Andrew Carnegie and the Gospel of Wealth (Part Two)

(Editor’s note:  This is the second and final segment in a two part series, introducing readers to the Industrial Revolution and one of its iconic heroes.  To view the first segment, click here.)

What, if anything, is the duty of the rich man to society, according to one of the most iconic and storied rich men of early industrial America?

While the industrial robber barons of the Gilded Age were said only to flash their great wealth to the masses, Andrew Carnegie, for one, articulated a call for these wealthy business titans of industry to return their wealth to society.  This illustrates Lesson 3 (of 4) of US History.  The king of steel strongly believed that the rich man had not the option, but rather a corresponding duty, to voluntarily return his wealth to society from whence it came.

Carnegie's Gospel of Wealth writings set forth a model of how the wealthy man should conduct his life.  First, the capitalist’s primary goal was to make money.  But he should then live only modestly, so as to bring no undue attention to himself.  Then, since the rich man had figured out how to achieve great wealth in the first place, he alone should choose how to spend that wealth.  Whether on charity, society, science, or any other worthy cause, in his sole discretion, he should accomplish all this before he dies.

According to Carnegie, it would be a curse for a rich man to die with money in the bank, and which the government could then get its hands on by mechanisms such as the inheritance tax.  In the end, if all went according to plan, the rich man who made it would, in turn, give it all away freely, the government involved neither while making the money, nor spending it in the end.

And Carnegie acted.  As part of his considerable financial legacy, Carnegie, the king of steel, donated substantial sums for a pension relief fund to the families of killed and injured workers, based on merit, and not given indiscriminately.  Additionally, he made bequests to build 67 libraries forming the backbone of the venerable New York City public library system and some 1,689 public libraries in the US during his lifetime.  The program was expanded to include church organs.  Lastly, he made a gift to establish the International Court at the Hague, in support of a world court of arbitration, where international disputes could be resolved without resort to war.

As the so-called “Apostle of Peace,” Carnegie has been quoted as saying: “We have abolished the duel.  Let it be our race that truly takes the first step to abolish international dueling.”  And Carnegie (remember, the year was 1910, before the World Wars) had also stated:

The whole matter is so simple  …  Germany, Great Britain and the US coming together (somewhat covertly) to form a joint police force to maintain peace is all that is needed.

But the impact of the Industrial Revolution on American society was not all positive.  Neither were the results all pretty, nor without a heavy price.  Consider that the process generated a sink full of dirty dishes.  The growth of corporations and trusts raised immense amounts of targeted capital but, importantly, decreased social responsibility.  Materialism was pronounced over all other values.  Natural resources were exploited, despoiling the land, to increase profits.  Wealth and industry, over production, people and politics, became overly concentrated.  This, in turn, led to corrupt political machines led by party bosses, the overcrowding of cities, the straining of resources and services.  It also necessitated the combination of diverse cultural groups which were unfamiliar with American city life or each other.

Moreover, American industrial workers faced deteriorating labor conditions.  Women, children and the unskilled immigrant factory worker were exploited, suffering work conditions which could perhaps best be described as unsafe, inhumane and produced substandard products.  Hours were excessive, on a daily and weekly basis.  Wages failed to keep pace with the cost of living.  Still, the abundant supply of cheap, new, unskilled immigrant workers greatly exceeded the supply of new factory jobs in the nation’s big industrial cities.

Workers also faced strong opposition not only from their employers but also the courts.  Government policy and judicial decisions fiercely protected not the industrial worker but the entrepreneurial spirit of American businessmen to lead by way of innovation.  Sweatshop working conditions and stagnant wages stimulated a movement toward the formation of labor unions.  However, attempts at unionization led to violent confrontations between big business and government in tandem against the interests of labor.

One thing was clear: America was making more products than it could consume.  This factor, added to the free-for-all, further stimulated unstable economic cycles of boom and bust that produced unrest on farms.  Due to increasing productivity, farmers faced declining prices for their crops, as well as a diminution of their land, with laws and government interest in protecting neither.  Land foreclosures skyrocketed.

Instability spawned a first of its kind political movement, a populist wing of the Democratic Party traced to the protection of the nation’s agrarian and common man labor interests.  Dramatized by William Jennings Bryan, “The Great Commoner,” “on the wings of a single great speech about a cross of gold,” it rose briefly to political prominence but ultimately failed and was swept away by 1896.

In cities, living conditions degenerated into tenement slums filled with crime and poverty, racism and nativism.  Advances in transportation, specifically the railroad, exacerbated segregated living arrangements for an increasingly diverse cultural society.  And the entire process, given the magnitude and swiftness of the forces of change, fueled a painless escape to drugs.

The ultimate result and impact, it has been said, was a society in chaos, seeking reform.  This was the state of affairs as the American industrial machine rolled into the 20^th century.

-Michael D’Angelo

The Industrial Revolution and the Robber Barons (Part One)

(Editor’s note:  This is the first segment in a two part series, introducing readers to the Industrial Revolution and the underpinnings of modern times.)

What were the key ingredients to "make" America's Industrial Revolution?  What, if any, was the government’s role?  Why were the times seen as a Gilded Age, when style points both in politics and culture triumphed over substance?

In truth, the US was “ready” for the Industrial Revolution long before it actually arrived, but divisiveness on the slavery question held back progress.  Compromise after compromise had put off resolution of the most basic of civil rights issues, until it could be put off no longer.  When the Civil War ended, and the states were reconstructed, the US could return to the matter of industrial progress and prowess at the turn of the 20^th century.

Some say the birth of the Industrial Revolution was a precipitous event, transitioning America from a promised land into a crusader state, to capture and protect the wealth of foreign markets for its own citizens.  In this way America was said to mimic every great empire which had come --- and gone --- before.

The Industrial Revolution was the great free for all, US government “guided” by principles of Social Darwinism.  Basically, it was a game of survival of the fittest, most adaptable, Darwin’s theory of evolution as applied to society.  Those individuals who had figured out how to amass great personal wealth were viewed as being in the best position to make leadership decisions for the good of the masses.

Government’s role was either to support these individuals and their industries or avoid meddlesome interference (laissez-faire acceptance of supply and demand theory).  Industrial ventures operated through large, capital massing business organizations, called “trusts.”  But the relationship of these trusts to their government was to test severely the lawmaker’s role as the impartial umpire in the people’s pursuit of happiness.

The so-called titans of capitalism were bolstered by the collective success of the nation occasioned by explosive economic growth brought on by the Industrial Revolution.  The early capitalists featured names like Rockefeller in the business of oil, Morgan in banking, Carnegie in steel, and Vanderbilt in railroads.  They were firm believers in a free, unregulated market promoted by competition, with a new consumer class, a thriving force in the industrial economy.  With the incentive to reap great profits, these titans consolidated operations into large mega-corporations, streamlined the various systems of production, eliminated redundancies and maximized efficiencies.  While consolidation permitted them to control their industries, a primary goal was still to give the customer the best product at the lowest price.

It is perhaps helpful to think of the process of “making” an Industrial Revolution as similar to baking a wedding cake.  There were several key ingredients.  Among them were natural resources, such as oil, copper, land and water; a capital supply serving as “fertilizer.”  Government support was in the form of protective tariffs for the new, fledgling American industries, the birth of the modern corporation, low interest loans and adherence to the monetary gold standard.  Entrepreneurs took risks, mastered the art of vertical integration, business re-organization, and buying low and selling high.  Technological developments, such as electricity, steel, glass and the internal combustion engine, permitted innovations in rail transit, and the invention of the telephone and canned food.  A work force/consumer class was fueled mostly by an abundant flow of previously uneducated and unskilled laborers comprised mainly of a seismic inflow of new immigrants.  They had migrated to the cities in search of opportunities, filling the abundance of new industrial jobs.

For sure, there were many positives to consider.  In the span of a mere generation, the US became the #1 industrial power in the world, during which time a modern industrial economy emerged.  Skyscrapers were constructed, soon began to overtake the urban landscape, and our modern, industrial, steel and glass cities were born.  Immigrants comprised a new economic unit, a powerhouse called the “middle” class, a new term for the era.  With rising income, industrial workers doubled as what became known as consumers.  Their collective purchasing power permitted them to achieve a raised standard of material existence previously unknown.  It also kept the economy humming.

