Political Parties and the Politics of Self-Interest, The Universal Political Ideology

[OrangeEmpire]

This began as a response to comments questioning the validity of the observation that our two main American parties are one and the same.

Does any one agree that politics is not idealogy but merely a tool for the implementation of ideology.

I would agree that the Republicans and Democrats are certainly different with respect to their strategies. They target different constituencies and use different rhetoric, but I believe their core ideologies are one and the same.

Both parties strive for power. Politicians struggle for power, there is no clearer message spoken to us by history. Power drives their rhetoric and in a democracy that power comes from majorities. The Democrats know this all too well - Bill Clinton was has been identified as the first president in history to govern according to polling data. (I think this is inaccurate - others did also but it does demonstrate how powerful the office of president has become today.)

If you think the Republicans are any different ask yourself why Congressional Republicans are beginning to scramble for cover, hoping to create a chasm between themselves and Bush's Iraq decisions as we approach 2008.

This is politics, one might say. We have to expect our leaders to be respondent to the wishes of the people. They should be held accountable for their actions. After all, if a crazed lunatic gets into office and launches America into a war that costs billions of dollars and gets thousands killed on the other side of the globe and we don't like it, why, we'll just vote him out of office!

No harm, no foul - that's democracy...the "politics of self-interest". People are self-interested, no doubt. Unfortunately, the founders of the United States knew this all too well which is exactly why they tried to constrain centralized government in the 1780s. They had firsthand experience with the dangers of majorities (often called factions) that caused them to universally condemn "democracy" as "vile"..."turbulent"..."corrupt".

They experienced the ills of faction as a result of legislative supremacy at the state level which resulted in the economic disaster of resorting to the printing press to finance debt, causing inflation. It was majorities that passed state laws in the 1780s that plundered working-class Americans (if such a term can be applied to the time period) in favor of creditors, that rewarded snakes that bought up bonds and paper notes for pennies from Revolutionary War vets who were broke and harbored no hopes of liquidating them at face value, and then used their political influence to pass laws that offered repayment at full value - all while debtors had to sell their property to the merchant-class to stay afloat. Majority rule in cases like this resulted in incidents such as Shay's Rebellion, prompting a national dialouge on the proclivities of unchecked democratic rule at the state and federal levels.

What did the founders learn? With the experiences of these local events they marched off to correct the evils of the Articles of Confederation by centralizing power in a unique way offering such ingenuities as dual-sovereignty and checks and balances among others to create a truly limited central government. What were they afraid of?

Politicans - people such as themselves. They were not afraid of evil people holding the reigns of power, they were afraid of good people. Good people who think they have all the answers are the ones who have mass appeal are are most dangerous. They seek expansion, militarily if necessary. They seek to solve the ills of society with the benevolant use of government coercion. They're dangerous to liberty and security.

I would argue that there were some very insightful men at the Constitutional Convention but they were men we hardly hear about today. Luther Martin, John Dickinson, Roger Sherman...these men seemed to have insight to something that history fails to give them credit for - that the growth of centralized power can at best be slowed but not stopped. If you think I'm wrong read George Mason's objections to the Constitution after the final draft, or read the anti-federalist arguments opposing it. Modern history tends to paint them as backwards hicks from small states who couldn't read or write. ( note that Mason, Patrick Henry were from Virginia, Robert Yates from New York, etc...in fact the biggest battle over ratification was fought in New York itself.)

They understood politics, and they understood it all too well - it's self-interest.

James Madison would argue that the best method of containing majorities (faction) was through an extended republic that would water down competing self-interests, making it difficult for factions to gather enough steam to use the reigns of government to plunder their neighbors.

Madison's words weren't even true in his own day, for the first major development in Washington's presidency was the development of political parties, the illegitimate children spawned by the attempted unification of competing local interests under one "national" umberella. The differences expressed at the Constitutional Convention and the during the ratification debate exploded onto the national scene with such a fury that Thomas Jefferson resigned from Washington's cabinet and the great General himself lamented the development of political parties in his farewell address. What followed? The Alien and Sedition Acts (clearly an attempt silence Republican opposition to the Federalists)...the Bank of the United States - clearly unconstitutional - established as part of a deal brokered for political expediency. And why? To get the good ol' national capital in the South!

Madison's mistake in Federalist no. 10 was that he did not effectively foresee national politics having any local interest...a presumption that is clearly indicated by his argument that there was no need for a Bill of Rights. He's been accused of idealism in this sense. For the better part of the rest of his life the hard-line nationalist at the Philidelphia convention became the limited government republican and enemy of centralized power. I don't think there are too many historians alive that would disagree with the contention that if Madison were here today, he would conclude that something failed.

