THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 16, 2010 GEORGE F. WILL
A nickel for big government
he crime scene at 138 Griffith St. has changed in 76 years. Today it is a barber shop. In 1934, it was a tailoring and cleaning establishment owned and run by Jacob Maged, 49. With his responsibilities as a father
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of four, Maged should have shunned a life of crime. Instead, he advertised his criminal activity with a placard in his shop window, promising to press men’s suits for 35 cents. This he did, even though President Franklin Roosevelt’s New Dealers, who knew an amazing number of things — his economic aides were not called a “Brains Trust” for nothing — knew that the proper price for pressing a man’s suit was 40 cents. The National Recovery Administra-
tion was an administrative mechanism for the National Industrial Recovery Act of 1933, which envisioned regulat- ing the economy back to health by us- ing, among other things, codes of fair competition. The theory was that by promoting the cartelization of labor by encouraging unions, and the cartel- ization of industries by codes that would inhibit competition, prices would be propped up and prosperity would return.
Soon there were more than 500 NRA codes covering the manufacture of products from lightning rods to dog leashes to women’s corsets. Amity Shlaes, in “The Forgotten Man,” her history of the New Deal, reports that the NRA “generated more paper than the entire legislative output of the fed- eral government since 1789.” Business- es were asked to display the Blue Eagle, an emblem signifying participation in the NRA. Gen. Hugh “Iron Pants” John- son, an admirer of Mussolini who headed the NRA, declared, “May God have mercy on the man or group of men who attempt to trifle with this bird.” Maged trifled by his 5-cent violation
of New Jersey’s “tailors’ code,” written in conjunction with the NRA. On April 20, 1934, he was fined $100 — serious
Every citizen should stay up late at night reading about the government’s multiple mandates.
money when the average family in- come was about $1,500 — and sen- tenced to 30 days in jail. The New York Times reported that Maged “was only vaguely aware of the existence of a code.” Not that such ignorance was for- givable. It is every citizen’s duty to stay up late at night, if necessary, reading the fine print about the government’s multiplying mandates. “In court yesterday,” the Times re-
ported, “he stood as if in a trance when sentence was pronounced. He hoped that it was a joke.” Maged was an im- migrant from Poland, which in the Cold War would become familiar with the concept of “economic crimes” and the use of criminal law for the “re- education” of deviationists. Actually, his sentence was a judicial
jest. After Maged spent three days in jail, the judge canceled the rest of his sentence, remitted the fine and, ac- cording to the Times, “gave him a little lecture on the importance of coopera- tion as opposed to individualism.” The judge emphasized that people “should uphold the president . . . and General Johnson” in their struggle against — among other miscreants — “price cut- ters.” Then, like a feudal lord granting a dispensation to a serf, the judge promised to have Maged “measure me for a new suit.” Maged, suitably broken to the saddle
of government, removed from his shop window the placard advertising 35- cent pressings and replaced it with a Blue Eagle. “Maged,” reported the Times, “if not quite so ruggedly indi- vidualistic as formerly, was a free man once more.” So that is freedom — em- bracing, under coercion, a government propaganda symbol. Today, as 76 years ago, economic re-
covery is much on the mind of the gov- ernment, which is busy as a beaver — sending another $26 billion to public employees, proposing an additional $50 billion for “infrastructure” — as it orchestrates Recovery Summer to an appropriate climax. But at least today’s government is agnostic about the prop- er price for cleaning a suit. In 1937, FDR asked in his second in-
augural address for “unimagined pow- er” to enforce “proper subordination” of private interests to public authority. The biggest industrial collapse in American history occurred eight years after the stock market crash of 1929, and nearly five years into the New Deal, in . . . 1937. Maged died here of cancer on March 31, 1939. He was 54. He remains a cau- tionary example of the wages of sin, understood by the progressives of his day as insubordination toward govern- ment that knows everything. The NRA lives on, sort of, in this Milton Fried- man observation: Pick at random any three letters from the alphabet, put them in any order, and you will have an acronym designating a federal agency we can do without.
georgewill@washpost.com jersey city STEVE RUARK/ASSOCIATED PRESS
Rep. Mike Castle, with his wife, Jane, addresses supporters after his defeat in the Republican Senate race in Delaware.
