Turley's Warning: Democrats' Embrace of Socialism Ignores History's Repeated Failures
Source: "JONATHAN TURLEY: Democrats embrace socialism as history's warnings fade away | Fox News." September 30, 2026. www.foxnews.com
The Gist
Turley argues that Democrats and young voters are falling for socialism's appealing promises without realizing that similar ideas have failed catastrophically throughout history. He compares today's Democratic Socialists to the French Revolution's Jacobins, warning that both movements sought to tear down checks on power, and suggests this reflects a dangerous, historically ignorant trend that could lead to serious harm.
Conclusion
Democrats and younger voters are dangerously embracing socialism/collectivism despite its consistent historical failures, because they lack memory or knowledge of past catastrophic outcomes.
Premises
- Polling shows 43% of Americans and 65% of Democrats now hold a positive view of socialism, indicating a significant ideological shift.
- Prominent figures like Zohran Mamdani and the Democratic Socialists of America are promoting collectivist policies (ending capitalism, eliminating landlords/debt, making goods like food and energy 'common utilities') using appealing but unrealistic rhetoric.
- Historical precedents (Mitterrand's France, Callaghan's 'winter of discontent' Britain, and especially the Jacobins of the French Revolution) show that socialist/collectivist policies lead to economic and social catastrophe.
- The DSA's push for a unicameral system and attacks on the presidency/judiciary mirror Jacobin efforts to dismantle moderating institutions, which preceded the Reign of Terror.
- Adam Smith's capitalist theory, foundational to the American Revolution, framed capitalism as liberating and government control/dependency as a form of servitude.
- A poll indicating ~60% of Democrats responded positively to the idea of a military coup against Trump suggests a broader erosion of democratic/constitutional commitment among the same population embracing socialism.
- This resurgence of socialism follows a cyclical pattern of generations forgetting historical failures, similar to how outdated fashion trends cyclically return.
Assumptions
- Historical instances of socialism (French Jacobins, Mitterrand, Callaghan-era Britain) are representative of what DSA-style policies would produce in the modern U.S.
- Positive polling on 'socialism' as a word necessarily reflects support for full collectivization/Marxist economic restructuring rather than more moderate social-democratic policies (e.g., Nordic-style welfare capitalism).
- The comparison between the DSA's institutional reforms and the Jacobins' revolutionary tactics is analytically sound rather than rhetorically inflammatory.
- Younger voters and Democrats lack knowledge of socialism's historical failures rather than having considered and rejected the relevance of those precedents.
- Capitalism as theorized by Adam Smith remains the correct/superior framework for individual liberty in the current economic context.
- The coup-support poll and the socialism-support poll reflect the same underlying population and mindset, implying a coherent anti-democratic collectivist trend.