteers to a Paid Professional Army
The Romans waged seemingly endless wars of expansion and conquest for centuries. Romans were either fighting a war, recovering from a war, or preparing for a war since the days of Romulus and Remus. To fill the ranks, the Roman legions absorbed personnel from conquered nations because the Romans couldn’t produce enough men themselves due to their penchant for endless wars of expansion and conquest. Eventually, they had to pay hard currency to foreigners to man the legions, which politicized their ranks and turned generals commanding those legions into politicians. Some of those generals upset the political order and became dictators. In any event, the armies and their leaders lost touch with average Romans.In the United States, the military trajectory has been different but in some ways similar. With seemingly endless wars to be fought, foreigners have been invited to serve in the U.S. military in exchange for citizenship rights. The Biden administration’s implementation of woke policies in the military has resulted in a recruiting shortage that has led to a collapse of standards across the board. The recruiting shortage results from the unwillingness of kids from traditional American families who served in the military across generations to enlist due to the critical race theory/diversity, equity, inclusion/LGBTQI cultural rot that has been destroying the military services from within. Military readiness and combat effectiveness have degraded to shocking lows as standards have been lowered to allow people to enlist who would have been summarily discharged from the military for similar behavior in the past.
Concluding Thoughts
By all estimations, the United States is on a downhill pull that mirrors what happened to the Roman Empire. The similarities are quite obvious despite the nearly two millennia separating the ancient Romans from America in the 21st century. Multiculturalism, open borders, rampant inflation, widespread corruption, the collapse of virtue, and weak leadership. These are the bane of civilizations ancient and modern.Will a sufficient number of Americans finally recognize the problems and take steps to reverse the tide, or will they meekly follow the Romans into the oblivion of history?
Views expressed in this article are opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times.
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