{"id":17687,"date":"2012-07-05T14:24:29","date_gmt":"2012-07-05T19:24:29","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/law.marquette.edu\/facultyblog\/?p=17687"},"modified":"2012-07-05T14:25:18","modified_gmt":"2012-07-05T19:25:18","slug":"never-been-this-bad","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/law.marquette.edu\/facultyblog\/2012\/07\/never-been-this-bad\/","title":{"rendered":"Never Been This Bad?"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>Independence Day was a hot one this year. Amid the celebrations and the record high temperatures, I thought about the framers of our constitution, who, in 1787, dealt with similarly oppressive heat. July 4, 1776, witnessed the founding of our nation, while July 4, 1787, passed as the document that would found our government was created. These thoughts about beginnings got me to thinking about all the recent talk of endings among the chattering classes and the punditocracy.<\/p>\n

Depending on the day\u00a0— or the issue being discussed\u00a0— our liberty, our democracy, or our very country faces imminent demise. If candidate X doesn\u2019t win in November, America is doomed. Unless this law is\/is not passed, our very way of life is threatened. Sometimes, we receive reports, rather than warnings. Recently, Scott Walker\u2019s recall victory killed our democracy, and the ACA being upheld killed our liberty. June was a tough month for America. Things have never been this bad.<\/p>\n

On the other hand, maybe they have been.\u00a0\u00a0 <\/p>\n

Consider this example: \u201cThe American people have witnessed the calamitous consequences of full and unrestricted Democratic control of the Government. It has been a record of unparalleled incapacity, dishonor, and disaster.\u201d While this sounds like it could have been said during election campaigns in 1980, 1994, 2000, or 2010, it is actually from the 1896 Republican Party platform. I\u2019m sure it wouldn\u2019t take much doing to locate similar passages about Republican control of the government. The dishonor and disaster is always \u201cunparalleled.\u201d Our country experiences continually escalating levels of governmental disaster, and somehow survives them all.<\/p>\n

Another example comes from our Supreme Court. In 1918, in Hammer v. Dagenhart<\/em>, Justice Day warned about the \u201cfar reaching result of upholding the [child labor] act,\u201d and predicted \u201call freedom of commerce will be at an end\u201d and \u201cour system of government be practically destroyed.\u201d Uh oh. Despite these dire warnings, in 1941, a similar act was indeed upheld, and our system of government has lived to tell the tale.<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, back in 1896, Thomas Reed, Speaker of the House (pictured above), in response to some rhetorical hyperbole he was facing, said, \u201cI have not been in Congress as long as I have without learning that \u2018constitutionality\u2019 and \u2018unconstitutionality\u2019 on the other side of the chamber are mere phrases, and that when a gentlemen of the other side, with swelling voice, denounces the tariff as unconstitutional, he merely means that he does not like it.\u201d Loosely translated: \u201cTake it easy, guys. It\u2019s not the end of the world.\u201d<\/p>\n

At this point, you may be wondering why am so well versed with 1890\u2019s politics. A friend, who knows I love old books, gave me one entitled The Great Leaders and National Issues of 1896<\/em>. As I paged through this 19th century version of politico.com, I saw national issues that looked familiar: monetary policy, foreign policy, immigration, the balance of trade, and labor relations. (There was nothing about healthcare, though. In 1896, you were paying out of pocket for your amputations, leeches, and patent medicines.) Party platforms sounded familiar, too. Republicans demanded that \u201cimmigration laws be thoroughly enforced,\u201d while the Democrats called for the wealthy to pay their fair share of taxes. (Not everything was the same. Democrats were calling for smaller government, while the Republicans pledged to protect the production of, among other things, hemp.) It seems like we can tackle the same problems repeatedly, and even have parties switch positions on them, without risking the destruction of our nation. I would venture to say that, considering the progress made since 1896, we can not only survive, but also thrive in the midst of all these thorny political issues.<\/p>\n

So, the next time you hear someone worrying that something will spell the end of the republic, tell them to take a deep breath and relax \u2013 we have been through it all before. Maybe if these folks spent more time in front of old books, instead of TV cameras and twitter feeds, they would make less dire predictions, and more progress.<\/p>\n