While the titans of industry were champions of competition, ironically, their goal was to eliminate competition.  Specifically, they sought to accomplish this by creating and then maintaining a hierarchy with themselves at the top.  Many had arrived there through superior intellect or other legitimate means.  But some used questionable or even illegal business practices.  Bribes, kickbacks and other monopolistic trade practices were all utilized to destroy competitors.

The times were regarded in negative terms as the Gilded Age, with great wealth flashed to the masses but accessible only to a precious few.  Those precious few were sometimes referred to not so nicely as robber barons.  Style points both in politics and culture triumphed over substance.  Consider the image of sunglasses attached to a bright, smiling face.

((Editor’s note:  The second and concluding segment in this two part series introduces readers to Andrew Carnegie, the Gospel of Wealth and the third lesson of US History.)

-Michael D'Angelo

The Umpire

Who acts as “Umpire” in the great American experiment in democracy?  How is the umpire protected from big money interests to complete our nation's great unfinished business --- achieving meaningful equality of opportunity?

Thomas Jefferson felt that the happiest society was one where inequalities of condition were not great.  As president, he considered what was needed for the happiness and prosperity of the people.  Jefferson talked about “a wise and frugal government, which shall restrain men from injuring one another.”  Further, that government should leave the people “otherwise free to regulate their own pursuits of industry and improvement, and shall not take from the mouth of labor the bread it has earned.”  Are these the government and conditions we are experiencing today?

Jefferson believed that the status of aristocracy, based as it was not on merit but inherited privilege, made it doubtful that this class would exercise its public obligation for human progress on its existing foundation.  Consequently, his ideas sought to restore “the natural order of freedom to give talent and virtue, which were scattered through all ranks of society, a chance to rise.”  He described his purposes in terms of “natural philosophy.”  Throughout his life, Jefferson never ceased to believe that men (white men, that is) by right were free in their minds and persons and that human society should guide its steps by the light of reason.

Today’s news media heaps praise upon America as a land of opportunity.  This praise is earned on merit.  The constitution requires all citizens to be considered equal under the law, that they should be afforded "equal protection of the laws."  But did the founding fathers designate anyone in particular to discharge the responsibility for fair dealing on a level playing field?  In other words, can we identify the Umpire?

Jefferson, for one, argued that it was the legislature, working in unison with the executive, which was best suited to play the unassuming, under-appreciated role of umpire.  On the important condition that proper policy was in place by the combined efforts of this pair, working together, then thereafter,

The path we have to pursue is so quiet that we have nothing scarcely to propose to our Legislature.  A noiseless course, not meddling with the affairs of others, unattractive of notice, is a mark that society is going on in happiness.  If we can prevent the government from wasting the labors of the people, under the pretense of taking care of them, they must become happy.

To this noiseless course approach,

It must be added, however, that unless the President’s mind in a view of everything which is urged for and against (a particular bill) is tolerably clear that it is unauthorized by the Constitution; if the pro and the con hang so even as to balance his judgment, a just respect for the wisdom of the legislature would naturally decide the balance in favor of their opinion.  It is chiefly for cases where they are clearly misled by error, ambition or interest, that the Constitution has placed a check on the negative (i.e.: veto) of the President.

So, it is the legislative branch which serves the role of umpire, calling balls and strikes, fair or foul, letting the citizens “play” and using its authority to maintain a level playing field.  But the ordinary citizen must be mindful that the “science of human nature” will be silently at work in the democratic process.  This involves an expectation of reasonable men acting reasonably in their own best interest.  That is to say, lawmakers face natural corruption by self-interest.

Notorious among the primary, big money, self-interest components of American democracy are the financial interests of capitalism, the resulting onset of political parties, large corporations, labor unions, lobby groups, political action committees, etc.  Importantly, each has evolved only after the constitution was enacted in 1789.  Together they tend to undermine the transparency necessary to understand how and why laws are made --- or not made.

The ordinary citizen may draw certain conclusions when wealth and income disparity are presently at an all time high, and those conclusions are not all positive.  For one, the situation is morally indefensible.  And for another, the legislative branch is inadequately protected from big money interests.  This confounds the quest to complete the great unfinished business of the nation --- achieving meaningful equality of opportunity.

How can the rules of the game be revisited to assist lawmakers with their inherently difficult role of impartial umpire in a level playing field society?  The good news is that sound, practical measures appear to be readily available.  Does the ordinary citizen possess the courage to meet the challenge of our time?