E.J. DIONNE JR. Storming the Castles O wilmington, del.
n the eve of the primary that would end his electoral career, Rep. Mike Castle was in a reflec-
tive mood. He seemed calm and confi- dent, yet almost everything he said sounded valedictory as he offered a prescient analysis that explained in ad- vance a defeat that echoed across the nation. A genial and courtly man in the manner of the elder President Bush (who held a fundraiser for him in Ken- nebunkport, Maine), the nine-term member of Congress was mourning the decline of both the conciliatory style of politics that animated his ca- reer and the moderate Republican dis- position that the Tea Party is deter- mined to destroy. “There are issues on which, as Re- publicans and Democrats, we should sit down and work out our differences,” Castle said Monday night as we sat out- side at Kelly’s Logan House, a watering hole where he has gathered his closest supporters the night before every elec- tion since his first victory, for the neighborhood’s state legislative seat, in 1966.
Republicans who might be inclined toward the middle of the road, he said, are petrified of “quick attacks by col- umnists and the Sean Hannitys of the world. People are very afraid of cross- ing the line and being called Repub- licans in Name Only — or worse.” As a result, “not too many members are willing to stand up.” “Part of it,” he added, “is worry about primaries, and this election has shown the power of very conservative groups.” Castle’s defeat at the hands of Chris- tine O’Donnell, a perennial candidate who may be the least qualified Senate nominee anywhere in the country, does indeed mark the collapse of the Republican Party not only of Nelson Rockefeller and Tom Dewey but also of Bob Dole and Howard Baker. After two decades in which moder-
ates fled a party increasingly dominat- ed by its right wing, the Republican primary electorate has been reduced to nothing but its right wing. O’Donnell, boosted by a last minute anti-Castle spending spree from the California- based Tea Party Express, pulled off her revolution with a little more than 30,000 votes. That’s all it took to seize control of a once Grand Old Party in which the center no longer has the troops.
When I visited Castle’s headquarters
Monday night at Riverfront Wilming- ton — a classic bipartisan economic development project backed by Castle
— the storefront was welcoming but not bustling. Only a half-dozen people were working the phones, a brave but paltry band standing against the Tea Party tide. Sen. Ted Kaufman, a Democrat ap- pointed to what had been Joe Biden’s Senate seat pending the outcome of this election, noted in an interview that most Mike Castle-style Repub- licans in northern Delaware aren’t Re- publican anymore. “There was a move of moderate Republicans becoming in- dependents, and independents becom- ing Democrats,” he said. The same pattern is visible in the nearby Philadelphia suburbs in Mont- gomery, Delaware and Bucks counties. The forces that drove Sen. Arlen Spec- ter out of the Republican Party in Pennsylvania defeated Castle in Dela- ware. The conventional Washington talk- ing point holds that as Republicans have moved right, the Democrats have moved left. But this is patently false — just count the number of moderate Democratic House members. And one politician who sees no equivalence is Castle. The domination of a party by its most ideological wing, he said, “is a more extensive problem right now in the Republican Party than in the Dem- ocratic Party.” He also offered a prediction: “I’d be willing to bet dollars to doughnuts that my opponent could not win a general election in this state for this seat — or any other seat.” Yes, the Tea Party has just about handed Delaware’s Senate election to Democratic nominee Chris Coons, the young New Castle County executive who was transformed from an un- derdog to Castle on Tuesday morning to the overwhelming favorite against O’Donnell by late evening. But the larger question is whether the country is ready to deliver a major- ity to a Republican Party that now holds problem-solvers like Castle in contempt; is scared to death of a well- financed right wing that parades un- der a false populist banner; and, in pri- mary after primary, has aligned itself with Sarah Palin, who anointed O’Don- nell one of her Grizzlies. Will moderate voters take a chance on the preposterous proposition that this Republican Party will turn around and work in a calm, bipartisan way with President Obama? Or will they use their ballots to wake up the Repub- licans and tell them that they need more Mike Castles, and fewer extrem- ists?