P.S. Political stunts, like political speeches, are also subject to encore performances. We all know that the senate filibuster (which nicely combines a political speech with a political stunt) goes way back. Another venerable tradition is the \u201cwalkout.\u201d Early in 2011, fourteen Democrat state senators fled Wisconsin in an effort to block the adoption of Act 10. Back in 1890, Speaker Reed was trying to pass new rules with which the Democrats of the time disagreed. In an attempt to deny a quorum, Democrats tried to flee the house chamber before the vote was taken. In a move I attribute as much to the lack of instant news media as to practicality on his part, Speaker Reed solved the problem by simply locking the doors.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Independence Day was a hot one this year. Amid the celebrations and the record high temperatures, I thought about the framers of our constitution, who, in 1787, dealt with similarly oppressive heat. July 4, 1776, witnessed the founding of our nation, while July 4, 1787, passed as the document that would found our government was […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":137,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ocean_post_layout":"","ocean_both_sidebars_style":"","ocean_both_sidebars_content_width":0,"ocean_both_sidebars_sidebars_width":0,"ocean_sidebar":"","ocean_second_sidebar":"","ocean_disable_margins":"enable","ocean_add_body_class":"","ocean_shortcode_before_top_bar":"","ocean_shortcode_after_top_bar":"","ocean_shortcode_before_header":"","ocean_shortcode_after_header":"","ocean_has_shortcode":"","ocean_shortcode_after_title":"","ocean_shortcode_before_footer_widgets":"","ocean_shortcode_after_footer_widgets":"","ocean_shortcode_before_footer_bottom":"","ocean_shortcode_after_footer_bottom":"","ocean_display_top_bar":"default","ocean_display_header":"default","ocean_header_style":"","ocean_center_header_left_menu":"","ocean_custom_header_template":"","ocean_custom_logo":0,"ocean_custom_retina_logo":0,"ocean_custom_logo_max_width":0,"ocean_custom_logo_tablet_max_width":0,"ocean_custom_logo_mobile_max_width":0,"ocean_custom_logo_max_height":0,"ocean_custom_logo_tablet_max_height":0,"ocean_custom_logo_mobile_max_height":0,"ocean_header_custom_menu":"","ocean_menu_typo_font_family":"","ocean_menu_typo_font_subset":"","ocean_menu_typo_font_size":0,"ocean_menu_typo_font_size_tablet":0,"ocean_menu_typo_font_size_mobile":0,"ocean_menu_typo_font_size_unit":"px","ocean_menu_typo_font_weight":"","ocean_menu_typo_font_weight_tablet":"","ocean_menu_typo_font_weight_mobile":"","ocean_menu_typo_transform":"","ocean_menu_typo_transform_tablet":"","ocean_menu_typo_transform_mobile":"","ocean_menu_typo_line_height":0,"ocean_menu_typo_line_height_tablet":0,"ocean_menu_typo_line_height_mobile":0,"ocean_menu_typo_line_height_unit":"","ocean_menu_typo_spacing":0,"ocean_menu_typo_spacing_tablet":0,"ocean_menu_typo_spacing_mobile":0,"ocean_menu_typo_spacing_unit":"","ocean_menu_link_color":"","ocean_menu_link_color_hover":"","ocean_menu_link_color_active":"","ocean_menu_link_background":"","ocean_menu_link_hover_background":"","ocean_menu_link_active_background":"","ocean_menu_social_links_bg":"","ocean_menu_social_hover_links_bg":"","ocean_menu_social_links_color":"","ocean_menu_social_hover_links_color":"","ocean_disable_title":"default","ocean_disable_heading":"default","ocean_post_title":"","ocean_post_subheading":"","ocean_post_title_style":"","ocean_post_title_background_color":"","ocean_post_title_background":0,"ocean_post_title_bg_image_position":"","ocean_post_title_bg_image_attachment":"","ocean_post_title_bg_image_repeat":"","ocean_post_title_bg_image_size":"","ocean_post_title_height":0,"ocean_post_title_bg_overlay":0.5,"ocean_post_title_bg_overlay_color":"","ocean_disable_breadcrumbs":"default","ocean_breadcrumbs_color":"","ocean_breadcrumbs_separator_color":"","ocean_breadcrumbs_links_color":"","ocean_breadcrumbs_links_hover_color":"","ocean_display_footer_widgets":"default","ocean_display_footer_bottom":"default","ocean_custom_footer_template":"","ocean_post_oembed":"","ocean_post_self_hosted_media":"","ocean_post_video_embed":"","ocean_link_format":"","ocean_link_format_target":"self","ocean_quote_format":"","ocean_quote_format_link":"post","ocean_gallery_link_images":"on","ocean_gallery_id":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[64,44,122],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-17687","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-legal-history","category-political-processes-rhetoric","category-public","entry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/law.marquette.edu\/facultyblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17687","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/law.marquette.edu\/facultyblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/law.marquette.edu\/facultyblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/law.marquette.edu\/facultyblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/137"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/law.marquette.edu\/facultyblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=17687"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/law.marquette.edu\/facultyblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17687\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/law.marquette.edu\/facultyblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=17687"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/law.marquette.edu\/facultyblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=17687"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/law.marquette.edu\/facultyblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=17687"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}