Category: Government

The Primal Progressive

I’ve been reading John Locke and Jeremy Bentham lately – Locke inspired Thomas Jefferson, especially in his writing of the Declaration of Independence. For example, the phrase “they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness” comes mostly from Locke, especially “endowed by their Creator with … rights”.  However, the “pursuit of Happiness” was an edit of his original “Property” and that new phrase came from Bentham. In his 1789 “An Introduction to the Principles of Morals and Legislation”, Bentham equated “happiness” with “benefit, advantage, pleasure, good” and applied it both to individuals and to society as a whole.

Bentham was the original “progressive” and would still be considered a leader in that direction.  Here’s how one source (Alexander Guerrero, U. of Pennsylvania) describes him (emphasis mine):
“… a political radical for his era, arguing for the separation of church and state, for equal rights for women, for the right to divorce, for animal rights, for decriminalization of sexual acts between people of the same sex, and for the abolition of slavery, the death penalty, and various forms of physical punishment including upon children.” This was in the late 18th to early 19th centuries.  How much further have we progressed (gay rights, and then  … ??? ).

Rejection of “conservative” or “tory” views, throwbacks to an age before republican democracies, the views Bentham battled more than 200 years ago, is mandatory if this country, this world, is to approach that goal so beloved by Miss America contestants: world peace – but peace between all segments of all societies in ways that matter to everyone, not just peace between power-hungry governments with weapons.

Or so I believe.

Presidential Promises

In an online Coursera course on the Constitution, the staff asked this:

The various presidential candidates each say, “If elected, I will …. ” build a wall, make college education free, whatever.

Is that really the way the Executive branch works today? Is that what the framers intended? Which way do you think it should work?

My reply:

When a candidate today says, “I will …” I read it as “I will use my bully pulpit and support from my Congressional caucuses to pass and enforce laws that will …”.
I’m not so sure that is different from the beginning, since those early Presidents were strong-minded men with attitudes about how best to proceed. I think in particular about Jefferson and Madison (and Hamilton had he survived), those strong leaders, who had differing views of how the country should progress and surely wished to use the Presidency as a tool for achieving that. The notion that the job stops with “enforce the laws” is and always has been naive.

When Trump says he will build a wall and is criticized for believing he can do that unilaterally, that is a wrong way to blast him – he (or his more informed staff) is aware that he would have to get approval and funding from Congress (and no, I don’t believe even he believes that Mexico would, in any sense, pay for it!). When Sanders and Clinton speak of free or affordable college tuition, they are fully aware that Congressional action could block them with no recourse.

Political promises at all levels need to be taken with a grain of salt, for sure, but also need to be translated into terms that the candidates are unwilling to state but which they know are the more accurate terms.  We, the voters, are as responsible for interpreting their speeches as are they for clarifying them.  If we believe “the wall” or “free tuition” are beyond both the power of the Presidency and the willingness of Congress to provide funding or other support, we can simply discard the promise as typical campaign hyperbole and look to other issues to make our choices.

“There’s No Free Lunch”
“Political Speech Has Its Own Language”
“First Pay Attention, then Vote.”

I’m Redcat, and I approved this message 🙂

A Constitutional conservative in the liberal tradition

The title is a major theme of mine, but its meaning might not be obvious.  I’ll be talking about it in future posts but here’s the “short” version.

The U.S. Constitution, as ratified and amended, is a marvelous prescription for organizing and operating a federal (collection of semi-sovereign states) government. With only a single exception (the 18th amendment), it holds together as a solid framework for an active citizen-based representative democracy.

The terms “conservative” and “liberal” here do not refer to current usage in political discourse, e.g. to partisan positions or popular beliefs.

I am conservative with respect to the Constitution in the sense that I accept and honor it as written within the times and under the circumstances it and its amendments were ratified.  Neither English common law nor the numerous letters and papers exchanged prior to ratification can substitute for the document as a whole, though they may shed some light on the meaning of words and phrases in common use at the time.  Not even Supreme Court rulings should be considered on a par with the document itself, since they can be (and frequently are) overturned or modified by later Courts without the stringent requirements imposed on formal amendments.

I am in the liberal tradition along the lines that inspired the founding fathers to part from Mother England and to establish a new form of government.  The roots are in the Enlightenment, in the writings of such men as Locke, Rousseau, Hume, Kant, and Adam Smith. From WikiPedia: “The Enlightenment included a range of ideas centered on reason as the primary source of authority and legitimacy, and came to advance ideals such as liberty, progress, tolerance, fraternity, constitutional government, and separation of church and state.” What is equally notable about those writings is their challenge to dogma, dictated values, and the status quo, and their desire to connect philosophy with the reality of people’s lives, to force governments to recognize the importance of what people cared about – in fact, to simply put forth individual liberty, both active and passive, as a prime mover in the affairs of all people.  It was a proactive movement, not static, not fixed in time, but forward-looking, progressive to the max.

Briefly: conservative as in “cautious, stable, value-based”, and “liberal” as in “individual identity, flexible, active involvement, value-based”.  That term “value” has many interpretations, which is another deep topic.