ejdionne@washpost.com LOCAL BLOG NETWORK
Excerpts from The Post’s local opinions blog:
voices.washingtonpost.com/local-opinions/
The yellow mailbox revolution
Revolution is in the air. In Delaware, Tea
Party activists propelled conservative Christine O’Donnell to victory over Repub- lican establishment favorite Mike Castle. In the District, aloof Adrian M. Fenty is out as mayor. And in the Richmond suburb of Brandermill, residents are painting their mailboxes yellow. The Brandermill case cuts to the bone of
what drives regular folk batty these days: unresponsive government. In this case, un- responsive private government. Despite outcries from members, the
Brandermill homeowners’ association board has decreed that all mailboxes in the community must be replaced by matching new models that cost $155 apiece. Brand- ermill has been sniffy about homeowner rules since it was hailed as a cutting-edge planned suburb in the 1970s. The sub- division has lots of trees, running trails, swimming pools and a homeowners’ asso- ciation — membership mandatory — that sets maintenance standards to keep up housing values. Homeowners’ associations are like pri-
vate government. Real governments like them because it means they don’t have to work as hard. Unfortunately, citizens have a lot more clout with real governments. The mood with homeowners’ associa- tions is often more one of fascism than de-
mocracy. You do what the board says or you get fined. Residents have no recourse. It’s almost impossible to get anywhere in court because association rules are set up by squads of real estate lawyers who give all power to the Soviets, er, boards. Since suing is not a good option, angry
Brandermillians are painting their mail- boxes — a clear violation of community rules — in protest. I live not in Brandermill but in a smaller subdivision several miles away. For much of my adult life, I rented in big cities such as Chicago, New York and Moscow, so sub- urban associations were new to me. I found out just how awful they can be when I moved into my home some years ago and the architectural control commission sud- denly found lots of things wrong with my house. It also didn’t think that the color of the shed I erected matched the house. Four months and $500 in legal fees later, we compromised. To be sure, sometimes associations do their jobs well. But there are also cases of abuse. In one Nevada subdivision, the board started ticketing residents who put their garbage on the curb for pickup. Un- fortunately, the geniuses who issued the tickets attached them to curbside garbage bags, which were . . . picked up. No one got their tickets, and the residents had to pay extra penalties.
So, one has to admire the Brandermill mailbox painters. Maybe more of us will join their revolution. — Peter Galuszka, Bacon’s Rebellion
KLMNO
R
A25 DAVID S. BRODER
Who will profit in November?
among conservative Tea Party activ- ists may jeopardize Republican pros- pects for large-scale, recession-fueled gains from the Democrats. The stunning defeat of nine-term
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moderate Rep. Mike Castle, a former governor, by Christine O’Donnell, a previous loser with a troubled person- al history who was endorsed by Sarah Palin and the Tea Party movement, in the Delaware Republican Senate pri- mary probably dooms whatever chance the GOP had of capturing Vice President Biden’s old Senate seat and, with it, the Senate majority. The low-turnout upset, coming af- ter similar shocks in Alaska, Nevada, Kentucky and other states, suggests that the shrunken GOP is paying a price for its lack of coherent policy leadership at the national level. But it still may profit in November from the anger of an electorate fixated on the economy and the widespread uncer- tainty bred by its slow climb back from disaster. This is the fourth election cycle scarred by a downturn in jobs, savings and profits since Ronald Reagan came to Washington in 1981, and judging from the voter comments I’ve heard, the psychological damage from this one has been worse than from any of its predecessors. That is, in part, because it began un-
der George W. Bush and has continued unabated, as far as voters can judge, under Barack Obama. Democrats may claim they have halted the downturn and begun to reverse it, but when you talk to voters — and local officials — few see reasons for confidence. Layoffs and threats of reduced hours and lost income have decimated whole neighborhoods, and local gov- ernments’ revenue has declined even faster than Washington’s — although the federal deficits are scary enough. A year ago, it was not clear which
party would be more damaged by the fallout from the economic catastro- phe. But now it is evident that, some- where along the way, Obama and the Democrats lost control of the dia- logue, and the populist backlash fo- cused on big government, rather than big business.
