On Government in Business

October 30, 2013October 30, 2013 / gouverneurmorris / 2 Comments

The White House, over the past couple days, has gone in a direction that vividly illustrates why government does not belong in business. Beginning first with Valerie Jarrett’s tweet, then Jay Carney’s press conference, followed by Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius’ testimony before Congress and now President Obama’s speech at Fanueil Hall in Boston, all attribute the broken promises and failures of “Obamacare” to those irresponsible insurance companies who took their products out of the market. It is not the fault of government for first getting involved in business, they claim. The utter disingenuousness of this claim vindicates what former President Coolidge wrote in 1931 as he observed the same phenomenon by a Washington incessantly intervening in commerce,

“Another proposal to be made in the name of relieving unemployment will undoubtedly be an extension of government ownership. Healthy and normal employment consists of serving another for his personal satisfaction or profit. As the government is not personal, its proper business employment would be for those serving for its profit…For the wage earners to benefit in time of general depression it would be necessary to assume that government ownership would prevent fluctuations in the business in which it engages…” As the post office makes clear even now, that never happens. Conditions are anything but stable after government takes over.

“It is assumed,” Coolidge continued, “that payment of wages will go on without work, that is not employment, but relief. Then no one should work.” Any system relying on the work of a few to support the many cannot, nor ought, to succeed. It places an immoral burden on the individual to work that others may reap the rewards of his labor. In another era, that was not known as progress, nor even liberalism, but it was nothing less than slavery.

Finally, the insightful Mr. Coolidge comes to the heart of the issue: “The government has never shown much aptitude for real business.” The challenge of providing a competitive good or service, operating from a profit, making payroll, acquiring the best equipment, cutting expenses and hiring qualified people have never been concerns to government. It can ignore all of these components and still levy more taxes to cover its waste and pass stricter regulations to change the “rules of the game,” at its convenience.

Instead, Coolidge reminds his readers, “The most free, progressive and satisfactory method ever devised for the equitable distribution of property is to permit the people to care for themselves by conducting their own business. They have more wisdom than any government.”

The actions of insurance companies have not occurred in a vacuum. They directly correlate to what the White House has forced on everyone, outside the favored few. The administration’s latest string of ignorant invectives against business underscores yet again how little government understands about operating a company in the market and how much they are counting on our cluelessness when it comes to its oppressive involvement in the economy.

On Columbus Day

October 12, 2013October 12, 2015 / gouverneurmorris / 1 Comment

Few individuals in Western civilization have undergone as pervasive a demonization as Christopher Columbus. He has been designated the “poster boy” of all that is wrong with the West, in general, and America, in particular. He is blamed for Western racism and slavery (as if those policies are unique to dead white Europeans) because of his enslavement of the indigenous population, despite discovering a New World that would establish freedom as the governing ideal of human existence. He is blamed for Western Christendom because of his conversion of the natives, despite taking the first step toward what would become a haven of religious liberty and freedom of conscience in America. He is blamed for Western imperialism because of his accidental destruction (by an uncontrollable lack of immunity) of the various cultures with which he came in contact, despite introducing a New World that would form the greatest melting pot of diversity ever accomplished. It was nothing less than American opportunity and freedom, at the basis of our institutions, that made this possible. None of the good America has meant to human history and its unprecedented advancement would have happened without that first step into the dark unknown.

The same folks who discredit and ridicule men like Columbus for his failures not only defend the most violent thugs and genocidal regimes of this and the twentieth century — one need only recall the Western media’s adulation for Mao, Castro, Qaddafi and “Uncle Joe” Stalin — to recognize the double standard. The “blame America first” mentality illustrates the failure, not of America, but of human nature itself. The principles that formed America as the exception to the rule of human affairs is not at fault here. We honor our heroes not because they lack imperfections or never committed any wrongs. We honor men like Columbus because we revere and love what good they did accomplish. It is a respect for good above evil that merits our praise and admiration. Meanwhile, as Coolidge would say,

[I]t is a very hasty and ill-considered judgment to conclude that there is more bad than good in any one. We are all a combination of both elements. While we ought not to approve of the evil in ourselves or in others…The only perfect man ate and drank with publicans and sinners. It did not scandalize Him, it was some of those who were not perfect who were scandalized.

The politically correct demand for perfection is chasing an eternally elusive object. When the only subjects worthy of study are those who never violated the politically correct creed, we will have an extremely narrow, and uninformed, view of human nature. We may know much but without a full understanding of our nature, the good with the bad, it becomes a fantasy fixated on the reality we choose, not the reality which is.

