The facts of political life

Facing reality – Part 1 of 2

The Ohio Freedom Alliance (OFA) is a diverse array of Tea Parties, 9-12 Projects, Campaigns for Liberty, minor parties (Constitution and Libertarian), single-issue groups, and a few cantankerous individuals such as yours truly. The mainstream media and the blogosphere has been active in recent months analyzing, dissecting, and trying to understand the purpose and direction of the liberty movement, which in Ohio is spearheaded by the OFA.

There seems to be a general agreement within the movement that, while rallies are a good thing; we need to move to the next level, which is defined as candidate recruitment and support. The movement has attracted many people who have had little or no previous involvement in the political process. The newcomers are attracted by freedom-loving ideals, but are unfamiliar with the means by which those ideals might be achieved.

The Republican Party now would like to take advantage of this inexperience, and steer the movement toward its candidates and policies. In so doing, the Republicans are doing nothing wrong – they are simply doing what the Republicans and Democrats have been doing to upstarts like us for a century and a half.

In the last two weeks, The Ohio Republic has issued several warnings – to the Tea Parties in particular – to beware of celebrities and establishment politicans. We must keep our wits about us. This means that we must communicate our goals clearly, often, and with passion. We must also be realistic about how the political process works, and what we need to do in 2010 to bring about a favorable result.

Many people who have entered politics with high ideals work at it for a while, then decide that politics is corrupt beyond repair. They get frustrated and give up. I suggest that this is because they do not have a realistic understanding of the political process.

Politics is the collective process of reaching a decision. In centuries past, when a king ruled with absolute authority, the purpose of the political process was to influence the king in one's favor. "Court intrigue" is nothing more than a synonym for politics in that context. In free societies, politics is the process of electing officials favorable to one's cause, and of influencing those officials to adopt favorable legislation or policies.

Since politics is a process, it is neither good nor evil. Rather, we should say that politics is used for good or not-so-good ends. As members of the liberty movement, we want to use the process to support greater personal freedom and a reduction of the role of government (at all levels) in our lives.

However, being a democracy in fact*, we acknowledge that every citizen has an equal right to participate in the process. Some citizens will see everything our way, some will see some things our way, and some will see nothing our way. That's life.

A legislator or executive who is accountable to the voters has to consider that the electorate as a whole has diverse opinions on every issue. The good ones will make their decisions on the basis of principles they have communicated to the people in their campaigns, and which have received popular support at the ballot box. Of course, the not-so-good ones will base theirs on which citizens make the most noise, or have given them the most money.

All right, you're saying, "Harold, this is just common sense!" And it is. Bear with me for just another minute, and you'll see where this is headed.

Legislation is a complex process of obtaining compromises, so the bill can attract the support of enough legislators to pass and become law. Take our state sovereignty resolution, for example. SCR 13 was introduced by the most libertarian members of the Senate – those who want to pass it in its original form. A majority of the Senate agreed to it without amendment – and that is because a majority of the people who voted for a majority of the Senators are likely to be sympathetic to state sovereignty resolutions. At the moment, SCR 13 is sitting in a House committee, where a majority of the people who voted for a majority of the Representatives are likely to be hostile to state sovereignty, at least in the form passed by the Senate. This leaves us supporters of SCR 13 with only two options: Accept the fact that it cannot pass in its original form and let it die in committee, or amend the bill in a way that it will attract the votes of a majority in the House. To its sponsors and the liberty movement, this will be considered "watering down" the resolution. So we must decide which is more important, to let the bill die in its "pure" state, or to get the bill passed with amendments.

When dealing with critical legislation like a budget, nearly everyone acknowledges that the bill must be passed somehow. No one really wants the entire apparatus of state government to shut down until the next election – so the only option there is to pass it with amendments. Lots of amendments. Amendments from representatives and senators who come from very different districts, all trying to respond to different, and often contradictory, sets of needs. All with an equal right to be represented. This is why we like to quote Mark Twain when he said, "Those that respect the law and love sausage should watch neither being made." It's ugly, but assuming there is no obvious corruption, it the only fair way it can be done.

I mention this because many newcomers to politics believe that any legislator who votes for a bill that contains any objectionable content lacks integrity; for example, a Congressman who would vote for a defense bill in which some other Congressman or committee sneaked in an amendment allowing torture of suspected enemy combatants. Now, what should the Congressman do? Vote for the defense bill because it was generally well-written and provides, say, better protective gear for our military forces, or vote it down because of the torture provision? If every legislator had to worry about litmus tests for every bill, nothing would ever get done. Then they would be derided for being a "do-nothing Congress."

So, if we have to expect that bills will contain some content that is objectionable, does that mean that voting for them displays a lack of integrity? No. I'll explain why in Part 2 on Wednesday.

* I agree that the Constitution intended to create a representative republic and not a democracy; but clearly the system that exists today is not the one the Founding Fathers envisioned.