Political party discipline a danger to good government

George Washington was in many ways the best of our presidents. One can get a glimpse of his wisdom concerning the way our government should operate in his Farewell Address, given at the end of his second and final term as president.

We ignore Washington's advice at our peril. If we had avoided national prejudices and other foreign entanglements, for example, we would not have been involved in the First World War, thus possibly preventing the rise of Nazism and the Second World War. Pursuing a neutral policy in the Middle East, we would most likely not now be a target of every terrorist group.

Another gem of Washington's wisdom is his warning against encouragement of a "spirit of party." He acknowledged that party spirit is natural to human nature, and can have some value: "There is an opinion, that parties in free countries are useful checks upon the administration of the Government, and serve to keep alive the spirit of Liberty. This within certain limits is probably true."

Washington believed that party spirit is strong enough by nature. Adding to that strength by encouraging it is dangerous: "But in those of the popular character, in Governments purely elective, it is a spirit not to be encouraged. From their natural tendency, it is certain there will always be enough of that spirit for every salutary purpose. And, there being constant danger of excess, the effort ought to be, by force of public opinion, to mitigate and assuage it. A fire not to be quenched, it demands a uniform vigilance to prevent its bursting into a flame, lest, instead of warming, it should consume."

It didn't take long for American political parties to break loose from the vigilance that Washington espoused. In the process, the parties have increasingly been harmful to good government. The worst feature of modern American partisanship has been the growth of party discipline.

Party discipline is the practice of enforcing approved voting behavior and even speech on members of a legislature such as the US Congress. Such discipline has become so extreme that the party position evolved to carry it out is called a "whip." The whip and other party leaders can influence a member's voting in various ways. The "carrots" available may be desirable committee assignments, help with campaign financing, promises of pork for a member's state or district, etc. "Sticks" may range from simple browbeating to threats of losing committee memberships. Politicians call these practices "horse trading" and other quaint terms. I call them corruption, bribery and extortion.

One recent example was reported in the Washington Post on September 27, 2005. Indiana Representative Mike Pence is the chairman of a group of conservatives in the House called the Republican Study Committee. This organization exists to push the Republican party in a more conservative direction. According to the Post, Pence was supposed to deliver an address to the YAF in Washington on "'why the conservative leadership in Congress has abandoned its allegiance to the principles of smaller government' and gone on 'massive spending splurges.' But instead, a chastened congressman delivered unstinting praise for his superiors."

Pence appeared chastened because he had just been subjected to a browbeating session by Dennis Hastert and Tom DeLay. We don't know what these leading Republican lights told Pence, but it must have been pretty extreme to bring about such a change in this principled conservative.

The Republican leadership had to have applied even more extreme measures to those members who resisted voting to approve CAFTA (the Central American Free Trade Agreement). Several representatives voted in favor in spite of expressing vociferous opposition right up until the day of the vote. Who knows what benefits were offered or what threats were made to induce these members to betray their nation's sovereignty so blatantly?

The danger in these practices is that it introduces influences over congressional votes that conflict with the representatives' primary duties: to defend the Constitution while representing their constituents. Whether or not the pressure meets a legal definition of extortion or bribery, it has exactly the same effect. It cannot contribute to good government.

Political parties should exist for the convenience of like-minded people working together to promote candidates. In legislatures, their function should be to help like-minded members work together for goals they have in common. When the parties go beyond this to enforce lockstep behavior, they become the out of control fire that George Washington condemned. We would have better government without fanatical party discipline.