The Dilemmas of Conservatism II
Wilson, James Q.
James Q. Wilson THE DILEMMAS OF CONSERVATISM II. Reagan the politician. The remarkable accomplishments of President Reagan's first year in office should not blind us to the...
...I think most believe that the country has a right to expect some form of service from all or most of its citizens and that national defense is a common obligation, not one of several possible occupations...
...The coalition that helped him win the nomination was made up of groups--intellectual libertarians, born.again Christians, business-oriented conservatives, doctrinaire conservatives--who disagree sharply over what "conservatism" means...
...It is the kind of plan that will be difficult to alter in coming years because any significant change will require Congress to vote for increases in individual levies--something it has been notably reluctant to do except in wartime...
...14 THE AMERICAN SPECTATOR MARCH 1982 The federal budget devotes one-half of its outlays to entitlements, one-quarter to national defense, and one-tenth to debt service...
...It would be a return to politics as usual, with our national security the pawn of our short-term domestic political needs...
...Congressmen willing to vote for cuts in early 1981 may be most reluctant m do so in mid-1982, especially if the normal electoral cycle appears in effect so that the party of the incumbent President loses House seats...
...How could one think of the economy, or make a policy for it, when the very idea of the gross national product had yet to be invented, when no one knew how many people were employed or unemployed, when the federal income tax did not exist, and when the recently created Federal Reserve Board saw its role simply as ensuring stability in the national credit markets and not as doing anything about general economic conditions ? A liberal administration might come to power and make the government do more (about public lands or industrial trusts...
...The size of government is important in some ways, to be sure--how much money is spent through public rather than private budgets, and how burdensome taxes may be, are important questions...
...On the others, the signals are hard to decipher...
...The attentive reader will note that I do not take seriously.the view of some supply-side economists that this tax cut will pay for itself through increased economic activity...
...We have become so accustomed to thinking of the federal government-rather than the community, the church, or society--as the obvious center of our collective lives that we forget that this very assumption is anticonservative...
...What criteria are to govern the decisions to use or conserve these resources...
...4) Race relations: How does the government propose to give effect to the widely accepted standard of equal opportunity for all and merit selection, without pursuing the not widely accepted standards of quotas, goals, and forced busing...
...And self-defined conservatives are only a minority of the population at large...
...Reagan faces two formidable obstacles...
...There are only a few issues of overriding national importance...
...To judge the record of Mr...
...War is too important to be left to the Pentagon lobbyists, the environment too important to be left to a controversial secretary of the interior, income maintenance too important to he handled casually by staff assistants who appear more interested in saving money than in clarifying the grounds on which income will be maintained, and race relations too important to allow policy to be secreted piecemeal out of a series of small actions...
...Perhaps the change most likely m endure is the cut in individual tax rates...
...In applying this test, citizens do not, except at a rather abstract and ambiguous level of discourse, care very much about what might be the proper size of the government...
...But the prospective loss to the Treasury (and, of course, gain to the public) of about $750 billion in tax revenues over the next five years will make the debate over expenditure policies more difficult, more divisive, and more uncertain than ever before...
...The Republican victory in the Senate was a more complex matter, but essentially involved the replacement of liberal senators (Bayh, Church, Culver, Durkin, McGovern) who had fortuitously come to power in conservative states (Indiana, Idaho, Iowa, New Hampshire, South Dakota), and the defeat of more centrist senators who had lost touch with their constituencies (Nelson, Talmadge, Magnuson...
...Can we justify income maintenance programs that maintain the incomes of well-off people...
...Reagan had was to be different from his predecessor...
...on one of them, the economy, the President has been clear and forthright as to his policy...
...2) Income maintenance: What do we mean by a "safety net...
...I happen to think that Congress's nature is not easily transformed, and thus I am doubtful that the tactic will be institutionalized...
...And many cuts involved shaving off relatively small sums from a variety of programs...
...Moreover, some of the larger cuts might have been made anyway...
...The ratio will be even higher for the expanded military establishment contemplated by the Administration...
...The President's tactical victories in Congress will, in the long run, prove less important than his strategic success (or failure) in persuading the American public that government ought to play a different role in their lives than it has for the last half century...
...Both Congress and the public worry about large deficits and neither will be much reassured by claims that deficits do not contribute to inflation unless they are monetized...
...When President Reagan in his State of the Union Address forswore tax increases, he was forswearing any effort to rearrange the political incentives that, left as they are now, will tempt Congress and the_ public to cut the defense budget...
...I do not believe a budget-cutting strategy can be sustained...
...Whatever economic costs might have been incurred by such changes would have been more than offset by the political benefits...
...It is difficult to reconcile the needs of a long-term policy cycle with the realities of a short-term electoralcycle...
...Other cuts, such as those in student loans, were achieved by ending the eligibility of higher-income families who had only recently become beneficiaries...