Because the Democrats so visibly DAVID IGNATIUS
Old-school politics: Put country first
crat from Indiana, he made a dumb parliamentary error that would have scuttled the bill he was advocating. The House Republican leader at the time, Gerald Ford, sent over one of his colleagues to help Hamilton fix the mistake. The story sounds almost unbeliev- able in today’s bitterly partisan cli- mate, and Hamilton smiles and shakes his head as he tells it. Was there really a time like that, when par- ty interests were subordinate to mak- ing the country work? And how could the America of 2010, a nation with an increasingly dysfunctional political system, ever get back to that Arcadia? I asked Hamilton to ruminate about these questions recently, for two rea- sons: First, because at 79, he’s one of the wisest and most experienced peo- ple in Washington, and second, be- cause he will be packing his bags in November and returning home to run an institute at Indiana University. People like him, who know what it was like for government to operate effec- tively, are a dwindling resource in the capital. “The big question in politics today is, ‘What happened to the center?’ ” he says. That erosion was evident in Tuesday’s primary elections, in which dissident Republicans backed by the Tea Party movement toppled estab- lishment Republicans in Delaware and New York. It was another sign that, as Hamilton says, “The centrifu- gal forces have become dominant.” Hamilton offered a simple formula for maintaining sanity in this period of insane politics: Put the interests of your country first. “You must encour- age the mind-set that if you’re elected, your first obligation is to see that America works and succeeds,” he said. Political loyalties must come second. That may sound naive — like telling someone who’s depressed to cheer up. But it conveys a larger point: If a poli- tician’s goal is to enhance the coun- try’s success, then he must retain the flexibility to make the pragmatic com- promises that can solve problems. “If you get a politician locked into a posi- tion, it reduces his freedom of maneu- ver,” warns Hamilton, and it becomes impossible to achieve consensus. Hamilton has fought to defend the ground for compromise and consen- sus during this divisive decade, as vice chairman of the bipartisan Sept. 11 commission and co-chairman of the
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ee Hamilton remembers that when he came to Washington 45 years ago as a freshman Demo-
Iraq Study Group. He has also served as president of the Woodrow Wilson Center since he retired from Congress in 1999. Hamilton still manages to look like someone from the middle of America, even after all these years inside the sa- tanic Beltway. He leans back in his chair and stretches his gangly legs out as if he’s sitting on a porch back home. And then there’s that trademark crew cut, which bespeaks an America when haircuts were cheaper and blow dry- ers weren’t a politician’s best friend. The Indiana Democrat remains un- flappable, even at a moment when American politics seems to be suf- fering a collective nervous break- down. The problem with politics to- day, says Hamilton, isn’t just that it’s partisan — the reigning ideologues when he arrived in Washington, Hub- ert Humphrey and Barry Goldwater, were partisan, too — but that it has be- come “mean-spirited” and bitter. The decline of governance has coin- cided with the rise of interest groups. Hamilton takes the example of agri- culture policy: When he came to Con- gress, there were three big lobbying groups — the Farm Bureau, the Grange and the National Farmers Union. Today, it seems every commod- ity has its own aggressive advocacy group. And business groups, while de- nouncing government in general, all want their own particular breaks. Hamilton has been a supporter of
President Obama. But he offered some constructive criticism, too. Looking back on the health-care debate, Ham- ilton said, it’s clear that there wasn’t yet consensus on a reform package — and “you don’t have a solution to a problem in this country unless you have a consensus.” He faults Obama, too, for not yet finding a pastorly voice that could unite Americans in crisis. “Obama is still reaching for that,” he said. I asked Hamilton if he thought that America, with its political problems, is a country in decline. He quoted Lin- coln’s famous Civil War speech asking whether a divided nation “can long endure.” “That was the question at Gettys-
burg, and it’s the operative question today,” he said. “It’s not written in the stars that we’ll always be No. 1 and we’ll always prevail.” But regardless of whether America is up or down, Ham- ilton said, “our responsibility is the same, which is to make the country work.”
davidignatius@washpost.com
he end of the primary season ar- rived Tuesday amid growing signs that a grass-roots rebellion
put their stamp on that government in 2006 and 2008, attracting vast atten- tion with the elections of the first female speaker of the House and the first black president, they are destined to take the brunt of the anti-Washing- ton protests. Thus, the biggest paradox of the
2010 campaign year — that Repub- licans are poised for major gains, even though their reputation as a party has not really recovered from the Bush years and there is no evidence that voters think they have developed bet- ter ideas than the Democrats have for improving the economy. Because the GOP image remains so weak nationally under Michael Steele, Mitch McConnell and John Boehner, states have been flirting all year with the danger that their primaries will produce candidates reflecting the in- ternal dynamics of right-wing constit- uencies scary to the broader elector- ate. That has happened already in the
Colorado governor’s race and the Ne- vada Senate contest against Majority Leader Harry Reid. And it happened again Tuesday in Delaware and in New York, where a Tea Party candi- date for governor won. It is likely to surface as a challeng- ing dynamic when Republicans turn to the choice of a 2012 presidential nominee. With Sarah Palin helping fo- ment rebellions within GOP ranks in states from Alaska and Utah to Florida and Delaware, it may be harder than usual for the Republican establish- ment to anoint a front-runner from its own ranks.
On the other hand, this year’s pri- maries have given Republicans candi- dates for governor capable of winning in states such as Pennsylvania, Ohio, Illinois, Wisconsin, Michigan, Iowa, Oregon and especially California, to add to Texas, Georgia and perhaps Florida, which they already hold. This could enhance the reputation of the GOP as a governing party beyond measure. Democrats can still affect the out- come, but under the spell of Obama, they have lost the opportunity to de- bate big issues among themselves. Their next chance will come after Nov. 2, when the Obama administration re- constitutes itself.
davidbroder@washpost.com
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