When I was teaching AP U.S. History, I required students to read a short book, Plunkett of Tammany Hall. George Washington Plunkett worked a ward for the New York City Democratic Party political machine in the latter part of the 19th century and wrote about his experience.
Plunkett described a situation that offered me a chance to engage the students in a conversation about competing values. In brief, there was a fire in a shop over which the owner and his family lived. Everything in the shop and the home was destroyed. The first person on the scene after the fire brigade was the ward boss for the political machine. In short order, he arranged for housing, clothing, furniture and food for the family and a job for the husband until the shop could be repaired. All the boss asked, Plunkett wrote, was for the man’s vote in elections.
Would that be, I asked the students, a reasonable deal?
Plunkett came to mind when I heard the mayor of South Bend, Indiana, presidential candidate Pete Buttigieg, talk with Jimmy Fallon about his military service in Afghanistan. Fallon showed the audience a photograph of Mayor Pete in full combat gear with a group of kids playing in the dirt street.
“The kids were acting like kids, laughing, running, playing. All their parents really want is a chance to be left alone and live normal lives,” said the mayor. There used to be a system of warlords in Afghanistan that supplied order and peace for the people, not democratic but generally secure. If the warlords insured people the chance to live normal lives, is that a reasonable deal?
Buttigieg’s observation came the same day candidates for the Senate in the Philippines loyal to President Duterte won all 12 of the seats being contested. Despite Duterte’s willingness to have drug dealers and users shot without the benefit of a trial, his popularity with the people of his country, according to independent polls, stands at 80% approval.
The NPR reporter asked his colleague, a BBC person stationed in the region, to offer explanations for why Duterte remains so popular even when his actions offend the sensibilities of people in other countries, including the United States. The BBC man replied that people were feeling safe on the streets again. Before Duterte came to power, promising to kill the people he seems to be killing, the reporter continued, people believed that drugs—buying, selling, using—were the underlying cause of substantial levels of violence that often endangered innocent people.
For someone living in Manila or some other city in the Philippines, is trading security for Duterte’s rule a reasonable deal?
People of a Certain Age, these examples are not just stories from other times and other places. We face decisions regularly that pose the same question; is that a reasonable deal?
Among myriad political discussions that are derived from false dichotomies, one that poses this question starkly, centers around government regulation. One hears some folks argue against any government regulation, overlooking such obvious regulations as stop signs and speed limits, zoning laws, truth in advertising, standards for clean water and food safety. Government regulation in these instances seems a reasonable deal. My freedom to do some things may reasonably be constrained for a greater good.
The real debate, then, is not about regulation or not, but about what is reasonable. Reasonable people often disagree about what is reasonable. That’s what fuels the political system.
Plunkett describes a trade that many people would consider corrupt; aid and services exchanged for a vote. How does that differ from a government committed to “promote the general welfare,” as the Preamble of the Constitution stipulates, elected to enact policies that support the economic well-being of its citizens?
Duterte promised security. “Common Defense” is another job of government on behalf of its citizens according to the Preamble. He defined an “enemy” and is acting as he said he would to combat that enemy on behalf of the citizenry. The citizens like what he is doing.
It is easy in the abstract to criticize political machines and autocratic leaders. Such criticism would point out that there are no restraints on either. Hence, machines or autocrats could easily move beyond the actions they have taken that seem beneficial to the citizenry to undertake possible actions that would be harmful to the citizenry.
But if you feel unsafe or have lost everything…
The fear of unrestrained power is what animates the idea of democracy, where regular voting is intended as a check on power, not to mention the separation of powers established by the Framers.
Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern of New Zealand has led the “Christchurch Call” in the wake of the killing in that city. The “Call” is aimed at eliminating violent extremist content from spreading online as happened in the March massacre. The Christian Science Monitor observed that in some parts of the world, such a call would raise issues about freedom of speech.
“In some parts of the world” refers to us in the US. Freedom of speech is enshrined in our history and culture.
Would the regulation Prime Minister Ardern is seeking from governments and social media firms be a reasonable deal?
This Fourth of July, let’s toast a political system where reasonable people can engage in reasonable dialogue about what constitutes reasonable deals. Now, if we could just do so.
Daniel E. White
July 4, 2019
people can engage in reasonable dialogue about what constitutes reasonable deals. Now, if we would just do so.