...The struggle for influence in the Administration among these groups is already well advanced...
...The choices made then, more than any made so far, will be the decisive ones...
...The real cost of the defense build-up will be in 1983, 1984, and beyond--precisely in those years in which the political temptation to cut the defense budget wilt be the greatest...
...Those who believe that it can be settled by appealing to a sharply defined and coherent ideology are, in my view, mistaken...
...The economic benefits of the Reagan tax cut would not have been vitiated if the plan had been phased in over a longer period or if it had been coupled with higher taxes on energy consumption...
...Policy on race relations seems to be managed by an a s s i s t a n t attorney general about whom no one knows very much...
...No one should belittle the significance of achieving these cuts...
...Finally, the bulk of the cuts will be felt first by state and local officials who will no doubt prove adept at directing blame for program reductions toward Washington...
...3) The environment: The people expect the government to take reasonable steps to conserve our natural heritage--clean air and water, valuable forest and shoreland...
...It provided little or no support for deregulation, only modest support for tax cuts (more Americans favored a balanced budget than immediate tax cuts), and only equivocal support for reduced federal spending (in general the public wanted the government to spend less but with only a few exceptions it wanted more spent on individual programs...
...The average citizen probably cares little for these definitions, but he cares greatly about the consequences of accepting one definition rather than another, tie applies to these consequences a kind of crude welfare test: Does this argument, if put into practice, make society better off...
...Not at all...
...Over half those who voted for Mr...
...The first is to alter the natural logic of democratic politics...
...Public opinion--even the opinion of self-described conservatives among the public--simply will not support any simple doctrinal answer to the problem of explaining conservatism...
...Though they do not add up m an ideology, they share a concern for the general weU-being of the society, defined in terms of traditional communal values-thrift, religion, economy, decency, the obligation to serve one's country--coupled with a reasonable individualism that would settle the question of abortion by some means well short o'f a constitutional decree...
...The central dilemma might be stated (or overstated) this way: In a modern industrial democracy, governance is essentially a nonconservative, perhaps even anticonservative, activity...
...The draft is one of several important test cases...
...Small wonder that President Reagan seems to draw lessons, not from the administrations of William McKinley or Calvin Coolidge, but from that of Franklin Roosevelt...
...These may be correct arguments, but in a hotly contested election they are not often persuasive ones...
...Conservative policy requires that in general the government do less...
...The President is thought to be unfeeling about old people...
...rather, the rate of growth of expenditures was slowed (from about 12 percent a year during 1971-1980 to about 5.4 percent a year during 1982-1985...
...The issue involves a conflict between the libertarian and the conservative definition of a good state...
...Expenditures were not "cut...
...The immediate effect of the change can be exaggerated, however...
...It offers a politics of subtraction...
...The public notes that we are spending more on the military, but is not certain why...
...Are these views inconsistent or shallow...
...James Q. Wilson THE DILEMMAS OF CONSERVATISM II...
...They have been addressed by the tax legislation and budget-cutting legislation of 1981...
...for most taxpayers, the Reagan plan does not offer a true tax cut, but only the repeal or offsetting of previously planned tax increases (arising from social security tax hikes and bracket creep...
...it is philosophical...
...In pursuing that strategy Mr...
...What are the obligations of the citizen to society to perform military (and nonmilitary) service...
...That is to say: Given a large, activist state in a complex economic order, the daily routine of governing requires officials to do things that maintain or enlarge the significance of government itself...
...a conservative administration might then come to power and, by refusing to act, lead the government to do less...
...16 THE AMERICAN SPECTATOR MARCH 1982...
...If that is true, how is it that in 1980 Mr...
...The competitive struggle for Votes provides powerful inducements for politicians to promise more to their constituents...
...Today, an administration cannot be James Q. Wi/son is Professor of Government at Harvard University...
...The expenditure cuts ($35 billion in the fast year) are another matter...
...The President's commitment to across-the-board tax cuts may well be a sound economic strategy but it is not clear that it is a sound political one if you believe that defense is the nation's first priority...
...In another ten years, the armed forces will have to attract one out of every three male high-school graduates not bound for college if its present manpower levels are to be maintained...
...006 Democratic politics is essentially a process of addition...
...But rank-and-file conservatives are opposed to an amendment banning all abortions...
...It is politically impossible to "make the government smaller" by requiring that one-seventh of the budget absorb nearly all of the cuts, just as it is politically impossible to end inflation by plunging the country into a prolonged recession...
...Essentially, the Republican congressional leadership converted the first budget resolution, which ordinarily had been little more than a target to shoot at, into a binding budget ceiling coupled with a set of instructions to the legislative committees directing that cuts be made in certain programs...
...If not, on what principles of contribution and benefit are these programs to rest...