Coolidge reminded those reading his daily column,

There is enough good in all of us to support the law of human fellowship. We shall be much more effective for good if we treat men not as they are but as they ought to be. If we judge ourselves only by our aspirations and every one else only by their conduct we shall reach a very false conclusion. When we have exhausted the possibilities of criticism on ourselves it will be time enough to apply it to others. The world needs high social standards and we should do our best to maintain them, but they should rest on the broad base of Christian charity.

If the politically correct code sought to lift and inform the culture with higher standards, it would not mock the only Perfect Man Coolidge mentioned. Christ would be its greatest example. The hypocrisy evident in “blaming America first” is laid bare by this point. The offense of Columbus, in these folks’ eyes, is not what they claim it to be. His offense is helping to make America possible. The exploitation and oppression he perpetrated (meant to assign the full guilt we should all feel for being Americans) defines all we need to “know” about him. The good he did — not the first to arrive but the first to introduce the New World to the Old — is spoiled and negated by his sins against political correctness. Nothing but the evil he represents matters to such people because it fits the political agenda not honest historical perspective.

Ultimately, it is a denial of good itself. Truth learns from both the wrong examples and the right ones, honoring good where it can be found, even in flawed and imperfect people like Columbus. Pessimists and cynics may long for the “good old days” when Meso-American empires sacrificed their own human populations and chiefs, like Powhatan, consolidated power through war and genocide. But, if not for the Christian boy Chanco, murder would have continued unabated. Considering Americans were the first to appeal to higher ideals, ideals grounded in a moral conscience, Coolidge could rightly say of Columbus on October 11, 1930,

He is entitled to rank forever as the greatest of all explorers. But the glory of his exploit, great as it was, becomes almost unimportant when compared with its results. It marked the inception of the modern era. The minds of men were opened to new thoughts. The gold and silver of America gave a new trend to the life of Europe. The arts began to flourish. The people began to assert their rights. More colonies brought more trade. A new age appeared, great in captains, admirals, statesmen, poets and philosophers, and finally new nations dedicated to human freedom arose on this side of the Atlantic. These are partly the reasons why Christopher Columbus is entitled to be honored.

The substance for recognizing Columbus in this, the five hundred and twenty-first year since his discovery, resides not so much in what he personally did, or failed to do. It resides in the part he played in the opportunity to establish, for the first time, a place where people can live free to govern themselves, keep the rewards of their own work, and practice, unfettered, the obligations of their conscience before God and mankind.

On Shutting Down Opportunity

October 2, 2013October 2, 2013 / gouverneurmorris / Leave a comment

“If the Federal Government should go out of existence, the common run of people would not detect the difference in the affairs of their daily life for a considerable length of time” — President Calvin Coolidge, “States Rights and National Unity,” given at the College of William and Mary in Williamsburg, Virginia, May 15, 1926.

As a perverse enthusiasm for the “Government Shutdown” pervades mainstream media coverage, the total mischaracterization of the issue is propagating confusion and fear, not clarity and sound information. The press, having long ago shed the veneer of objective journalism, is no longer upholding its obligation to arm people with accurate and honest information.

The issue is skewed from the outset as a picture of vast human suffering all caused by a callous, unfeeling opposition to the President and his Party’s agenda. Disagreement with that agenda, instead of the agenda itself, is blamed as the problem. In actuality, the problem is never connected to its real cause: the President’s own policies. The cause is never attributed to a Government that has overgrown its very limited and specific Constitutional role. The problem is those lousy Republicans who want Government to shut down and people to die because they want to see “Obamacare,” the law of the land, undone, or so goes the absurd mantra.

Temporarily furloughing those the Government already deems “non-essential” while keeping Congressional and Executive offices open is not a shutdown. Suspending the online stream of the National Zoo’s “Panda Cam” is not a shutdown. Closing the gates of a few parks is not a shutdown. It makes it appear all those indispensably wonderful services Government provides us are going away permanently. It is political manipulation designed to force people yet again to justify a vast, all-encompassing Government in their lives. To believe an apocalypse awaits via Government “shutdown” demands the ultimate credulity. Threatening to withhold military checks while entitlement programs still keep the checks mailing out does not even begin to approach the genuine shutdown this economy is already experiencing directly because of this President’s decisions.

Playing a game of smoke and mirrors, the President and Senate leadership would rather provoke more suffering especially as it helps advance their permanent campaign against Republicans. The focus is never on the 90 million Americans no longer in the work force because of this President’s agenda. The concern is only ever how does the latest Labor statistics make the President look?

