APRIL 25, 2020 – Feeling outraged that America’s led by a village idiot, I think about this day in Portugal in 1974. That’s when the military initiated the largely bloodless “Carnation Revolution”—named so because citizens stuck carnations into rifle barrels of soldiers guarding the streets. It signaled the end of Estado Novo—the “New State”—under the nearly half-century dictatorship of António Salazar.
More precisely, “25 de Abril” reminds me that having the opposite of a nitwit in power doesn’t guarantee a good outcome. You see, Salazar was a brilliant scholar, a professor at Coimbra University, Portugal’s Cambridge and one of the oldest universities on the continent. He was well-intentioned, and early on in government he’d won a reputation for honesty and competence. In 1926 he was recruited by President Óscar Carmona to serve as minister of finance to solve the country’s financial crisis, and in short order Salazar saved the day. He was later appointed prime minister.
Salazar believed the party system had failed Portugal miserably. In the early 1930s he led a group of lawyers, businessmen, clerics, and academics in drafting a new constitution. In 1933 it was put to a national referendum in which for the first time women were allowed to vote.
During World War II, Salazar kept Portugal neutral and played a brilliant game of complex, duplicitous diplomacy with the British and the Nazis. His goal was strategic, but it allowed thousands of Jews to find safety—and an exit from Europe.
Scholar, good shepherd, dedicated servant of the national interest, Salazar stood tall next to a village idiot like Trump.
But that’s where history reaches a full stop.
Salazar got ahead of himself. Under his “he knows best” notion of governance, he ruled with an iron fist until 1968. That’s when Salazar the workaholic (he had no time for recreation or a family) fell out of a chair and hit his head while trying to enjoy a rare half-day of “R & R” on his porch. That was the official story. Insiders said he’d fallen in his bathtub, a less dignified way to end your career. He was never the same after that, and he died in 1970. (His hand-picked successor clung to power for another three-plus years until the Carnation Revolution.)
Between the end of World War II and 1968, Salazar broke the spirit and the economy of Portugal. A mass exodus ensued. My daughter-in-law’s family were among the Portuguese diaspora in France—a full 12% of the population of Portugal landed there in the 1960s and 1970s. In the end, Salazar the brainiac, Salazar the “good shepherd” had ruined the country.
The road back to democracy and economic prosperity was difficult. April 25 marked only the beginning. “Smart” and “educated” and even “well-intentioned” don’t guarantee “good” any more than a democracy can survive an elected nitwit. But somewhere between Salazar and Trump is a happy medium—democratic and smart/educated/well-intentioned. Portugal finally found a way. Can America?
Viva a revolução dos cravos! Long live intelligent democracy!
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© 2020 by Eric Nilsson
