Remembering civility

It was the late 1940s or early 1950s, I was around ten, and a neighbor in our new home of Pasadena had put up a lawn sign favoring a politician running for something or other. This was a most unusual act, and it amused my dad no end. Who's he trying to convince? my dad laughed. Probably himself.

At another time, same era, I remember my parents wondering if their new friends, whom they liked a lot, were Republicans or Democrats. They were staunch FDR Democrats. But dad thought the new friends might be Republicans. This was wondered in amusement and in no way would threaten the friendship; it was amused curiosity.

Personal politics was nobody's business. It was like religion. There was freedom of religion, and there was freedom of political belief, and neither was available for public discourse unless you had bad form or irrational prejudice. These beliefs about religion and politics were personal, not public. You didn't put up a lawn sign for a politician any more than you put up a sign declaring, I am Catholic! Nobody's business. Life went on fine without anybody caring. Indeed, once when a petitioner came up to my dad about some issue or other, my dad stared at the poor fellow and said, What's wrong with you? Don't you believe in a secret ballot?

I'm glad I grew up in and can remember such civil times. They are so far from where we are today. No, not all change is progress. Indeed, little of it seems to be.

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And you don't have to go all the way back to the post WWII era. In the late 1960s, my best friend, recently out of the Army, wanted to get a loan so he could go to college. He applied to his small town bank in Idaho. This was all done on the phone -- his mom had gone to school with the bank president. Everybody knew everybody. I was visiting when he went to pick up the check. As we were about to get into his car in the bank parking lot, the bank secretary came rushing out. "Would you fill this out for our records?" she asked, handing him a form. It was an application for a loan! First he got the money, then he did the paperwork. Deals were done on a handshake. The times were so different. And I don't call where we've come "progress."