Wallace Scapegoating and Weaknesses

Scapegoating and Weaknesses

In Gorge Wallace’s speech he uses many types of fallacies. One particular that I noticed the most is scapegoating. Wallace bashes on his opponent, the government by blaming them for taking the freedom away from the American people. In his speech he says, “It is a government that claims to us that it is bountiful as it buys its power from us with the fruits of its rapaciousness of the wealth that free men before it have produced and builds on crumbling credit without responsibilities to the debtors, our children”. Wallace is saying that the government should be taking full responsibilities for their actions. He believes that the government is fearing the people and not protecting the people. Wallace states that the government is taking credit away from the American people and is raising police power, making them masters of the people instead of servants of the people.

Although Wallace is very confident and sounds very intelligent in his speech, there are also weaknesses. Through out his speech, Wallace demands segregation so the American people can have the freedom back that they once had in the past. Wallace brings up how God should be in control and not the government. Yes, I understand his points he makes but if Wallace truly wants freedom of the people, why would he push for segregation. In my opinion, that is very contradicting for wanting to segregate the whites from African Americans. Also, instead of Wallace representing himself in his speech in a positive way by explaining the benefits of him as governor, he bashes on his opponents, which makes him seem unprofessional and unfair. If Wallace truly wants to persuade his audience to vote for him as governor of Alabama, I believe he should talk about what he can do specifically for the people to make Alabama a better and safe environment.