On Honoring Our Veterans

October 5, 2013October 5, 2013 / gouverneurmorris / Leave a comment

As Senate Democrats continue to back the President’s cherry-picking approach on which public sites to shut down and who deserves funding, veterans simply do not contribute anything to their Party agenda that merits respect or support. In the midst of what is supposed to be a Government “shutdown,” we saw the reinforcement of the World War II Memorial fencing by seven Park Service employees. At the same time, the Normandy American Cemetery and Memorial in France has been chained shut “due to the U.S. Government shutdown.” So, we are spending money to reinforce gates and place guards at closed sites because we no longer have the money to keep them open?

Meanwhile, Camp David, the Presidential retreat, is kept open. The Blue Angels and NASA programs have long been shut down as visible symbols of American achievement and patriotism. Now Senator Harry Reid is refusing every effort to fund the National Guard, salaries for Reserve personnel, veterans’ services, and museums and parks. Taking all of these together, combined with the rabid attacks by Democrats against our military for serving in Iraq and Afghanistan during the previous administration, it forces the question: What do the Democrats have against our Armed Forces? Of course, they do not have value to the agenda.

Calvin Coolidge, upon being officially informed of his nomination as Vice Presidential candidate, spoke at length on what the country needed. He saw America suffering under a militant White House, continuing to prosecute the powers of wartime in peace. When a return to respect for our laws and institutions was needed, President Wilson and his Party kept the hostility and obstruction going. Evading their responsibilities to govern, the Democrats had assumed control at the expense of the people’s sovereignty. Millions were now unemployed, many of them World War I veterans and their families. The economy was stagnating under high taxation rates extracted by the Internal Revenue Service. A culture of fear was being perpetuated by Wilson’s Justice Department. The Democrats were shirking the duty they held not only to all the people but to those who had served. The unrestrained waste of the people’s substance had to be stopped. It was time to change those in charge. What they were doing was wrong and the first opportunity for the people to correct the direction in which America was going came with the 1920 election. As we know the people took their country back decisively, sweeping the White House, the Congress and state governments across the land.

When it came to veterans, while there could be no price quantified for what they had sacrificed, America had an obligation to them they could not pass off to anyone else. Coolidge said,

Whenever in the future this nation undertakes to assess its strength and resources, the largest item will be the roll of those who served her in every patriotic capacity in the world war. There are those who bore the civil tasks of that great undertaking, often at heavy sacrifices, always with the disinterested desire to serve their country. There are those who wore the uniform. The presence of the living, the example of the dead, will ever be a standing guaranty of the stability of our republic. From their rugged virtue springs a never-ending obligation to hold unimpaired the principles established by their victory. Honor is theirs forevermore.

The form this honor should take is what compelled Coolidge to stand on principle against cash payments to veterans, or any other special demographic. He knew what the perception of a Government giving money away does even to good and honest people. He knew that no amount could adequately recompense those who risked all, some giving life itself, for America’s ideals. When he vetoed measures to bestow cash bonuses to veterans, he acted with full awareness of what it might cost him politically. Principle mattered more to him. The principle of honoring sacrifice to Coolidge did not consist of merely appropriating money to show that “we care” but by embracing a deeper, more profound respect and reverence for what our veterans have done. The Congress of his day, overrode his veto.

Americans had made promises to veterans and those promises must be kept. Coolidge continued,

Duty compels that those promises, so freely made, that out of their sacrifices they should have a larger life, be speedily redeemed. Care of dependents, relief from distress, restoration from infirmity, provision for education, honorable preferment in the public service, a helping hand everywhere, are theirs not as a favor but by right. They have conquered the claim to suitable recognition in all things.

This recognition would be desecrated, however, if honoring our veterans became nothing more than a cash giveaway. More is required than simply to throw money at the problem and walk away. Unless we take up the service of those who served, no amount we give purchases the compassion and respect we owe. By helping the veteran who lives next door, providing for the assistance of his family, supporting the education and upward mobility of our defenders, wherever they are, ensuring the wounded are healed, the forsaken encouraged and the war-torn are built up, we are meeting that obligation. Responsible government appropriates the funds but it accomplishes nothing without the active participation of you and me serving those who served.

On numerous memorials across our nation, what Coolidge said next is fittingly preserved for posterity on the stones we have established in recognition of our veterans’ sacrifices. He reminds us still, “The nation which forgets its defenders will be itself forgotten.”

On Pretense and Truth in Politics

October 3, 2013October 3, 2013 / gouverneurmorris / Leave a comment

As events unfold across America’s most familiar parks, monuments and memorials, it is becoming increasingly obvious that we are witnessing a very deliberate theatrical display by the Obama administration. Whether denying the request to allow D-Day veterans the permission to see their own memorial in Washington or barricading the publicly-owned parking lots furnished for privately-owned sites like Mount Vernon, the result is anything but an honest mistake. It is evident closing sites normally open to the public 24/7 (after Park Service personnel go home) that this is not real. It is meant to convey a false perception of reality in order to score cheap political points against a Republican Party leadership that has willingly conceded everything to avert “shutdown.” Instead, the President and his Senate majority leader have rejected every proposal to fund, by separate legislation, every program but one: “Affordable” health care because of the obvious harm it is already inflicting on millions of Americans. Obama, having no interest in working out any solutions, demands full support for “Obamacare” or no one gets any funding and he will make sure it hurts.

This denial for funds even applies to the National Institute of Health, despite the Republican measure (with no strings attached) to keep research and treatment provided for children with cancer. Asked by reporters on Wednesday, “[I]f you can help one child with cancer, why wouldn’t you do it?” Democrat Majority Leader Harry Reid responded, “Why would we want to do that?”

Only in the artificial world of partisan showmanship does this kind of behavior on the part of Obama and his Party make sense. He is trying to create a perception of reality and no attempt to actually solve the problem is allowed, especially when it comes from those cootie-infested Republicans. Full funding for Obamacare or else kids will be denied cancer treatment, veterans will be refused access to their own memorials and privately owned properties will be barricaded…until all of you out there in this ungrateful country feel the pain of Government “shutdown.”

When Coolidge contemplated the true meaning of politics, he did not have much good to say about Washington, D.C. It was instructive, to be sure, but it was usually a lesson in what not to do rather than illustrative of the sound and noble purpose of statesmanship. To obtain guidance from politics as it ought to be, he had to return to the ancient principles of political philosophy learned from the Greeks. “Politics is not an end,” he would reiterate, “but a means. It is not a product, but a process. It is the art of government.” This current regime, however, has been weaned on Alinsky’s Rules for Radicals, the influence of Frank Marshall Davis and a host of other violent and hateful men and women. Politics is the end result for this group. This is not a politics Coolidge would have tolerated. It has become a seemingly endless chain of subterfuge, calculation and disregard for any law that blocks the selfish interests of this man’s ideology. The agenda trumps everything. Nothing is allowed to divert, detract or disparage what this one man wants done. Governing never enters the picture. It is only by perpetually politicizing every event for personal advantage that politics itself is corrupted from its original purpose as a “minister to civilization” with a “candid and sincere service.” Instead, it is the “counterfeit” and “false,” the “spurious presentment” or fake imagery that defines politics now, Coolidge had said. “So much emphasis has been placed upon the false that the significance of the true has been obscured and politics has come to convey the meaning of crafty and cunning selfishness.” The “mean” or lowest common denominator has become the central focus of political attentions. The “sordid” or shameful and sleazy character of politics, while distorting all sense of “true and dignified proportions” at present, can be defeated with a clear-headed and moral leadership.

Inspiring people to greater things is not gone. Though it be “obscured,” as Coolidge noted, it has not been eradicated. It is ready to come back with a righteous vengeance when honest and genuine leadership steps forward, rejecting the fraudulent snake oil salesmanship of this Administration and returning to a “sincerity and integrity of purpose” which comes from men and women, like us, who hold fast an “informed conscience.” “All the predominant political opinion of the nation which is worth cultivating is never impressed by decisions made for effect. Those who compose that body want responsible officeholders to try to find out what is best for the welfare of the people and do that…Pretense does not appeal to them…The people know a sham even when they seem to be trying to fool themselves and they cannot help having a wholesome respect for reality.” The staged political production Obama has orchestrated here to further a deliberately fake perception is no service to civilization. It is a repudiation of civilization for nothing more than concession to one man’s desires to instigate perpetual backlash against his enemies, force them to fund “Obamacare” in order to escape this and any future “shutdown” and cement a permanently uninformed electorate that will keep his vision for this country in power for decades to come.

We hold greater power than we realize to effect a far brighter outcome than this fate. Restoration remains in our hands. Every time we have united together and exercised that sovereignty over our Government, we ultimately prevail. It was true in the legislative triumphs after the 1995 “shutdown” as well as the 2010 election, winning control of the House. It was true in the defeat of gun control and even now in what is an incremental defeat of “Obamacare.” It may not yet appear victorious to us but greater are those who are with us than those who are with pretense and theatrics.

Coolidge, upon accepting his nomination to the Vice-Presidency in July 1920, declared, “All authority must be exercised by those to whom it is constitutionally entrusted, without dictation, and with responsibility only to those who have bestowed it, the people” (emphasis added). Coolidge embraced honesty. He knew that telling the truth, however much it challenged his listeners, served the good. He lived in reality, dealt straightforwardly with all and refused to manipulate people with deceitful fantasies for his benefit or the perceived gain of anyone else. When he reminded people, as he often did, to “work out salvation,” he was not engaging in callous platitudes or pollyannaish delusions, he was expecting nothing less than what Americans have proven is possible every day of our exceptional history.

On Remaining Under Law or Man?

