July 26: Statism's Day

Some of the Disappointing, Deleterious, Disastrous, and Tragic Events On This Date Throughout History

President Harry S. Truman did some good and much bad. At his best, he promoted individualism and equality before the law. More often, he advanced statism, which is inimical to both.

July 26 throughout history has seen important, even monumental and momentous, events. In 1847, Liberia, a nation founded by freed American slaves, became independent. In 1948, President Harry Truman issued Executive Order 9981, desegregating the United Sates military. In 1971, astronauts launched Apollo 15 from the Kennedy Space Center, sending a successful manned mission to the Moon for the fourth time. Reportedly, record producer extraordinaire Terry Brown, best known for his work with Rush, was born on this day in 1936.

But the day that is now coming to a close in the Eastern Time Zone has seen some of the most damaging, destructive, covert, disappointing, and just plain unfortunate events in the history of statecraft, politics, and totalitarianism. It has been a particularly ambitious day for that favorite target of Donald Trump (and its more effective critics and actual antipodes): the “Deep State”.