Is America in Need of a Revolution?

This week Obama has issued a familiarly ridiculous and ironic warning to Congress—“Don’t shut down the government.” It sounds pretty absurd that the President has to issue a warning—publicly—to another branch of government that they need to not shut down the very institution they are supposed to be protecting.

So it’s probably unsurprising—and pretty commonly known—that people don’t like Congress. I think this phenomenon can be largely attributed to the circumstances cited above. People don’t like Congress and this distaste can be chalked up to a variety of causes—general distrust, fear of corruption, thoughts of government complacency, partisan aggression and more. But I think the crowning jewel on this laundry list of congressional hate is as follows: people think congress doesn’t really do anything. This issue is the sum of all those other problems—in the end, an untrustworthy congress, riddled with corruption, all too focused on partisan ties, doesn’t care what you want, and certainly doesn’t get anything done (and in the worst of circumstances, the Government entirely shuts down).

Last time the government shut down it was with regard to the budget—Congress just couldn’t agree enough to pass one—but this time, a possible shut down could be caused than more than just that. In an interview with the Washington Post, Obama explained that “Some [people in Washington] have been talking abut shutting down the government at the end of the month…for unrelated reasons that, by the way, don’t even have anything to do with the budget. They have to do with politics and presidential elections and posturing.” I read this quote and was pretty startled—it essentially explains the government could shut down for no other reason than people just can’t agree—not on one thing, but on anything.

            So I have to ask—why in the world can’t people just agree? These are trained politicians, educated, presumably intelligent. Yet, they lack the maturity of even a well behaved 5 year old who knows to agree to one cookie even though she really wants a hot fudge sundae. Compromise. It’s something we’ve all been taught to do. It’s something that our great republic, and not to mention congress itself, was founded on (are we forgetting the Great Compromise??).

            To examine the reasons for this inability to compromise I would like to reference an essay written by a thinker whose ideas also influenced the founding of our country—Baron de Montesquieu.

 Montesquieu’s work—The Spirit of the Laws—worked to inspire both the American and the French revolutions. In this work, he explains that he believes that each form of government (of which he thinks there are three) has a different spirit, or guiding principle. The spirit of a despotism (or a government with an absolute ruler) is fear. Citizens of a despotism are motivated to adhere to the will of the state out of fear that the supreme ruler will punish them if they don’t—because he or she has the ultimate and utmost power to do so. The spirit of a monarchy (or at least a well functioning monarchy) is honor. Honor, or honors, are given to those who do good deeds in the interest of the state. For example, if a citizen of the monarchy builds a nice new hospital or fights valiantly in a war, they will be awarded with status and honor. The thing about honor, Montesquieu explains, is that it is not driven by a desire to improve society as a whole (although that may be the end product). Instead, a monarchy is fuelled by ambition. Members of a monarchy make decisions in the hope of receiving higher honors. Lastly, the spirit of a republic is virtue. By virtue, Montesquieu is referring to how members of a republic must act in favor of the public good, rather than in self interest. A republic requires virtue because in an equal society, without virtue,  the strong would naturally dominate and the republic would progress into becoming a despotism. Ambition is toxic to a Republic. The point of this long-winded summary of a 300 year old text is this: perhaps, the issues of our current congressional system are due to unbridled ambition.

            Obama felt that he had to warn Congress to counteract its own ambition: to put their own personal ambitions aside in favor of the public good. Obama asked Congress to practice virtue. Now, the question becomes, will Congress live up to the call? Or are we unknowingly living in an alarmingly un-republican republic? Are we currently living in a pre-revolutionary state?

http://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/obama-warns-congress-not-to-shutdown-the-government/2015/09/09/876e887c-5730-11e5-8bb1-b488d231bba2_story.html