The Presidential Election: Where Is Our Country Heading?

The purpose of democratic government, as stated in the Declaration of Independence, is to secure the rights of the people to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.  We may have never pursued this perfectly, certainly not for all the people.  But we have now, unfortunately, reached a point in our history where the best interests of the people, securing their inalienable rights, is no longer the driving force behind government.  

Our government has stopped being “of the people, by the people, and for the people.”  Instead, it has become a government which, while elected by the people, primarily serves the interests of corporations and the rich.  

This is true of Congress.  Legislators, both Republican and Democrat, have become so dependent on the financial donations of corporations and the rich to run their election campaigns that they provide a ready and willing ear to corporate lobbyists.  (It should, however, be noted that while Democrats have fallen into the same trap, they do still promote the public interest, just not as unequivocally as they should.)  

It is also true of Federal regulators.  These government employees are supposed to protect the interests of the public but instead, as we’ve learned, often become so close to the corporations they are supposed to regulate that they are more interested in protecting them than the public.

A result of this perversion of government’s purpose can be seen in the increased income inequality that we face today.  There has always been and there will always be income inequality.  It’s in the very nature of things … some people will be rich and others poor.  But from the end of WWII to the early 1970s, incomes grew rapidly across all income groups. 

Beginning in the 1970s, however, income growth for the middle and lower income groups either stagnated or slowed sharply while incomes at the top continued to grow strongly.  For example, average real wages for the bottom 90% of working Americans only rose from $28,500 in 1979 to $33,200 in 2014 (a 16% increase).  By contrast, average real wages of the top 1% of Americans rose from $269,000 in 1979 to $671,000 in 2014 (a 249% increase).  Since the top 1% have substantial income over and above wages, the true inequality is even worse, with average total income for the bottom 90% still being around $33,000 in 2014 while the average total income of the top 1% was $1,200,000.

  

What role did government have in this increase in inequality?  Globalization of the economy, which is a primary cause of the increased inequality, was fostered by government policies together with changes in technology.  

Second, and less discussed, was the loss of power of labor unions.  This resulted partly from the loss of manufacturing jobs due to companies’ moving jobs off-shore (a major detrimental impact of globalizations) and partly from the increase in anti-union “Right to Work” laws in much of the country (an additional 7 states including for the first time, “rust-belt” states).  

In both cases, government policy supported the interests of corporations in obtaining cheaper labor and thus increasing profits.  Other government policies, such as deregulation (pursued by both Republican and Democratic administrations post-Reagan) and significant tax cuts for the rich under Reagan and Bush II, furthered the accumulation of wealth at the top of the wage spectrum.

The impact of this increased income inequality has been anger towards government for what the formerly middle class views as a lack of concern by government regarding their plight.  They blame government, and to a large extent rightly so, for their financial distress.  Government in this case really is the problem, in that it has acted at the behest of big business.  But it is also the potential solution.  However, government has not done anything to date to really improve their lot.  Lots of talk but no action.

And so in this presidential election season, we have seen two phenomenon.  On the Republican side, Donald Trump, campaigning as an anti-establishment avatar, has stoked the fears and angers of this large group of mostly white voters and has reaped the benefit of their vote, and thus the Republican nomination, against a crowded field of far-right but tainted-by-government candidates.

On the Democratic side, Bernie Sanders also campaigned as an anti-establishment avatar,  seeking to upend the influence of corporations and put “the people” back in the forefront of government policy.  His campaign was much more successful than anyone every dreamed, but he had the misfortune of having just one opponent who, although few felt strongly about, was strongly supported by the party establishment and was considered safe by most.  And so he lost.

Of all the candidates, only Bernie Sanders offered the possibility of a truly transformative Presidency.  Because only he had at least the potential of getting the large mass of people who usually don’t vote … because they feel the government has no concern for their problems … to vote and thus win back the House as well as the Senate.  

