Economist Opinion - Page A2
January 20, 1997 House Ethics Panel
by William Heartstone, The Daily Republican Newspaper
Shuts Down American Renewal!WASHINGTON DESK - The speaker of the House, Newt Gingrich is a serious minded leader who seeks to remedy the failures of our government to serve its people.
The speaker has a vision that in our American republic power resides in the people, who delegate that power to govern in their behalf to elected representatives and officials who are the servants of the people.
In practice, this concept of power has been variously stretched, distorted, and corrupted, making it necessary for Americans to engage in a process of American renewal in which there is a precise re-definition of the term American republic as this nation enters the new millennium.
Some members of Congress like David Bonior(D), and Mike Fazio(D), and Jim McDermott(D) want the America republic to be the Socialist welfare state that it is now rapidly approaching.
Economic inequality, under our historic capitalist economy, means that individual effort, skill, and a well-developed sense of personal responsibility are highly rewarded traits. Laziness, wasting one's personal resources, and shifting blame are frowned upon and should not be encouraged.
While economic inequality tends to create inequality of opportunity in white-collar jobs, higher education and so forth, government plays some role in 'leveling the playing field' and off-sets, to a limited extent, individual disadvantage, while retaining competition.
The House Ethics panel investigated speaker Newt Gingrich on a host of frivolous allegations brought by David Bonior(D) among others, that speaker Gingrich had violated the House Ethics rules. The Ethics panel began investigation of the charges on January 3, 1996, and concluded their deliberations on December 12, 1996.
In the course of the so-called investigation of Bonior's ethics charges, approximately 90 subpoenas or requests for documents were issued, approximately 150,000 pages of documents were reviewed, and approximately 70 people were interviewed.
According to the House Ethics panel, the cost to taxpayers of this investigation was $300,000.
The House Democratic leadership has indicated it will support the panel's recommended and a costs penalty which would allow Gingrich to continue as speaker. But Democrat Party mongrels like Congressmen Bonior and Vic Fazio continue to press for Gingrich to step down as speaker.
It became clear by Sunday some members of Congress, like insurgent partisans Bonior and Jim McDermott will face ethical and criminal investigations over their role in the wire-tap recording of a cellular phone conversation of speaker Gingrich.
Ethics panel chairwoman Nancy Johnson said on Sunday's Fox-TV's News that the ethics process had suffered from over 70 ethics charges filed against Gingrich by Bonior and other Democrats that were eventually dismissed. House whip Tom Delay, told CBS 'Somebody needs to pay for these charges.'It appears that most of the $300,000 costs levied on speaker Gingrich are the result of those Bonior & Fazio frivolous charges that were dismissed by the Ethics panel.
Johnson said, the 'House cannot go on using the Ethics committee as a field on which to play out political differences...'
The political difference that Bonior, McDermott, and Fazio object to is the republican mission of speaker Gingrich, renewing American civilization.
That mission is to create and disseminate the classical republican from of government, that is, rule by the majority and freedom from the tyranny of the minority.This is the doctrine which defines a caring, humanitarian reform oriented society. Bonior takes an anti-republican position and holds that the Gingrich mission is not lead to democracy.
David Bonior's real objection is to is speaker Gingrich's core message, that the welfare state has failed, that it can not be repaired but must be re-newed with a capitalist state driven by an opportunity society based on: (1) personal strength and wealth accumulation; (2) entrepreneurial free enterprise; (3) the spirit of invention; (4) quality production; and (5) the lessons of America's unique history.
The speaker's message concentrates on:(1) jobs and economic growth; (2) health, wealth; and (3) renewing inner city family neighborhoods.
It is a message that republican principles are democratic principles, that everything does not need to be done by government, that you can do better by trusting individuals to act for themselves than you can by having government tell individuals what they must do, that a smaller government is frequently better than a larger government, that it is better to reduce taxes than raise taxes.
It is a re-affirmation of the institutions of a dynamic capitalist economy, of the importance of contracts & private property, inheritance, freedom of individual initiative, competition, the profit motive, and success in the millennium only four-years away.
It is possible to articulate this vision of an America that can and should be.The speaker's message appeals to most Americans, reflects the broad values of preserving values like individual responsibility, entrepreneurial free enterprise, and technological progress.
It is the speaker's goal to define the republic in those terms, It is a position of a caring humanitarian applying common sense and learning from the past.It is a worthy goal for America as we enter the new millennium.
Most young people under 40 are not politicized. Historically, building a new majority has involved three essential tasks: activating a group of non-participating citizens to support an existing party (or form a new party), constructing a theory or explanation of what is right and wrong in society with which the non-participating citizens agree, and developing the right language (political rhetoric) to communicate that theory to the non-participating citizens.
Newt's vision stated 'The potential for a new governing majority exists because of the large and growing numbers of non-participating citizens in our political system.'
'Consequently' Newt said, '... a major premise is that younger citizens are the right target group for a new majority strategy and that a political theory and language needs to be effective with them if it is to be effective at all. Supporting this premise is an additional opportunity (to their not voting now) about younger voters - they are already predisposed to vote Republican.'
The American people have come to recognize that it is possible to create that America in our own generation.
The American people understand what the have lost and what they can regain and now insist that Washington politicians abolish the welfare state that is crippling the nation's productivity. Americans want the welfare state replaced with what Newt calls the opportunity society based on historically proven principles.
Newt wrote, in 1995, 'Our overall goal is to develop a blueprint for renewing America by replacing the welfare state, recruit, discover, arouse and network together 200,000 activists including candidates for elected office at all levels, and arouse enough volunteers and contributors to win a sweeping victory in 1996 and then actually implement the Republican Party victory in the first three months of 1997.'
Aristotle's Politics provides another republican concept, one that prevails in most of the Western world. Aristotle categorized governments on the basis of - who rules.
President, James Madison, the 4th President of the United States, often called the father of the U.S. Constitution, defined a republic in terms similar to those of Aristotle's. In his view, the American republic should be a system of government that permits indirect control by the people over those who govern. He did, however, warn against the effects of 'majority factions' and emphasized the rights of minorities. Madison sponsored the first ten amendments to the Constitution (Bill of Rights) to fulfill a pledge made during the fight over ratification, when it was charged that the Constitution failed to protect individual rights.
So, Madison's idea of what the American republic should be, parallels Aristotle's vision in many important dimensions as well as those of speaker of the house, Newt Gingrich.
Madison, Aristotle, and Newt Gingrich were concerned with the means by which just and stable rule by the many could be secured. To this end Aristotle relied on a predominant middle class.
The modern republican era began with the American Revolution of 1776 and the French Revolution of 1789. Elements of republican government were present in the administrative institutions of the English New World colonies.
However, the concept of republicanism did not become dominant in American political thinking until the colonists declared their independence.
The establishment of the United States as a federal republic with a government made up of three branches, each independent of the others, created a renewal of the age-old concept that has made America what it is today.
In the years 1831-1835 the Frenchman, Alexis De Tocqueville warned, in his book, Democracy in America, of the danger of lowering American ambition and harming the nation's common welfare by excessive government provision for worldly-welfare to the people and corporations.