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On the Dangers of One Party Rule
In the best traditions of Robert’s Rules of Order, I would like to provide a second to the previous motion from my distinguished colleague Robert Stein, and assign some additional, useless bloviation as an amendment. Right up front I would hasten to point out that, at least in theory, I have always felt that the Federal Government works best for the people when one party controls the White House and the other holds a majority in Congress. It forces the two ideologies to work together and find some common ground in order to accomplish anything and served us fairly well in times past, such as during the Clinton administration. With that said, though, some lessons in recent history may be in order.
The Republicans are now warning us all about the dangers of handing over unfettered power to one party in the Oval Office and both chambers of the Legislative. It’s powerful medicine, but as Stein points out, it is best served to those with short memories. Those with more synapses in firing order may recall the period around 2004. The GOP held not only the Presidency, but a decidedly non-bullet proof majority in both the House and the Senate. The message we were receiving then was notably different. The Democrats, we were told, were abusing their power in the minority. They were making a mockery of the Senate’s role in advise and consent when President Bush attempted to nominate highly conservative justices to the bench. They were preventing the properly democratically elected majority from pushing through their agenda in accordance with the will of the people. They were, in short, obstructionists.
Since we so love batting around pointless hypotheticals, let us postulate one possible future. Assume for a moment that a continuing repressed global economy and unstable global security conditions turn Obama’s first term into a disaster. In 2012 an angry and impoverished electorate is swept up in another wave of “throw the bums out” sentiments and thrust the GOP back into the White House and a slim majority on Congress. Come 2014, do you suppose we’ll hear the newly anointed Republican Majority Leader saying, “Hold on now. Let’s not get carried away here. For God’s sake, don’t elect any more Republicans. You don’t want one of those dangerous single party rule situations, do you?”
Remember, voters. Single party rule is dangerous. But only if it’s the Democrats.
UPDATE: An alert reader provides a brief history lesson and asks a poignant question.
Will Bill Frist come out of retirement next year if the Democrats fall short of 60 and deliver his famous speech on the House floor yet again? Will he remind us of the validity of using the Nuclear Option to prevent obstructionism by the minority party? Or will the Republicans who screamed for that option now suffer a collective memory failure and fall silent?
12 Responses to “On the Dangers of One Party Rule”
short of being caught in bed wiht a live boy or a dead girl, there is no way that Obama can lose in 2012. No matter the state of the economy, no matter what the government does, Obama will receive the same level of support from blacks, Hispanics, Jews, Gays, college professors, union members, and government employees that he will receive in 2008. Also given that population of blacks, Hispanics, union members,and government employees will have grown during those four years and given that it will be four more years of open borders and unlimited immigration coupled with a no questions asked voting process, there is little chance that Obama can lose.
If a political party can reelection Marion Barry multile times no matter how bad his performance, it will reelected Obama no questions asked.
Also, there is a difference between one party rule of which 2001-2006 was a weak example (the Republicans never had 60 votes in the SEnate and Democrats will quiet happy to go along with tax cuts and massive increases in government spending) versus one party politics. the real question is what happens when there is only one party running relevant candidates for office. What will the first Tuesday in November be like when there are zero competative elections. What happens when elected offices are treated like family possessions (See Kennedy and Biden)?
Jazz
Thanks for the reminder. I don't know how I could have forgotten how the GOP howled about minority obstructionists, then of course proceeded to do the exact same thing once they became the minority party in Congress!
“Bi-partisanship,” “moderation,” “cooperation” = do as the Democrats demand.
We'll see what happens not only if Obama lunges leftward (I fear a problem with the courts, to name just one fear Americans have) but if the Dems do as well as or better than most people expect next week, and they learn the wrong lesson and expect to attempt too much and go too far leftward, or at least attempt too much for Americans' stomachs as well as their wallets. (Will state governments all come stampeding to Washington right behind the Detroit dinosaurs? What about other industries? The list of things we could see actually is endless.)
Another lesson from history may also be in order:
The GOP fulminated. . . .but they never pulled the trigger on the “nuclear option.”
However, it was a DEMOCRATIC President . . . in a “one-party” government . . . who attempted the most radical and dangerous elimination of obstructionists.
This was, of course, the sainted FDR who . . . with a landslide of Democrats in 1936 . . . proposed the “reorganization” of the Supreme Court that would give him the right to appoint six extra Justices to eliminate the last GOP challenge to his New Deal.
This would also have torn the fabric of the Republic, far more than any GOP “nuclear option” under Frist. Fortunately, the Democratic Majority leader suffered a heart attack . . . and Democrats on the Hill pulled back from the prospect of giving FDR the power over both the executive and the judiciary he desired.