Part I

 

[OrangeEmpire]

What would he see today?...an enormous amount of decisions being made in Washington D.C. affecting the lives of everyday citizens - overseas wars to spread "democracy" (the very cancer that our founders tried to prevent from spreading into the central government), government mandated retirement programs, massive schemes for the redistributive of wealth, centralized banking which has resulted in the destruction of real money replaced by an ever depreciating currency, inflationary assault on the savings of working-class Americans, corporate welfare, massive foreign aid, protectionism, federal interference in interstate commerce, federal invasion of private property and voluntary contracts through laws affecting hiring practices and minimum wages, federal interference in traditional state matters such as the regulation of drugs, threatened interference in the (traditionally) private institution of marriage, an income tax scheme which causes employers to serve as tax collectors for the government and destroys the historical understanding of one owning the fruits of his/her labor...on and on.

Limited government? HA!

But "politics" will sell all these ideas as "national interest". Now ask yourself - go through the above list and show me which ones the Republicans disagree with and which ones the Democrats disagree with. What you'll find is that if your flavor of choice isn't exactly gung-ho about something on the list you will not hear them condemning it. Why is this? Because each plank has become an imbedded part of the American political system - they are all part and parcel to nationalized democracy. To attack them is sacreligious, because they have the tacit support of majorities who have been trained to accept them as legitimate functions of government. You will hear Republicans talk about reducing the amount of income tax but never questioning it from an ideological perspective. Democrats will pay lip service to anti-war sentiment but will of course support their guy when he starts his own overseas adventures in the Balkans.

If politics is a vehicle for implementing ideology then one has to ask...what are the competing ideologies? Can one party really be said to be the supporter of limited government?

The ideology of political parties is a question that contains its own answer. Both parties want to stay in power. Political leaders who inspire are men of action. Unfortunately, limited constitutional government requires men of inaction and restraint.

Name the greatest presidents. Who is usually at the top? Men who presided over war and eras of government expansion...Lincoln (Civil War), Wilson (WWI), Teddy (would have fought WWI by himself had they let him), FDR (The New Deal and WWII)...the growth of federal power during their times was exponential.

But hand in hand with the warfare state goes the welfare state. Centralized welfare and government regulatory control is the hook of nationalism that plugs Americans into the progressive state-consciousness of designing men. As such, the biggest eras of military expansion were accompanied by an equal growth in domestic powers exercised over economic and individual affairs - with the Civil War came the arbitrary exercise of presidential perogative (the suspension of habeas corpus, nationalization of industrial sectors, military draft); American involvment in World War I would not have been possible without price controls, subsidies, the Federal Reserve system and income tax; FDR's New Deal expansion was followed by an entry into World War II...Johnson's "Great Society" coincided with the escalation of the Vietnam War...and of course the War on Terror has the Patriot Act.

Welfare and Warfare are Siamese twins. Again, all of the above scenarios - resulting in the massive growth of centralized power - were the result of the good intentions of great leaders...right?

Maybe...but one thing is certain...a politican who has a history of inaction is not seen as a great leader. Who knows anything about the presidency of Martin Van Buren, John Tyler, or Grover Cleveland?

Name one American political figure - just one - who is praised for keeping the U.S. out of war.

Maybe George Washington - is it because he can do no wrong in our eyes, or because we really believe it was a great achievement?

Such is the nature of American politics (and the world, for that matter)...great men of character solve bigger and bigger problems.

I would disagree, "great" politicans create problems. Real problems are solved by freedom-loving people who cling to their liberty pointing their guns at government. That's why private ownership of firearms will always be a threat to government.

No just war requires conscription. Just look at the American Revolution. If you think they were natural warmongers at the time and hence needed no conscription, take a look at the repeated attempts by the Crown, Royal Governors, and Lord Proprietors to get the colonists to wage war against French the presence in Canada in the late 17th/early 18th centuries. The Americans quite simply refused to join the fight, culiminating in the French and Indian War, where the American constribution was minimal at best, and where the proposed centralization of the colonies was unanimously rejected by the thirteen colonial assemblies.

The memory of this "apathy" may have led British statesmen (subconciously) to see how far they could push their American cousins.

Political parties?

I think it's quite plain they are organizations that seek to hold the reigns of power and as such cannot be trusted. The only trust our founders placed they placed in a document...as Jefferson said, "bind them down with the chains of the Constitution."

