WASHINGTON — If this week’s presidential inauguration feels different, that’s because it is. Presidential scholars agree that the conflict and divisiveness marking this week’s transfer of power are unique in modern American history.
“In the last half century the American presidential transition has been a timeout, a moment for the combativeness and divisiveness of campaigns to be buried,” said McGill University history professor Gil Troy, author of 11 books on the U.S. presidency.
Scholars said the divisiveness and anger of this inauguration are unprecedented in modern times. They fault both sides.
Troy charges that civil rights leader Congressman John Lewis, (D-GA), a staunch backer of failed Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton, added to the conflict and others share the sentiment.
“I love John Lewis … he’s a longtime hero of mine, but I don’t think he should have said what he said,” said Elizabeth Sanders, a government professor at Cornell University.
Lewis told NBC’s “Meet the Press,” “I don’t see this president-elect as a legitimate president.”
“I think that’s a mistake. He did win the election,” Sanders said.
Both Sanders and Troy said the Democrats’ unwillingness to accept the election results has added to the divisiveness. Sanders recalled Democrats’ impassioned pre-election pleas to Trump to accept the results, when they thought their candidate was going to win.
As for Donald Trump — Troy said unlike presidents John F. Kennedy and Jimmy Carter who won close elections and moved swiftly to curry favor with all Americans, Donald Trump has not.
“Donald Trump has seemed to be stuck in campaign mode, stuck in combative mode, stuck in reactive mode,” Troy said. “We have not seen that pitch to the higher presidential level,” he said.
Protesters are nothing new at inaugurations, but the Trump inaugural is expected to draw high numbers on a day that is traditionally reserved for burying the hatchet.
“Something that Democrats and Trump have to start changing on Jan. 20, we need a new tone in the country, the country needs that healing moment that inaugurations usually give,” Troy said.
