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On October 25, 2002 a gray day turned black. All morning the weather had been trying to make up its mind, like an irritating, indecisive child. Clouds would reach down, touch the earth, then melt away, alternately and sometimes simultaneously spewing icy rain, stinging sleet, and clinging snow. In such an atmosphere it was easy to imagine the Anishinabe trickster, manabozho, painting ghostly outlines with the mist. Somewhere in the tumbling gray shapes wrestling above a small plane carried Minnesota Senator Paul Wellstone, his wife, daughter and campaign aides.
As the pilot began his approach to land, he inexplicably veered off course only a few miles from the airport runway and the plane spun out of control into the ground. An eyewitness recalled that he heard an impact he likened to a rifle shot. As the airport radar display swung yet again in its sweeping arc, it recorded only empty darkness where once had been a ghostly signal. When the tangled mass of metal was finally spotted, it took a great deal of effort to reach the site, hacking through thick pines, spruce and underbrush. It has taken a great deal more effort to understand the consequences.
One certainty emerged, that freakish accident was one of those serendipitous events, like Robert E. Lee accidentally dropping his battle plans before Antietam, that can change the direction of a nation. Along with the one vote of the Supreme Court that gave George W. Bush the presidency, the death of Paul Wellstone gave the Republican Party control of all the executive and legislative branches of the federal government for the first time since before most Americans had been born. It is a story manabozho would find intriguing.
The deaths of Paul and Sheila Wellstone also represented a serious blow to what many have proclaimed an endangered species: those who openly accepts the label of liberal. By the time of the Wellstones’ untimely deaths, liberalism had lost its luster in an argumentative and angry atmosphere punctuated by the raucous chatter of talk radio and the vitriol of extremism.
Had they both lived there is no doubt America would be a different place today. Both spoke strongly for what I have termed the core value of Liberal America–equity. Fortunately their commitment lives on in Wellstone Action. In honor of Paul and Shelia, I would ask readers of this essay to pause for moment of reflection, and then spend a minute at the Wellstone Action website, for this is a group that has it right as it trains a whole generation of leaders dedicated to the ideals Paul and Sheila fought for. They hold sessions all over the country for those who want to put liberal ideas into action. Check for one near you. They are well worth it.
In Minnesota people still sport bumperstickers saying, “What would the Wellstones do?” It’s not a bad question to ask.
A Personal Note: My book began with the deaths of the Wellstones and is dedicated to the people who died in that plane crash. Something is in the air when this site celebrates its millionth hit for the year on the 25th of October.
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