Author: Thomas Walters

PBS has recently begun rebroadcasting the English series, “Wolf Hall”.  The story is set in Tudor England, in and around events in the life of King Henry VIII.  Cardinal Thomas Wolsey, the King’s confidant and faithful advisor, has fallen from grace because of his inability to procure an annulment of the King’s marriage to Katherine of Aragon, his first wife.  In those days, a royal wife’s principal job was to supply an heir to the throne.  We forget how important that the death of a monarch meant that the transfer of power could be interrupted, leave a vacuum, or cause a bloody conflict, in the event there were no clear successors or lines of succession.  Henry died with a young son, aged 9, but when that son died six years later, still in his teens, the line of succession became murky among his other offspring and relatives.  

We pick up the trail with Thomas Cromwell, a lawyer with a close association to Wolsey.  He is unable to save his mentor, but the Cardinal is spared certain execution only because he’s ill and dies before being brought to the Tower of London.  Cromwell, however, impresses the King with his intelligence and insights, and thus assumes much of the trust and many of the duties that Wolsey had previously provided.  In play, of course, are the machinations and manipulations of the various factions at court.  We see Anne Boleyn early on, jockeying to become queen, and, when she too fails to produce a male heir, she becomes expendable and her life expectancy cut short.  

While this series doesn’t take us quite so far in history, Cromwell will fall from favor when he arranges Henry’s disastrous marriage to his fourth wife, Anne of Cleves, a German princess, with the aim of strengthening England’s ties to the Holy Roman Empire.  None of that works out as planned, although Anne is clever enough to give Henry a divorce and survive. Things turn ugly, though, for Thomas Cromwell.  Despite his successes in managing the monarchy and dissolving the monasteries at Henry’s behest in the move against Rome, his enemies in court move against him.  He is condemned without trial and executed in July, 1540.  Nobody was ever truly secure in positions of power.  Henry’s father, King Henry VII, defeated his predecessor, Richard III, in battle and took his place on the throne, thus ending the seesaw conflict between the Houses of Lancaster and York, known in English history as the “Wars of the Roses.” And, shortly after Henry VIII’s young son, Edward VI, died, Lady Jane Grey, a cousin, held the throne for a scant nine days before being deposed, imprisoned, and eventually executed.  Once more, faction against faction, enemies looking to seize advantage and power, only to fall with predictable swiftness.  

Five hundred years later, we’d like to think that societies and the governments that guide them have evolved.  Government should be less whimsical.  Elections have supplanted absolute rulers, giving voice to the people, and laws are created to protect the citizenry from the caprices and excesses of leaders.  Protections from an act or event that doesn’t go the Head of State’s way. And yet, in our 21^st century world, Alexie Navalny, Vladimir Putin’s primary critic and adversary, died earlier this year after a rapid decline in his health – suspected poisoning, Mr. Putin’s execution of choice.  A year earlier, Yevgeny Prigozhin, head of the Wagner group, became a critic of Russian’s military in the Ukraine war.  He died in a mysterious plane explosion while returning to Moscow. Also poisoned, in London, was former Russian Security agent Aleksandr Litvinenko, in 2006, and leader of the Liberal Russia, and opposition party, Sergei Yushenkov was shot in 2003.  The methods of execution may be more sophisticated, but it’s not much better than Tudor England in North Korea.  Defectors from that regime have revealed scores of deaths at the hands of Kim Jong Un, people perceived as threats to the leader, including his elder brother, Kim Jong-nam and Kim’s powerful uncle, Jang Song-thaek.  

We do have political assassinations here, but not by the Executive Branch of government. They are lone shooters, disgruntled by real or perceived offenses.  The last one that involved a government official was the feud and eventual duel between Vice President Aaron Burr and Treasury Secretary Alexander Hamilton in 1804, which resulted in Hamilton’s death.  But we can point to notable examples of individuals in the highest spheres of influence that have suffered for their blind, sometimes crippling loyalty.  That loyalty has been demanded but not, of late, be returned, recognized, or seemingly appreciated.

Former New York mayor Rudy Giuliani, was Time Magazine’s Person of the Year in 2001 for his courageous leadership after the September 11^th attack on his city.  In recent years, he has been disbarred and seen his fortunes spiral downward in defense of Donald Trump’s claims of a “stolen” election in 2020.  A massive financial judgement against him recently by election workers in Georgia has left him with virtually nothing, including his once impressive reputation, and deeply in debt.  The former mayor insists that Mr. Trump and the Republican National Committee still owe him millions in unpaid legal bills and reimbursements.  He even went to Mar A Lago earlier this year to beg for help, which by all accounts, fell on deaf ears.  Much like Katherine of Aragon’s plea to the court in her marriage annulment: “I have been to you a true, humble and obedient wife, ever comfortable to your will and pleasure. . . .”  Substituting “legal advisor” for “wife”, you would have Mr. Giuliani’s sentiments.  Or Anne Boleyn approaching her execution, spoke of Henry as her “gentle and sovereign lord.”  Does that make it easier to understand why Mr. Giuliani spoke at a recent New York rally for the now president-elect?  Or why Steve Bannon, Paul Manafort, Roger Stone, Michael Cohen, and others went to jail in service to Mr. Trump?  It is a different time, so for me, it does not.  There is a definite “Henry VIII” scent hanging over the Trump inner circle, as there was surrounding Richard Nixon’s close advisors. Then again, events of this week’s elections have done a great deal to undermine my confidence in the American voter to choose competent leadership, much less to understand and have a voice in the complexities of democratic governance.  To understand the rule of law, how the economy works, or anything much beyond a narrow self-interest.

Complete and total loyalty is the hallmark of leaders whose power is absolute and unquestioned, and who brook no descent. There are any number of them, from the aforementioned Vladimir Putin and Kim Jong Un, to Syria’s Bashar Al-Assad. Some leaders inherited their positions of power, and have grown up with its excesses and abuses. There is a common thread – they don’t handle criticism well, and repercussions for those that do disagree and speak out under such regimes, don’t fare well. Not unlike what happened to Cardinal Wolsey, Thomas Cromwell, St. Thomas More, and others in Henry’s time. It’s important for us in a democracy, where no one wields, or should wield, that kind of power, to be very wary of someone who tells us he’s willing to use the military, if necessary, against the “enemies from within.”  By which he means, anyone that questions the legality of his actions or stands in his way.