So regardless whether Trump or Clinton wins, the future does not look good for the American people.  If Trump wins we will have a bully blowhard as President who depends on his instincts, not his thought (or the thought of those around him).  He will try to dismantle most of what President Obama accomplished for the American people.  I could go on and on, but I won’t.  If Clinton wins, government will be mostly business as usual both because of her ties to the business establishment and the fact that at least the House will likely be in the hands of Republicans, which means she will not be able to move her policy agenda with much success.

In either case, the primary direction of government will not have changed.  Although clearly a Trump presidency would be far worse for the American people and the country than a Clinton presidency.

Bernie Sanders was calling for a soft revolution, and that is what this country needs at this point in time.  We need a major shakeup in the direction of government.

Thomas Jefferson famously said that a democracy needs a revolution periodically to keep it alive.  Certainly we have come to the point where that is what our country needs because our democracy has become one in form only, not in substance.  

We must return to a government which is “of the people, by the people, and for the people,”  Corporations should certainly have a place at the table, in recognition of their importance to the economy and the welfare of all, but they should not be in the driver’s seat.   We have long since learned the emptiness of the phrase, “What’s good for General Motors is good for the country.”

All Men Are Created Equal?

In my writings, I often refer to this iconic phrase from the Declaration of Independence, together with its companion language setting forth our unalienable rights and the statement that government’a purpose is to secure those rights, as the touchstone against which all acts of our government should be judged.  

Yet this very phrase, when viewed as hypocritical because of its obvious disconnect with what was actually happening at the time in the halls of government and in people’s lives, has called into question the intent of the framers and signers of the Declaration.  Was this merely a bold rhetorical flourish to gain acceptance both at home and on the world stage. or was it a deeply held conviction which was meant to chart the future course of the nation?

Not surprisingly, much research and writing has been done on this topic.  And the answers provided are by no means uniformly in one direction or the other.  In truth, the answer is often foretold by the politics of the researcher.  

Because of the enormous importance and potential of these words, to my mind, in redirecting our government and our citizens to a stronger, more just society and nation, I wanted to survey the literature to see what answers I would draw from it.  As objectively as I could, despite my admitted liberal bias.  

First let me restate the obvious.  Slavery was present in the country, both in the south and the north.  The Constitution codified slavery in the “3/5 compromise,” which stated that each slave shall be counted as a 3/5 person when the census was taken to establish the population of each state and thus its representation in Congress.  Thomas Jefferson, who crafted the phrase, was a slaveholder and remained a slaveholder to his death.  All the signers from the South were slaveholders.  

And the problem does not just lie with the fact of slavery.  Women were legally little more than chattel under the total control of their husbands; they had virtually no rights. And in fact, it would take women longer than African-Americans to achieve legal equality and the right to vote. The evidence arguing for a finding of hypocrisy could and has filled up books.

But that is not where this question ends.  Thomas Jefferson and most of the men who were present at these debates and signed the Declaration were men of the enlightenment.   They were men of ideas, and ideas are not always ... actually almost never ... a reflection of the reality of the moment.  Ideas, by their very nature, are meant to chart, to influence the future, whether in science or in human affairs.

In looking at various writings and notes of Jefferson and others, some researchers have thus concluded that what this phrase relates is their belief that all men and women are created equal in the sight of God.  Yet they were all well-aware that the kingdom of God is not to be found on Earth.  And so. like many ideas, it’s inclusion in the Declaration was meant to be an aspirational statement, something to guide the future of the nation.

In our current age, in which the paucity of ideas is reflected everyday in the halls of Congress, in our schools, and in corporate and government offices throughout the country, it is hard to fathom the age of enlightenment and the role that ideas played in bringing about changes in all areas of human activity.  To understand that Jefferson was neither hypocritical nor schizophrenic when writing “all men are created equal,” but rather a man caught in his time who knew, however, that there was something beyond the exigencies of the present, something larger, that needed expression and preservation.  There was no intellectual dishonesty here.

And so the power of the words of the Declaration of Independence remain undiminished.  They should be used to repurpose, to redirect our government and our citizens ... not to something new and unfamiliar, but to something deeply embedded in our founding documents, waiting to be put into action by a nation grounded in social consciousness.

“We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.--That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed . . .”