The Parties Versus the People: An Interview with Mickey Edwards

By ANNA MEIER

With a dismal record of passing legislation, perpetuated by hyper-partisan gridlock, the 112^th Congress has been
called the “worst Congress ever.” Some prefer to stop at “dysfunctional,” but whichever
nickname you choose, there’s something seriously off about Congress these
days.  Bills are proposed with the goal of
advancing partisan interests, and not necessarily the public’s. Debates have deginerated into bitter partisan bickering, not thoughtful consideration of public policy.

In such an
environment, it’s natural to search for someone to blame. But according to former Congressman Mickey Edwards, who spent many years as a member of the Republican leadership, the problem in Congress isn’t its members—it’s the system
itself.

Fortunately, it’s not beyond repair. In
his new book, The Parties Versus the People: How to Turn
Democrats and Republicans into Americans, Edwards, who served 16
years in the U.S. House of Representatives representing Oklahoma’s 5th Congressional District, lays out the features of the American
political order that make it easy for parties to seek power over the public
interest.

In order to combat cronyism and get Congress back on track, he proposes
sweeping changes to our political system, from ending party-controlled
primaries to eliminating corporate donations to candidates. We caught up with
Edwards to talk about provoking accountability, moving beyond labels, and encouraging
a more effective Congress.

POGO: You’ve said that partisanship, not
polarization, is to blame for dysfunction in and frustration with government
today. Can you explain the difference?

Mickey Edwards: Polarization is a natural part of the
democratic process; there are more than 300 million of us and a lot of
different viewpoints, some of them very strongly held.  A democracy
depends on a vigorous exchange between those alternative visions.  Some of
the greatest advances in our history have come not from the political center
but from the “poles,” including the civil rights movement and the women’s
movement, both of which were radical reversals of long-held practices and
beliefs.

Partisanship, on the other hand, is the taking of political
positions that seem advantageous to one’s political club. Today, neither
Democrats nor Republicans are open to proposals—no matter what their merits—that
emanate from a member of the other party. The democratic process requires
a willingness to engage honestly in an exchange of views, with an openness to
considering an opponent’s perspective; partisanship cuts off that exchange and
proceeds solely from a cold political calculus that depends on hurting the
other side in order to gain an advantage in the next election. The two
terms—polarization and partisanship—are often confused, but they are very
different.

POGO: Political parties are an innate
feature of the American political system, but hyper-partisanship is a
relatively new phenomenon. Why the sudden shift in loyalties away from
constituents and towards political “clubs”?

Edwards: The kinds of political parties we have today are a
relatively new phenomenon.  Historically, members of parties united around
a few major issues but were willing to come together on many others.  Many
of the most contentious issues of modern American politics—social security,
Medicare, environmental protection—eventually won the support of members of
both parties.

Today, extreme partisans—hostile to cooperation with “the
enemy” —have awakened to the enormous power they can wield through closed party
primaries to punish candidates who express a willingness to consider
alternative viewpoints. It’s not that the American people have become
more partisan (in fact, the number of independents continues to grow rapidly)
but that the party zealots have realized that the party-controlled primary
system that limits voter choice in the general election gives them great
leverage to insist on uncompromising loyalty.      

POGO: Your grassroots organization is
called “No Labels.” As a political leader, how does one move beyond party
affiliation in terms of identifying oneself?

Edwards: I’ve been supportive of “No Labels” because I agree
with the organization’s fundamental premise, which also happens to be the
premise of my new book: that our political leaders ought to recognize that they
are Americans before they are Republicans or Democrats and that they’ve been
elected to come together as our representatives to address national concerns,
not to become knee-jerk advocates for their own political clubs. That’s
really all that’s required: understand that it is the United States, not one’s
party, to which we owe our loyalty; that we take an oath to uphold the
Constitution, not a party platform.

POGO:  With the cost of running political campaigns
these days, how can members of Congress keep from becoming beholden to special
interests?

Edwards: It’s difficult. Ideally, candidates would
devote much more of their campaign efforts to grassroots campaigning—door to
door, town meetings, coffees—but that’s hard to do if one is running
statewide. But we all have to live with ourselves and we have to be able
to face ourselves in the mirror without being forced to look away.

Special interests (and parties are special interests, too) will always try to
win commitments in exchange for their support; laws and regulations can help
make it more risky to bow to those demands, but ultimately, it comes down to a
matter of personal courage and a willingness to risk defeat rather than become
just another part of the problem.

That said, it is nonetheless possible
to reduce the ability of special interests to affect political outcomes. 
For example, in terms of campaign financing, my own preference is to limit
contributions to actual people—no corporations, no labor unions, no political
action committees, no political parties. Only real people can vote, and only
real people should be able to contribute to campaigns.   

POGO: Does accountability to the public
rather than a party necessitate complete transparency?

Edwards: Absolutely.  Every campaign contribution
should be publicly reported, immediately.  Every benefit accepted by a
public official should be publicly reported.  Every commitment made by a
public official, every “pledge” signed, every favor done must be
transparent. 

POGO: Your 2011
piece in The Atlantic on how
to combat partisanship received a lot of attention from the media and the
public alike. If citizens are concerned about this issue, what can they do to
bring about change?

Edwards: In that article, I made a number of suggestions.
Now, in the book, I’ve had room to expand on those—everything from
eliminating closed primaries and taking away the power of parties to draw
congressional district boundaries to creating non-partisan congressional staff
and eliminating the power of party leaders to control committee assignments,
chapter after chapter of proposed reforms. Some of those can be done at
the state level through referenda and initiative petitions; others can be done
through the simple means of applying pressure to one’s own member of
Congress.

Ultimately, it’s up to us; it’s our country, and only we can
change the system to make it work for us.

Anna Meier was a communications
associate at the Project On Government Oversight. Image courtesy of Mickey Edwards.

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2012-08-29 03:46:17

Source: http://pogoblog.typepad.com/pogo/2012/08/parties_versus_the_people.html