September 25, 2013September 25, 2013 / gouverneurmorris / Leave a comment

In early 1919, Governor Coolidge received a bill in which the State Legislature had voted to raise their own salaries by fifty percent. It was fully expected that the Governor would sign the bill and everyone would let it quietly slip by the people of Massachusetts. They underestimated with whom they were dealing. Coolidge launched a fiery veto of the measure, in which he shot back, “Those in whom is placed the solemn duty of caring for others ought to think of themselves last or their decisions will lack authority. There is apparent a disposition to deny the disinterestedness and impartiality of government. Such charges are the result of ignorance and an evil desire to destroy our institutions for personal profit. It is of infinite importance to demonstrate that legislation is used not for the benefit of the legislator, but of the public.”

Coolidge had no sympathy for those who take their public trust as an opportunity to aggrandize, profit or otherwise serve themselves with the laws they pass. Legislators had to be brought back to this reality. They were, and will remain, under the rules they write for everyone else.

The people, to whom the costs fall, ultimately see to it that politicians do not successfully legislate their own escape clauses. Through years in the State House, Coolidge saw the need to resist this dangerous trend of legislators, who carve out special provisions or exceptions in their own bills. From that experience he urged his father as the elder Coolidge prepared to serve in the Vermont Senate, “It is much more important to kill bad bills than to pass good ones.” Coolidge recognized, with equal fidelity to his oath as President, his responsibility to check this impulse in Washington. Speaking to labor leaders from the White House, he declared, “The Government of the United States is not for the gratification of the people who happen to hold office. It is established to promote the general welfare of all the people. That is the American ideal. No matter how many officeholders there may be, or what their origin, our institutions are a failure unless they serve all the citizens in their own homes. It is always necessary to find out what effect the institutions of Government and society have on the wage earner, in order to judge the disability of their continuance.”

When Ronald Reagan spoke out in October 1964, ten months after President Johnson announced his “War on Poverty” which would form the basis of the Great Society later that same year, he observed an all too rare occurrence in government social experiments: They never read us the score. We never hear how each new effort to eradicate the evils of society with legislation makes conditions worse every time. Government programs and the appropriations claimed necessary to fund them are sold on the lofty promises of good intentions mixed with the fear of chaos if Washington is not given room to act. What is never included in the rush to legislate is the honest discussion of the problem, the truthful calculation of cost, the price not only in tax dollars but also in human lives. The cost is never so high at the initial estimates as it is in the end. Moreover, the end never comes. The program never achieves its purpose and the problem never resolves. The costs only increase, monetarily and spiritually.

Those with the audacity to ask whether “Program X” or “Act Y” is working are rebuked as unfeeling and devoid of compassion. The good intentions of the what LBJ touted as “the best thought and broadest knowledge” are supposed to silence all questions, trusting that Washington, with its purest intentions, has it in hand and with just a little more time we can wipe poverty away, cure all inequities, and make a happy, healthy and content people.

Coolidge saw all this for the fraud it is, saying, “There can be no perfect control of personal conduct by national legislation.” He knew the outcome of naively expecting more than mere legislation can ever produce, when he said, “Laws are insufficient to endow a nation with righteousness” or again, when he observed, “Real reform does not begin with a law, it ends with a law. The attempt to dragoon the body when the need is to convince the soul will end only in revolt.” Even legislation passed which is “changed and changeable on slight provocation, loses its sanctity and authority.” Too many pieces of legislation over these last five years had little sanctity or authority at their beginnings to the shame of those who helped pass them.

When “train wrecks,” like Obamacare (set to go into effect on Tuesday), find a President arbitrarily waiving parts of the law to exempt the lawmakers, it is time for the people to again exercise their sovereign authority. When that same President and a timid and willing Senate then keeps other provisions in place on the backs of the rest of us, it is time for reality, through the voice of the people, to return to Washington. It is time for Americans to reassert the standards of our foundation. Coolidge identified it this way, “Our country has maintained the principle that our Government is established for something higher and finer than to permit those who are charged with the responsibility of office, or any class whose favor they might seek, to get what they can get out of it.”

We have gone too long without hearing the score. In reality, Washington is winning while liberty is losing. It did not get here quickly and it will take decades to get back. But this is what gives us all the more urgency to act now. We are no longer looking at these problems as Coolidge saw them: approaching from afar. They are already in our midst. Doing the right, while never easy, is historically the simplest and most obvious course. It is the choice between a very real evil and the genuinely fulfilling good. Either we are a republic of laws over human whims, holding the light of constitutional self-government aloft in this world, or we are ready to recede back into the ancient darkness of despotic kings, permanent immobility, and hereditary classes dispensing freedom or oppression to us as they see fit. It is the impasse plotted by Coolidge when he said, “The choice lies between living under coercion and intimidation, the forces of evil, or under the laws of the people, orderly, speaking their settled convictions, the revelation of a divine authority.”