...and they think we are spending t o o little on government programs aimed at crime, drug abuse, and national defense...
...The sizeable increases in 1982 defense outlays (around $18 billion) are little more than a continuation of trends begun in the last year of the Carter Administration and take only a small step toward ensuring that the window of strategic vulnerability is closed, that we can fight and win in the Middle East, and that our Navy can keep open the sea lanes in the four oceans in which it has responsibilities...
...In the 1910s and 1920s, very few people would have supposed that the health of our economy was to any significant degree dependent on an economic policy fashioned in Washington...
...It is time to extend that sound strategy to other key elements of a conservative agenda...
...CETA public service jobs had been in deep trouble for some time owing to reports of waste, fraud, and abuse...
...Representatives are always running for reelection after their first 18 months in office...
...It was an extraordinary accomplishment...
...But I am skeptical that it will last, at least in its present form...
...The match does not yet exist and will not exist for some time...
...Any effort to reverse the direction of American public policy is a gamble, dependent on imperfect economic knowledge and an impatient electorate...
...They have been about union, slavery, liquor, war, welfare, the franchise, and the currency...
...Under the combined impact of a recent election, Republican solidarity, the defection of the "Boll Weevils," skilled presidential lobbying, and the (correc0 perception that the public wanted the government to spend less, the budget ceiling was passed...
...President Reagan has reiterated his libertarian views about the draft, indicatTHE AMERICAN SPECTATOR MARCH 1982 15 ing that while he is willing to continue draft registration he is opposed to conscription i t s e l f except in a grave national emergency...
...Liberals may be right in saying that, for better or worse, they are the natural governors, for they welcome a large and expansive government...
...I cannot do justice to this question in a paragraph, but in brief my view is this: Virtually every informed analysis of the 1980 vote, including those carried out by such conservative groups as the American Enterprise Institute, agrees that Mr...
...the second is to supply a convincing definition of the conservative c~iuse he espouses...
...If conservatives make the t e s t of conservative politics its success in reducing the government to the correct size, they will be engaging in a debate that most people believe is irrelevant...
...But neither should anyone exaggerate their magnitude or believe they _will remain intact...
...One of the great strengths of this Administration has been its ability to use the Presidency as a means for stating goals and mobilizing consent, leaving the management of policy to others...
...But even apart from electoral considerations, the Congress as an organization will resist any procedural arrangements that, like the binding budget resolution, reduce the autonomy of the legislative committees, force congressmen to make hard choices, and lessen the ability of individual legislators to be of help to constituency groups...
...Reagan's first year, one must measure it against his goal of altering public expectations about what government is supposed to do...
...The Constitution calls for national elections every two years...
...I think most Americans disagree with the President here...
...The industrial revitalization on which so much depends requires the creation of favorable expectations which in turn may take several years of lowered tax rates, stable or declining interest rates, and modest or shrinking federal deficits...
...In short, President Reagan had to create public and congressional support for a policy that promised the government would do less in every arena save foreign and military affairs...
...But the major challenge facing the Administration now is not to continue the search for governmentshrinking steps, but to begin to enunciate more clearly the principles on which our government, of whatever size, should operate...
...thus, the principles'of a conservative state must not only be congruent with what conservatives already believe, they must be generally acceptable to some nonconservatives...
...And some conservatives readily accept the view that the government has a tutelary and sumptuary role, and is properly concerned, albeit under carefully defined restrictions, with producing virtue among its citizens...
...Ronald Reagan won for much the same reason Francois Mitterrand won in France --the public no longer had confidence in the incumbent...
...It is the same philosophical issue found at the root of public policies toward crime, schooling, pornography, drug abuse, " v i c t i m l e s s crime," and even immigration...
...Reagan won because of popular dissatisfaction with Jimmy Carter and the national problems with which his Administration had become associated...
...What they care about deeply is that the government, whatever its size, folloqr right principles...
...Government spending will (if the claims made for the cut prove correct) be $35 billion less than it would have been, but still more than it had been the year before...
...The statement will not be persuasive or, if persuasive, will simply convert the Federal Reserve system into a political football...
...The reality may be much better than this, but if a conservative regime is to succeed, it must make its practice vivid and its ideas compelling...
...At present, each of these four issues is being managed by lesser officials~ on the basis of imperfectly understood criteria, and in ways that lead the press and much of the public to see the matters in narrow partisan terms...
...Environmental issues seem to be in the hands of James Watt, widely perceived to oppose conservation and favor exploitation...
...I recall George Will's observation that to speak of a libertarian conservative is like speaking of a promiscuous celibate...
...His policy had four major components: to cut individual tax rates substantially, to reduce federal spending on a variety of social programs, to deregulate large segments of American business, and to take a firmer line against the Soviet Union backed up by a larger military establishment...
