Politics

3 Years Ago Bill James Publicly Warned America Was Headed Towards A Civil War

Do not dismiss this warning or fail to take it seriously.

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Bill James

Bill James

Regardless of whether you are a Republican or a Democrat, last week — the week of July 4th nonetheless — was a difficult one for America. And for those of you not feeling rested and relaxed today, you are not alone. I am not a knee-jerk alarmist, but, over the last month, I have heard friends on both sides of the political aisle suggest that the United States is headed, nay careening, towards a civil war. One Blue State lawyer-friend of mine told me she’s particularly concerned because, as she put it, “the other side has all the guns.”

Last week, my Facebook feed reminded me that three years ago, prolific author and Bill James made this very prediction.

My answer to that one is too gloomy to give. We could be drifting toward civil war. If the political process stops working, it will result in a civil war, as it has resulted in a civil war thousands of times over the course of centuries. And our political process is not working very well at this time.

If you are not into baseball, statistics or crime stories, you might not have heard of Bill James, considered the father of using advanced stats in baseball, a concept that inspired the best selling book and later movie, Moneyball. James now has a front office position with the Boston Red Sox but is also something of an American history buff. But, what should make us all more than just a bit nervous is that he has a penchant for being ahead of his time.

Even if you read my posts regularly, you’ve probably never read this interview and here is the story of why. Three years ago, when we launched the very first version of ReplyAll, I decided that I was going to use the platform to publish conversations with some of my favorite writers, and on a whim I reached out to James, who, to my great surprise, said “yes.” I had recently read Popular Crime and was recommending it to anyone and everyone. I assumed our discussion would focus on some key passages in the book including James assertion that when solving problems as a country, it was critical to think outside of the boxes of conservative and liberal. Summer 2013 was was the heyday of the Tea Party, so I asked James about the then current state of political partisanship, to which he gave his “gloomy” prediction that we were drifting towards a civil war.

Now, because I was a rookie interviewer at the time (my tone in that conversation was somewhere between fan-boy and straight up kiss-ass), it didn’t occur to me to follow up and ask, “Civil War? Really?” But I did follow up with James afterwards by email and he did not back down from his prediction.

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I’m not “gloomy”, I don’t think. I’m realistic. Our political problems are more serious than most people are willing to admit. You look back at history, at nations that are careening into civil war — that is, at the US in 1850, at Kosovo in 1996, at England in 1642, at Rome in 60 BC or 90 BC — and you ALWAYS find that people don’t take seriously the POSSIBILITY that they could be creating the conditions of a civil war, until something happens that they didn’t expect, and… BOOM… all of a sudden it is too late to stop it. So what I am trying to say to the country, as best I am able to from my relatively small podium, is “take seriously the damage that you MAY be doing.” You don’t see a civil war coming… well, nobody ever sees a Civil War coming; that’s why they happen. Nobody sees it until it is too late.
Is it too late? Only time will tell. But, as Dilbert creator and political blogger de jour Scott Adams wrote recently, “Governments without credibility devolve into chaos.” For anyone who went to law school or simply paid attention in civics class, the United States rests on a foundation of rule of law, and that foundation is becoming dangerously shaky. What perhaps sounded crazy to some three years ago does not sound so crazy now. Now I’m speculating wildly, but my guess it that you’ve heard the words “civil war” recently, and my guess is that it didn’t only come out of the mouths of your usual alarmist friends. So while I hope James was wrong, I am writing this post today in the hope that we do not dismiss his warning or fail to take it seriously. Because if James is right, time may be running out.

Zach Abramowitz is a former Biglaw associate and currently CEO and co-founder of ReplyAll. You can follow Zach on Twitter (@zachabramowitz) or reach him by email at zach@replyall.me.

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