WI: Enoch Powell gives a less "racist" Rivers of Blood speech.

fashbasher

Banned
Small-scale one, but what would happen if he slightly toned down the rhetoric at a couple key points:

1) He adds in a paragraph emphasizing his historic opposition to colonialism and stating his opposition to mass net migration as a natural consequence of that:

Now we are seeing the growth of positive forces acting against integration, of vested interests in the preservation and sharpening of racial and religious differences, with a view to the exercise of actual domination, first over fellow-immigrants and then over the rest of the population. The cloud no bigger than a man's hand, that can so rapidly overcast the sky, has been visible recently in Wolverhampton and has shown signs of spreading quickly...For these dangerous and divisive elements the legislation proposed in the Race Relations Bill is the very pabulum they need to flourish. Here is the means of showing that the immigrant communities can organise to consolidate their members, to agitate and campaign against their fellow citizens, and to overawe and dominate the rest with the legal weapons which the ignorant and the ill-informed have provided. As I look ahead, I am filled with foreboding; like the Roman, I seem to see "the River Tiber foaming with much blood."

instead reads as

Now we are seeing the growth of positive forces acting against integration, of vested interests in the preservation and sharpening of racial and religious differences, with a view to the exercise of actual domination, first over fellow-immigrants and then over the rest of the population. When Churchill stood silent during the massacre at Hola in Kenya, in which brutal domination was exercised over a native people in the name of Britain, I stood up. And I will stand up anywhere in the world, including here at home, where a people's self-determination and freedom from outside domination is being threatened in the name of our Kingdom. The cloud no bigger than a man's hand, that can so rapidly overcast the sky, has been visible recently in Wolverhampton and has shown signs of spreading quickly...For these dangerous and divisive elements the legislation proposed in the Race Relations Bill is the very pabulum they need to flourish. If we go beyond mere equality to the transformation of Britain through massive and unbalanced immigration, we will be repeating the same horrors that still scar our former colonies. The way to address the wrongs which have been imposed upon India, Kenya, and Nigeria in the service of the Crown is not, under any circumstance, to impose the same on us. As I look ahead, I am filled with foreboding; like the Roman, I seem to see "the River Tiber foaming with much blood."

2) He removes the part that sounds like he's blaming African Americans (most of whom were brought in as slaves) for the US' poor race relations so that

As I look ahead, I am filled with foreboding. Like the Roman, I seem to see "the River Tiber foaming with much blood". That tragic and intractable phenomenon which we watch with horror on the other side of the Atlantic but which there is interwoven with the history and existence of the States itself, is coming upon us here by our own volition and our own neglect. Indeed, it has all but come. In numerical terms, it will be of American proportions long before the end of the century. Only resolute and urgent action will avert it even now. Whether there will be the public will to demand and obtain that action, I do not know. All I know is that to see, and not to speak, would be the great betrayal.

instead reads as

As I look ahead, I am filled with foreboding. Like the Roman, I seem to see "the River Tiber foaming with much blood". We are a small and crowded isle, and we cannot house everyone from the former colonies who wishes to live here, or else we will turn into a failed nation. We will continue to support and educate people from the Commonwealth, of course, but we cannot stand a massive imbalance of migration with it. There is no personal hatred in my message, just an awareness of Britain's limitations - the NHS no longer is in desperate need of manpower and many Commonwealth immigrants would end up in utter destitution as we cannot provide for a population of 100 million. Only resolute and urgent action will avert it even now. Whether there will be the public will to demand and obtain that action, I do not know. All I know is that to see, and not to speak, would be the great betrayal.

Other parts of the speech that could be seen as going beyond principled opposition to mass unbalanced immigration are also toned down or reworded, but the general policy proposals and about 70% of the words are verbatim.
 
The thing is, his speech was popular either way, with the general population, and would have been castigated either way, by the powers that be. By including racially inflammatory content, he was merely handing ammo to critics who already had their sights fixated on him for the position of restrictionism. That isn't going to change because he hits on some Bevanite talking points.

The most interesting thing about Powell's speech is just how wrong he was about the proportions of mass immigration. He undershot it by a mile. The level of migration was far higher than he ever predicted in his worst nightmare.

As for anti-colonialism, I just don't see how you make that work. He was not a fan of Oswald Mosely and the anti-colonial far right movement. He later joined the Ulster Unionists, and defended one of the last bastions of the Empire (depending on your perspective) in existence in Northern Ireland and was a vociferous hawk in the Falklands conflict.
 
The problem with Enoch Powell toning down anything is that once he had convinced himself of the logic of a position, then that was his position, and he wouldn't tone it down for mere convenience. Other politicians might adapt a viewpoint to the prevailing mood or the audience. Not Powell.

When one reads Powell's speeches and writings, one does not gain a feeling of someone prepared to tone down or reword something for mere convenience.
 
I'm surprised how you manage to have apparently read that speech, while not actually touching on the worst aspects of it IMO. "In ten or fifteen years time" and the 'anecdotes'.

I don't think this is unlikely because of some fantasy myth of Powell as utterly resolute on policy, I think it's unlikely because Powell was doing exactly what you see him plainly doing in this speech; pure and simple demagoguery designed to excite and provoke. It was, in Powell's words, meant to 'go up like a rocket and stay up'. It only gets a pass as something less cheap because it was on the lips of Powell; with any other politician it would be just dismissed as what it was, a misbegotten lunge of ambition towards rabble-rousing.