...L e t me suggest four topics that ought to be the subjects of major and sustained presidential remarks, coupled with clear White House directives to subordinates: (1) National defense: To what ends are we prepared to use military force...
...they do not think that cutting taxes is more important than balancing the budget...
...The major political conflicts of American history have been about those principles, not about the-size of government...
...to do so is a violation of freedom...
...We should hire soldiers...
...But the fundamental issue is not practical at all...
...One of the striking findings of students of public opinion is that most voters are influenced in their political preferences more by how they evaluate the condition of the economy as a whole than by how they evaluate their own economic condition...
...Reagan won the Presidency and the Republicans won the Senate...
...In February 1983, the White House will already be planning for the 1984 presidential election and Congress will have just returned from an election in which the Democrats may have made gains in the House (remember, Ronald Reagan is not as popular as Dwight Eisenhower, and under Eisenhower the Republicans lost congressional seats during the off-year elections of 1954 and 1958...
...As he began his first term, public opinion provided clear support for only one of these policies (increased military spending...
...The justification, apparently, is that the government has no right to conscript labor...
...The remarkable accomplishments of President Reagan's first year in office should not blind us to the fundamental dilemmas facing anyone who wishes to give a conservative direction to American Government...
...The first responsibility of this government--of any government--is to ensure that our military capacity matches our overseas commitments...
...The conservative justification for this, of course, is that a government which does less will by its reduced scale promote private initiative, economic growth, and personal freedom...
...Every serious conservative congressman knows this, and by this time next year, Washington will thus either have abandoned its effort to make the government smaller, or slowed the increases in the (so far untouchable) defense and entitlement areas, or increased taxes...
...conservative by doing little, it can only be conservative by doing a great deal--cutting the budget, controlling the money supply, refinancing, the social security system, altering business regulations, enlarging the military establishment, managing foreign commerce and deploying its navy to achieve its political aims abroad, trying to formulate the attitude the federal government should take toward prayers in public schools and the use of busses to integrate those schools, and conducting a debate over the moment during pregnancy at which life begins...
...The temptation will be very strong to do the following: avoid raising taxes (higher taxes are unpopular), avoid reducing entitlements (lower benefits are unpopular), stop cutting the Vulnerable One-Seventh of the budget (state officials and interest groups will not tolerate any more cuts), and cut the defense budget (who cares...
...Reagan described themselves as liberals or moderates...
...With some exceptions, it is THE AMERICAN SPECTATOR MARCH 1982 13 hard to find in the 1980 election a pronounced shift in opinion toward a more conservative view of the federal government's economic and welfare responsibilities...
...Whatever the economic case for or against tax increases to cut the deficit, the political case for them is strong...
...The effect of this maneuver was to force Congress first to vote on the budget cut before voting on individual appropriations...
...That leaves one-seventh for everything else...
...Some additional steps are still possible, such as constitutional amendments that induce Congress to act more responsibly in voting on appropriations...
...To achieve these cuts and the legislative authorization for even larger reductions in future years, the President and his congressional leaders had to devise a tactic that, if successfully institutionalized, will transform the nature of Congress...
...But our political system does not easily tolerate long-term plans...
...9 _9 _9 The chances for making a long-term gamble work depend heavily on the ability of the President to provide a persuasive definition of the nature of a conservative state...
...That would be, in my judgment, a grave error...
...The congressional debate over-the plan was largely a debate on principle, lightly flavored with some old-fashioned horsetrading over the inclusion of various "sweeteners...
...The conservative favors a state that, though limited, is strong within those limits...
...In short, national service, except in a crisis, is an occupation, not an obligation...
...The short-term success of this politics of subtraction is well known...
...There are, of course, practical reasons as well for thinking that continuing reliance on the all-volunteer force may be difficult...
...Various poll data summarized by Everett Carl Ladd (Public Opinion, February/March 1981) suggest that self-defined conservatives do not, as one might suppose, support passing the Equal Rights Amendment or pressing environmental concerns to the exclusion of energy development, while they do favor (as do voters of every ideological hue) allowing prayers in the public schools...
...they do favor the draft...
...It was the first across-the-board, multi-year tax cut in memory, the first deliberately designed to provide larger dollar benefits to the well-offthan to the'not-so-well-off, and the first to contain a provision (not yet in effect) to index tax brackets so that inflation will no longer be able to produce automatic tax increases without Cong r e s s ' s having to vote for them...
...Indeed, the very concept of an "economic policy"--or even a concept of the "economy"--was largely an alien notion...
...though it approves of becoming stronger, it is not certain what strategy underlies that strength...
...The libertarian favors a minimal state and maximum individual freedom...
...When he took office, the only mandate Mr...
...In tax policy as in expenditure policy, there is no such thing as a free lunch...
Vol. 15 • March 1982 • No. 3
