"Political moralism can focus usefully on abstract moral and ethical principles, but that focus can lead to a view of political combat as a binary battle between the forces of light and darkness," Steven Schier writes. (Rebecca Villagracia/The Minnesota Star Tribune)

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Minnesota has long been known as a state with a “moralistic” political culture, and that culture nowadays produces political polarization on steroids. The political distance between “greater Minnesota” and the Twin Cities grows ever wider. Political battles in the state have become highly ideological and increasingly take the form of life-or-death struggles.

Political scientist Daniel Elazar in the 1960s first identified the moralistic culture evident in the northern tier of American states, including Minnesota. Issues of the common good and community betterment take precedence in such cultures. Politics in this view should be a moral proving ground, not a series of individualistic bargaining and deals.

The bright side of moralism has been on display in Minnesota‘s political history. A signal example of that lies in Minneapolis Mayor Hubert Humphrey’s speech against racial discrimination at the 1948 Democratic National Convention: “The time has arrived in America for the Democratic Party to get out of the shadow of states’ rights and to walk forthrightly into the bright sunshine of human rights.”

Yet Minnesota has also spawned restrictive and censorious moralism. Many like to forget that the 18th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution inaugurating alcohol prohibition was spearheaded by U.S. Rep. Andrew Volstead of Minnesota, who championed that legislation, known as the Volstead Act.

Political moralism can focus usefully on abstract moral and ethical principles, but that focus can lead to a view of political combat as a binary battle between the forces of light and darkness. An authoritarian impulse fuels extreme moralism — evident in the right imposing the Ten Commandments in classrooms or the left imposing gender ideology in school curriculums.

That impulse can lead to a drive to exterminate political opponents.

We are all aware of the harsh denunciations of political opponents by President Donald Trump and his MAGA supporters, rooted in a sense of moral superiority over their opponents. Similar sentiments are widely abroad on the political left. Minnesota features outspoken advocates of both moralistic extremes.

The Social Perception Lab at Rutgers University in a recent survey discovered the rise of an “assassination culture” in the United States. Fifty-five percent of left-of-center respondents responded that the hypothetical murder of Trump would be at least somewhat justified.

The researchers concluded: “These attitudes are not fringe — they reflect an emergent assassination culture, grounded in far-left authoritarianism and increasingly normalized in digital discourse.” Minnesotans have tragic recent evidence that “assassination culture” is not just a province of the moralistic left.

Sound government and politics properly abhor a moralistic extremism that countenances assassination. Political scientist Greg Weiner notes that in extreme form, “The moralist is … apolitical, hovering pristinely above and sneering down upon those faced with the hard choices of government. But it is more than that: By foreclosing meaningful moral deliberation, moralism is actively anti-political.”

We would all do well to recall the counsel of Judge Learned Hand: “The spirit of liberty is the spirit which is not too sure that it is right; the spirit of liberty is the spirit which seeks to understand the mind of other men and women; the spirit of liberty is the spirit which weighs their interests alongside its own without bias... .”

More of that in Minnesota, please.

Steven Schier is the emeritus Congdon Professor of Political Science at Carleton College in Northfield.