National politics in the 19th century, far from being local and fragmented, took on an incredibly national and sectional character. The numerous small factions were amalgamated into two competing groups, the descendents of Hamiltonian mercantilism favoring corporate welfare (of the 19th century variety), protectionism, central banking and government spending on internal improvements which were at best constitutionally questionable. This party morphed into different versions from the Federalists to the Whigs and from the Whigs to the modern Republicans. The faces changes but the policies stayed the same.

The other party, the descendents of Jefferson, favored state and local power, agrarian society and westward expansion. They typically opposed centralized authority (though not always) and criticized the policies of the Federalists and Whigs. Beginning as Republicans, the limited government "faction" of the national level transformed into the 19th century Democrats.

Despite their ideological affinity for limited government, even they became intoxicated with national politics. The result was the Mexican War and resulting land cession, threats of war with Britain over Oregon, and the beginning of hardline Indian policy that resulted in the bloody war on Native Americans - all under the Democrats.

Regardless, if ever America was to have a true political struggle against the growth of centralized government, it was to be waged through this party - in its earlier days.

But nearly everything they opposed was eventually mainstreamed into the "American System" - protectionist tariffs, high taxes and spending, internal improvements, dependence of the banker/merchant class on government patronage in its varying forms. The only battle that can be claimed as a victory would be the Bank War. Of course, today we have the Federal Reserve. Some things just take a little bit of time.

The ideological struggle between localized power (of the republican variety spoken of by the antifederalists) and national power ended with the Civil War. The Civil War, which took place in the context of a wave of nationalization movements throughout the Americas and Europe, firmly established the supremacy of national government, at a cost of 600,000+ lives, the ultimate check against centralized power, so eloquently espoused by Madison and Jefferson in the Virginia and Kentucky resolutions, being smashed into oblivion once and for all.

Part II

 

[OrangeEmpire]

Since that time there has been only one ideology among politicans - the control and exercise of political power. Sure, a Ron Paul comes along once in awhile...but investigate the difference in the platforms between the Republicans and Democrats in the campaign of 1912, you might find a dime's bit of difference if you're lucky. It is this era that gave rise to the contamination of the American political arena with national power-politics. From this generation of political do-gooders are both the modern parties derived, and the dichotomy between them is far narrower than any Jeffersonian or Hamiltonian could have imagined.

The defeat of classical liberalism during the progressive era marked the final shift to nationalism in the United States begun at the close of the Civil War. Government was no longer truly limited - where designing men needed to be carefully watched with the reigns of power. Now government became the ultimate tool of good. Social ills? A good president will take care of that...Income discrepancies? Easily solved with a federal regulatory commission. Overseas dictators? No problem for politicians of resolve.

Government was now the answer - domestically, in foreign policy, as well as other walks of life. Such an ideology prompted Theodore Roosevelt to intervene to address the roughness of college football and to respond to an inquiry into constitutional presidential powers with the comment that if the Constitution doesn't forbid the power in question to the president, then he has it!

He was a nice guy, though. So nice they named a stuffed animal after him.

To demonstrate the allegiance of modern Democrats and Republicans to the flag of arbitrary national power, witness the fact that both groups claim to be the heirs of Teddy Roosevelt. Modern Republicans have no problem invoking the name Wilson, FDR, or Truman. Democrats extoll the virtues of Teddy's conservation movement and trust-busting.

European countries experienced the same growth of nationalized power during the same period. It brought us WWI. Luckily, the Americans joined the game at the same time. It's a good thing, too. If the U.S. hadn't joined the race with its brand new engine, our politicians might not have gotten a chance to redraw the map of Europe with crayons, or to try to convince Europeans that the only thing we needed was more centralized power! Poor Woodrow...ahead of his time.

The "progressive" march towards the solution of national power has brought the world more death and destruction in the twentieth century than all other centuries combined. Nationalism is the biggest danger to world peace and to individual liberty. Let's be done with it.

But we have Democrats and Republicans and they are going to change things...okay sure, but they're going to change it using the strong arm of government power. Make no mistake, big government is the ideology of both parties. It's a means to its own end. Both parties want to use it to focus on what they can do to make the world better...whether it's establishing democracy overseas or handing out money to the voting masses. It's a nice car they both want to drive. Great men are men of action.

You say politics is the vehicle for advancing political ideology? I couldn't agree more. But the dominant political ideology of our era is politics itself.

Thoughts?

Part III