-Michael D’Angelo

Needs vs. Wants

In a land of plenty, what does the ordinary citizen really need?

What does the ordinary citizen really need?  On a collective level, an excellent place to begin analysis is on the expense side, that is, how the Prince is prioritizing the expenditure of the People’s money.  Common sense dictates that those items which relate to what the People “need” must first be identified as the so-called necessities of life.  These must be distinguished from the things which the People merely “want,” relating not to need but rather a whole host of discretionary items, or simply greed.

In the category of “needs,” much of the conduct of Benjamin Franklin’s early life evidences the truth that the only thing we need is the mere subsistence of bread and water.  However, when it comes to human nature, it is amazing, Franklin remarked, how many poor souls, given the simple choice of bread (needed) or beer (discretionary), in fact, would choose beer!

Over the ensuing centuries, a self-proclaimed “enlightened” People has continually and consistently expanded on what are presumed to be our needs.  Concepts incorporating more scientific theories about diet (other necessary subsistence in addition to bread and water), standards of “adequate” housing, “equal opportunities” in education, and “good,” meaning high-paying, jobs are identified.

In the more recent decades of the late 20^th century, prior Princes and legislatures have presumed to add to the basic list of needs certain guaranteed “benefits” atop the salaries of public sector jobs.  Although contractually promised, and presently protected under our laws, it is doubtful these benefits were ever the subject of valid actuarial accounting practices.  Surely, secure retirement payments in the form of lifetime pensions, unconscionable annual expenditures in too many cases, as well as free, unlimited access to health care and related services, are not on the ordinary citizen’s list of needs.  But, hence, the Prince calls for more revenue anyway.

When it comes to analysis of “need,” the ordinary citizen is guided by the example of Franklin D. Roosevelt, our 32^nd President.  In the throes of the Great Depression, F.D.R. left the ordinary citizen with the enduring legacy: a primary obligation of the government is to provide help to its Citizens, especially in their time of need.  During that time, need meant food, government bread delivered to hungry people waiting desperately on long lines.  The government subsidized clothing, housing and sponsored programs designed to put the People back to work.  The New Deal "freedom from fear/freedom from want" experiment was designed to confront an ongoing emergency, because the private sector had failed.

In the category of “wants,” all the People must do to distinguish needs from wants is watch just a bit of television in prime time.  In less than an hour, it is apparent that 99% of what talented Madison Avenue marketing professionals advertise involves a wish list, for which the ordinary citizen falls easily.  Just how badly does the ordinary citizen need another prescription, marketed by the powerful pharmaceutical industry, to alleviate the phenomenon of “restless leg syndrome?”

Ben Franklin also warned of excessive Debt, an ugly but sometimes necessary evil.  If permitted to grow unchecked to the point where it can not realistically expect to be repaid, Debt robs the ordinary citizen of the ability to act independently.  Debt thus poses perhaps the greatest danger to fundamental liberty.  Its potential adverse consequences can be chilling.

Finally, lawmakers who take an oath of “service” invariably find themselves intertwined with economic interests.  In a capitalist economy that often expresses itself in terms of excess, the alliance tends to corrupt both.  An understanding of how and why laws are made --- or not made --- is not always apparent.  As the line between needs and wants loses definition, the greater good is overwhelmed by an identifiable self-interest component.  May the People some day realize that all they truly need is the will to contain it?

-Michael D’Angelo

The Traffic Light (Part Two)

(Editor's note:  This is the second and concluding segment in a two part series published under heading of The Traffic Light.  To view the first segment, click here.)

Does the ordinary citizen's pursuit of happiness come with any significant limitation?  Perhaps, we should just wait ...

The traffic light serves as a useful metaphor for the ordinary citizen’s interaction with change.  Some prefer the safety and comfort of a red light, indicative of all they know and all they care to know.  Sometimes, when the light turns green, all hell breaks loose.  Others detest the red light as evil and the mortal enemy of progress.  For them, the traffic light is always, or should always be, green in a perfect world.

But suppose there were a powerful force which had little interest in permitting the traffic light to change.  What happens then?

Recall the young Baptist minister, reared in Atlanta, well educated with a doctorate degree in theology.  Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. advocated civil disobedience, but in a different way.  He preached nonviolent, direct action guided by the Christian ideal of love and not through racial hatred.  Jailed in Birmingham for such protests, Dr. King wrote that his people had been told to “Wait!” for constitutional (and God-given) rights for nearly 350 years.

