Independent U.S. Senator Angus King is using a 1950 speech by a Maine Republican Senator to rail against the Trump administration.
King spoke on the Senate floor Tuesday, where he used Margaret Chase Smith’s iconic address, which attacked colleague Joseph McCarthy for his aggressive pursuit of perceived communist sympathizers.
“So, with thanks to Margaret Chase Smith for her example and inspiration, this is my ‘Declaration of Conscience,” said King.
McCarthy was censured by the Senate four years after Smith’s “Declaration of Conscience” speech.
King has spent much of President Trump’s first 100 days in office criticizing the administration’s tactics in implementing Trump’s agenda.
He continued those criticisms in a nearly half hour speech Tuesday on the Senate floor.
“Again, this is not about the President’s agenda (and yes, I disagree with most of it), it’s about the manner in which he is pursuing it—which includes ignoring the Constitution and the rule of law—and it’s this roughshod non-process that endangers all of us, his detractors and supporters alike,” said King.
In her “Declaration of Conscience” speech, Smith railed against the administration of Democratic President Harry Truman, while warning about the overreach of McCarthy’s ant-communism campaign.
“Surely it is clear that this nation will continue to suffer as long as it is governed by the present ineffective Democratic Administration,” said Smith. “Yet to displace it with a Republican regime embracing a philosophy that lacks political integrity or intellectual honesty would prove equally disastrous to this nation.”
The term “McCarthyism” was coined in 1950 in reference to McCarthy’s practices.
King’s speech was intended to mark the upcoming 75th anniversary of Smith’s landmark speech, which comes June 1st.