Expaticats

But if the power to exercise exclusive legislation in all cases what so ever over the District of Columbia; if the power to lay and collect taxes, duties, imposts, and excises, to pay the debts and provide for the common defense and general welfare of the United States; if the power to regulate commerce with foreign nations and among the several States and with the Indian tribes, to fix the standard of weights and measures, to establish post offices and post roads, to declare war, to raise and support armies, to provide and maintain a navy, to dispose of and make all needful rules and regulations respecting the territory or other property belonging to the United States, and to make all laws which shall be necessary and proper for carrying these powers into execution — if these powers and others enumerated in the Constitution may be effectually brought into action by laws promoting the improvement of agriculture, commerce, and manufactures, the cultivation and encouragement of the mechanic and of the elegant arts, the advancement of literature, and the progress of the sciences, ornamental and profound, to refrain from exercising them for the benefit of the people themselves would be to hide in the earth the talent committed to our charge — would be treachery to the most sacred of trusts.

– John Quincy Adams, State of the Union, December 6th, 1825

John Quincy Adams, the 6th president of the United States, believed in using the power of government for the good of society. Of course, he achieved little of what he wanted to do, as he was obstructed by a Congress that supported his rival, Andrew Jackson, who subsequently defeated him in a nasty, personal campaign in 1829.

I’m using this quote for a couple of reasons. First of all, it seems that, especially in the United States, good intentions with regard to the government’s role in society seem to get buried easily in nasty rhetoric. Secondly, it shows that the idea of government playing an active, positive role has been around for a long time in the United States, although some people would have you believe that it hasn’t.

In present day America, as a foreigner, you can’t help but notice that there is a large group of Americans who talk about “the government” as if it’s some nefarious entity that is out to get you. It’s not that you don’t hear people complain about the government in other countries. But in the United States, a lot of people take it a lot further: they see the government not merely as an annoyance, they actually think it’s evil. Where did this come from?

I can’t quite explain it, but I’ll try anyway (that’s what blogs are all about; never let a lack of understanding stop you from saying what you think, right?).

The United States were born out of a group of colonies, controlled from far away by a government in which they had no representation. Obviously this was a situation that couldn’t last, and the colonies broke free. It makes sense that this struggle lead to a distrust of a central controlling body, like the British Parliament was. Also, the slow communication of the time must have made this worse: as this faraway body made decisions about the colonies, the news about these decisions came in slowly, and must have been accompanied by rumors as the news slowly made its way across the ocean, and then spread throughout the colonies.

Ever since then, there has been a current of strong resistance to the government in the United States. Or, to be precise, to the federal government. Many resisted a strong federal government when the US constitution was written (anti-federalism), and in the early history of the United States, many things the federal government did would be challenged as unconstitutional. A long series of Supreme Court decisions slowly shaped the role of the federal government.

Having said all this, it is hard to see why this sentiment is still strong today. The federal government has been a large entity with a big influence for a while. You’d think that people would have accepted this by now. But, especially amongst the conservative / rightwing crowd, anti-government sentiment remains strong. Or does it?

There is a crowd of people who fairly consistently oppose the role of government, amongst which are libertarians and, more extremely, the bunker-building militia crowd. But for most Republican politicians, anti-government sentiment seems to be a political card that is played when it’s convenient. Government interference is decried as bad only when it doesn’t fit with their goals. When it comes to the military or anti-terrorism legislation, the federal government can’t be big enough for the Republicans. It’s also perfectly fine with them if the federal government interferes with personal matters such as marriage.

However, when the federal government (more specifically, a Democratic federal government) does something they don’t like, all of a sudden they conjure up the spirit of the Revolution in order to claim that something is just wrong and, well, just plain un-American.

The best example of something done by the government that triggers much gnashing of the teeth are taxes. Now, nobody likes taxes. In countries all over the world, you will hear people grumbling about them. But, in the US, to a lot of people, taxes are the work of the devil himself. For a politician to raise taxes (even if it’s just on the rich, and not by very much) is a very risky move. The word ‘tax’ is almost a curse word. This situation is exploited by Republican politicians. If they don’t like a bill, they will almost invariably claim it will raise taxes (like, for example, the cap and trade bill currently being discussed).

All in all, any discussion in the US about the federal government using its power for the good of society tends to be polarized by dogmatic attacks. That’s unfortunate, and it makes it harder to discuss the actual merits and drawbacks of the plans at hand. As John Quincy Adams might have said: “tell me about it”.