The most interesting thing about Powell's speech is just how wrong he was about the proportions of mass immigration. He undershot it by a mile. The level of migration was far higher than he ever predicted in his worst nightmare.

Given he predicted a race war within ten or fifteen years time, I think we can say that he seriously overcooked things on this issue.

As for anti-colonialism, I just don't see how you make that work. He was not a fan of Oswald Mosely and the anti-colonial far right movement. He later joined the Ulster Unionists, and defended one of the last bastions of the Empire (depending on your perspective) in existence in Northern Ireland and was a vociferous hawk in the Falklands conflict.

He was pretty firmly an anti-East of Suez man at this point in his career and the OP is referencing his fully historical outrage over the actions during the Mau Mau insurgency of the late fifties, when Powell was still happy to rail against people describing other people as sub-human. Of course, Powell was also a backbencher then and not an ambitious member of the Shadow Cabinet.
 
The most interesting thing about Powell's speech is just how wrong he was about the proportions of mass immigration. He undershot it by a mile. The level of migration was far higher than he ever predicted in his worst nightmare.

I’m sorry, what?
 
Fsbasher wrote:


2) He removes the part that sounds like he's blaming African Americans (most of whom were brought in as slaves) for the US' poor race relations

I never read that as Powell blaming African Americans for the poor race relations. I read it as his blaming white Americans, with the implied message being "Please don't think I'm like those awful Americans who complain about race riots. They forced blacks to go over there as slaves, but I'm fighting against people who are voluntarily coming in here and causing trouble".

Basically, "I'm not racist but...", with an overlay of anti-Americanism thrown in as a pander to post-Empire resentment. You see the same sort of thing nowadays, eg. when Black Lives Matter got going in Canada, there were comments on social media along the lines of "What are they complaining about? This is Canada, we never had slavery or segregation. We had the Underground Railroad!"
 
Here's the part of the speech about African Americans...

Nothing is more misleading than comparison between the Commonwealth immigrant in Britain and the American Negro. The Negro population of the United States, which was already in existence before the United States became a nation, started literally as slaves and were later given the franchise and other rights of citizenship, to the exercise of which they have only gradually and still incompletely come. The Commonwealth immigrant came to Britain as a full citizen, to a country which knew no discrimination between one citizen and another, and he entered instantly into the possession of the rights of every citizen, from the vote to free treatment under the National Health Service.
 
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fashbasher

Banned
I'm surprised how you manage to have apparently read that speech, while not actually touching on the worst aspects of it IMO. "In ten or fifteen years time" and the 'anecdotes'.

I don't think this is unlikely because of some fantasy myth of Powell as utterly resolute on policy, I think it's unlikely because Powell was doing exactly what you see him plainly doing in this speech; pure and simple demagoguery designed to excite and provoke. It was, in Powell's words, meant to 'go up like a rocket and stay up'. It only gets a pass as something less cheap because it was on the lips of Powell; with any other politician it would be just dismissed as what it was, a misbegotten lunge of ambition towards rabble-rousing.



Given he predicted a race war within ten or fifteen years time, I think we can say that he seriously overcooked things on this issue.



He was pretty firmly an anti-East of Suez man at this point in his career and the OP is referencing his fully historical outrage over the actions during the Mau Mau insurgency of the late fifties, when Powell was still happy to rail against people describing other people as sub-human. Of course, Powell was also a backbencher then and not an ambitious member of the Shadow Cabinet.

It's truly remarkable, though, that Powell was willing to stridently condemn colonialism and stand up for African tribesmen. Yes, he may have been a demagogue, but he was much more articulate and nuanced than Trump or even contemporary European populists.
 
It's truly remarkable, though, that Powell was willing to stridently condemn colonialism and stand up for African tribesmen. Yes, he may have been a demagogue, but he was much more articulate and nuanced than Trump or even contemporary European populists.

The speech in question was not remotely nuanced in its main thrust for all its classical references, it was populated with saloon bar crudities about "wide-grinning piccaninnies" pushing dog shit through letter boxes. Far from being more nuanced than Powell's Faragist single issue anti-immigration successors in this country, they, having much more political nous than Powell ever had, generally try to avoid that kind of explicitly racist stuff like the plague and rely on the power of suggestion and dog whistles. It's often been noted that Powell's injection of sheer racial demagoguery buried the issue for decades because politicians were afraid to touch it due to the fire Powell lit, and they don't want to go down the same route.

The difference between Powell in the fifties and Powell in the sixties was, as I said, that they were at different stages of their career. That's really all. It's also been noted that Powell was pro-EEC in the early to mid sixties, and flirted with outright eurofederalism, and then moved on from that post-Rivers of Blood. There's nothing mystical about this, though a lot of people in this country somehow convince themselves otherwise, any more than it's mystical that Trump has taken an ungodly number of contradictory positions over the course of his political engagement. What separates Powell from the populists of today is only the fact that as an ivory tower scholar of Classics rather than a business-minded huckster who has marinated in the cynicism of New York politics for decades, he was crap at being one.
 
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