The attention is never on the creation of one “unprecedented” crisis after another to force by legislation what would never be passed if calmly and deliberately vetted. The angst is only ever on how can we survive without Government?

The entire emphasis is turned on its head. The priority is not upon removing the obstacles to ingenuity, opportunity and individual freedom. The priority is ever only on keeping Government alive and growing by “revenue neutral” tax schemes, continuing resolutions, and an endless debt, $17 trillion and counting, which our great grandchildren will still be paying! Add to this “Obamacare” exemptions for Congress ordered by President Obama, the reaffirmation of “quantitative easing” by Chairman Bernanke and now even “shutdowns” are tools to threaten any attempt to restraint this Administration and its agenda for the rest of the country. It is the transfer of authority from a self-governing people to subjects serving an autocratic elite. The focus is all in the wrong direction. The questions should be: How is liberty faring? Are the people being served? How does life look for the people with inflation, massive unemployment and generational indebtedness? Can we survive with Government as it is now, unlimited and absolute?

While Government was significantly smaller in Coolidge’s time, the temptation to encroach on people’s lives was no less alluring. It was leadership that made the difference. Moral character, humble perspective and faith in the institutions and ideals that make America have no substitute when it comes to our leaders. There is nothing that can possibly replace the lack of these qualities in order to lead and lead responsibly. But there is also a fundamental, even natural limitation to any Government which tries to do too much. Opportunity’s door invariably closes whenever and wherever Government gets involved. Consequently, nature itself will rebel against this offense. That is what we are seeing in our time. This is why there remains cause for renewed confidence in our ideals not a lazy and pessimistic resignation to circumstances. The status quo in Washington has already lost. Not living in reality, however, the establishment led by President Obama, does not realize it…yet.

Speaking to those who came to honor their fellow, fallen veterans of the heroic First Division in the American Expeditionary Forces, President Coolidge reflected on the cause for which they fought, saying,

…I cannot let this occasion pass without expressing my most strong and emphatic commendation for the reverence which your words and actions constantly express for the liberty-giving provisions of the fundamental law of our land. You have supported the Constitution and the Flag which is its symbol, not only because it represents to you the homeland, but because you know it is the sole source of American freedom. You want your rights protected by the impartial judicial decisions of the courts where you will have a right to be heard and not be exposed to the irresponsible determination of partisan political action. You want to have your earnings and your property secure. You want a free and fair opportunity to conduct your own business and make your way in the world without danger of being overcome by a Government monopoly.

Such freedom is what we now desire and expect. Government fails when it assumes the life of the individual can best be managed from its halls and corridors. Coolidge went on to explain what happens when Government ventures into the people’s business,

When the Government goes into business it lays a tax on everybody else in that business, and uses the money that it collects from its competitors to establish a monopoly and drive them out of business. No one can compete. When the Government really starts into a line of business that door of opportunity is closed to the people. It has always been an American ideal that the door of opportunity should remain open.

Coolidge saw the road Government takes every time it asserts itself in people’s choices. Opportunity closes. Freedom contracts. It is this road we are now on, with destinations including a single-payer scheme for American healthcare promised by the Government and paid by the rest of us, including generations not yet born. This latest frenzy over “shutting down” the Government is but the latest attempt to distract with fear and obtain by coercion the desired result of greater control and more of the same from an autocratic few. If people will simply stop opposing this Administration then the crisis will evaporate and all our pain will go away, they claim. This President is counting on both ignorance and addiction to the need for Government.

Coolidge reminds us to distinguish between what seems essential from what actually is. When we view it this way, it becomes obvious that the Federal Government needs us, not we it. If Washington ceased to be tomorrow, we would survive. We would even do better than we think. The importance rests with the individual and then his local and state authorities. The Federal Government would not leave a gaping hole which none could fill. The people, exercising their own judgment and creative abilities, would fill that hole. In fact, we would witness the return of choices, opportunity and freedom to our lives impossible when Government tries to “help” us.

Coolidge kept his faith in the ultimate triumph of the people to retain their liberties. The truly intimidating challenges faced by Americans of every time, place and background vindicates his faith. The confidence he had bore no time constraints, it was a faith firmly placed in the strength of ideals we share even now. The assurance of their truth and power for good rests on the conviction not only treasured by Coolidge but by millions of those who build, from nothing, lives of success and quiet excellence without a Washington subsidy. It is the solemn charge of our generation to ensure that door of opportunity remains open.