For you Democrats: Can you imagine a GOP successor to FDR . . . say a Richard Nixon . . . with the power over the judiciary he would have inherited from FDR's rash gambit?
The lesson: Forget partisanship. Singe party rule is ALWAYS a bad thing.
Lord Acton was right: Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely.
Marlowe, I'd suggest that the only reason the GOP didn't pull the trigger on their “nuclear option” was due to the Gang of 14 (of which McCain was a member). Had this bipartisan group not come together, I'm not so sure the Republicans would have held back.
Back in the 1980s, when there no longer was a Democrat in the White House or an acceptably compliant Republican there (think 1960s “me, too” Republican, a rubber stamp, a passive “Good Time Charlie” old-fashioned governor as President), the clucking hens (aside from the screeching, Perpetually Angry Usual Suspects) were all upset about “divided government” (in reality, failure of Washington to robotically proceed with Democratic Party and liberal policy objectives). They talked of “fusion of powers” and other novel concepts that in reality were ideas for giving Democrats more power in years when they didn't win a suitable number of elections.
If we get Democratic domination of Congress (a rubber stamp for Obama, though Obama is as likely if not more so to be a rubber stamp of the Congressional Democrats; we shall see) there is the fear they will misread the election results and seek too much. Americans already are wary of that result.
But it does simplify things, such an effective lack of “divided government” [sighs from NPR smarm queens of both sexes], and it does give the Democrats and liberals their greatest chance in years, at a time that may (the next years will reveal this) be coincidental with a resurgence of a revitalized Left.
Very well. It's clean, direct, straightforward if it's Democratic tsunami this year. Fine.
It also means the Dems and liberals have NO MORE EXCUSE FOR MAKING BOGUS EXCUSES FOR THEIR FAILURES.
Not that it will stop the bogus excuses, but the rest of us already know better.
Who knows, it might prove interesting (in ways ranging from comical to perverse to horrifying) what a Dem super-majority and Dem White House, with a herd of Angry Children to please, may seek to do.
I used to be a firm advocate of a divided government but 8 years of Bush have changed my mind. The consolidation of power in the Executive branch is now so complete, Congress is essentially worthless. Through foreign policy initiatives, Executive orders, Executive Priviledge all combined under the Unitary Executive Theory makes the Presidency akin to a King. Give me a Democratic President and the Republicans can have the Congress for all I care. Congress has forgotten that part of their duties are to the people of the entire U.S., not just those who can effect their next election.
jdledell,
do you really think that Obama will give up any of the power that has been given to the executive department under Bush? Obama wants to expand the executive branch into industrial planning and the management of healthcare in the U.S.
Maybe every progressive should list something power or authority that Bush gained that Obama should give up.
JWeidner, you may be right. The Gang of 14 certainly reduced the tension in the Senate, and were the only sign of bipartisan sanity in that Congress.
They may even have saved Senate Republicans from themselves.
If the Democrats do not break 60, however, I wonder how soon the drums will start beating for a Democratic “nuclear option”.
It is amazing how short politicians memory spans are . . . and how in their hubris they forget the political wheel is always spinning.
The GOP thought they had a permanent majority only a few short years ago. Now look at the landscape.
If FDR, who was a titan, fell to the bottom of the wheel in the late 1930s. . .a President Obama may easily do so in two years time.
Marlowecan,
the Republicans did not believe that had a permanet majority,. It was Democrats who were writing books about the Coming Republican Majorty. http://www.amazon.com/One-Party-Country-Republi… Yet, those same Democrats had to force themselves to ignore demographics due to political correctness. When you start off believing that all voters can be swayed by election gimmicks, you will end up with the wrong conclusion.
Do you really believe that Obama will receive one less black, Hispanics, Jewish, gay, union remember, or public sector vote in 2012 no matter what he does?
the GOP is playing chicken-little when they talk about a Democrat Presidency and Congress. Real one-party problems arise when such a party is in power for 40 years and with that sort of lock on all avenues of power.
The only electoral route to GOP electoral competitiveness is by getting 70 percent of the white non jewish vote, and the Dems will have a lock-down on national politics until that happens, in the future. Rove/Bush buying off hispanic voters through easy home ownership just put off the inevitable demographic effects for an election cycle or two. If the GOP cannot get 70 percent of the white non jewish vote then it will slide into electoral collapse, and it will be replaced by some sort of coalition that can capture that demographic. Either that or we'll have true one-party rule by the Democrats, where they will control the presidency and both houses for dozens of election cycles.
jdledell- Good comment- and it is so true! We've also realized that the office of Vice President can have a lot of fuzzy outlines,unmandated powers, unclear responsibilities and almost no accountability to anyone.