By any reasonable measure that’s a long time to wait at a red light, while the cars with the green on the other side barely noticed.  It’s called empathy, and the lack thereof.  But reasoning correctly that wait usually meant never, Dr. King’s people were no longer willing to stand by and wait patiently for equal rights, that the “Time is now.”

The phenomenon of the 1960s sit-ins, the civil rights march on Washington, D.C. and his powerful “I have a dream” speech were embedded into American culture.  Meanwhile, the mass exodus of Southern white Democrats to the Republican Party seemed to coincide with, and may have been facilitated by, these events.  Presently, that powerful constituency comprises the party’s affluent conservative base.

Some fear change --- others embrace it --- all in the constancy of our predictable human nature.  Do we dare risk the folly of changing a classic Rembrandt painting?  Sometimes, as Theodore Roosevelt has noted, the institution fittest to survive tends in fact to survive the change whirling about relatively unscathed:

It is true, as the champions of the extremists say, that there can be no life without change, and that to be afraid of what is different or unfamiliar is to be afraid of life.  It is no less true, however, that change may mean death and not life, and retrogression instead of development.

Change is messy.  Great achievement is all but impossible absent an individual willing to incur a dangerous level of risk that is unacceptable to most.  The first person through or over the wall always gets hurt.  This ordinary yet peculiar but necessary citizen gets beaten up, beaten down and absorbs the full brunt of the damaging blows of an entrenched status quo.  Taking it square in the teeth, the innovative risk taker oft becomes a regrettable front line casualty.  But the process exposes the powerful force of resistance as a dying voice.

Recently, President Obama stated that “I am not going to walk away from 40 million people who have the chance to get health insurance for the first time.”  It’s an admirable undertaking which has befuddled presidents dating back to T.R. a hundred years ago.

At a time when the richest 400 Americans possess more wealth than the bottom 150 million combined, consider that these stark numbers do not lie.  At the traffic light they present a distorted reality from what one may have come to expect.  One privileged car commands the favored state road on a long, uninterrupted green for every 375,000 cars jammed in at the crossroad red.  The one car, in turn, provides consideration to a small percentage of the latter group to keep it that way.  Everyone, it seems, must wait.

Dare to engage in a social science project charged with the responsibility of adjusting the flow at that particular traffic light?  Such an intellectual exercise may prove enlightening.  The requisite, independent traffic studies are completed, and demonstrate beyond doubt that the timing and sequence must change.  But it doesn't end there.  Where human nature is concerned, perhaps the individual who happens to have things in abundance and consequently the perpetual green light has a valid point and typically the final say:  Do pretty much whatever you want in your pursuit of happiness, but just don’t try to change my status quo.

Who wants to be first over that wall?

-Michael D’Angelo

The Traffic Light (Part One)

(Editor's note:  This is the first segment in a two part series.)


What may we learn from the cycling of a solitary traffic light from red to green and back again?

Long distance travel by auto remains a favorite family pastime, especially during the busy holiday season.  Often, a pilgrimage to the home of relatives is the only occasion a family may have to spend meaningful time together as a unit, all in one place.  In their children parents anticipate the pleasure of a captive audience.  For children, extended travel offers a host of valuable new experiences.  It is a time when lasting memories are born.

As the family car meanders along one of the nation’s many rural state roads, invariably it encounters a lonely traffic signal.  Often, it is the only traffic light in small town America.  Fortunately, traffic is not terribly heavy, but thank goodness the light is green anyway.  And we speed on through without giving it another thought.

The intersection is often empty.  But sometimes a lone car or two may wait, patiently, for the light to change.  A certain curiosity may develop as to how long these cars have been waiting, what they may be up to.  As these cars disappear in the rear view mirror of our adventures, surely the light which is now behind us must change for them at some point, that they should be permitted to cross.  What is their story?  Occasionally, what may seem like more cars than the little town possesses are backed up to the traffic light.  The first thought of the passing motorist may be how all those cars got there and what the attraction is in the first place.

Eventually, the traffic light turns in a three part cycle, first from green, to the yellow caution, and finally to red.  The yellow permits cars driving at highway speeds sufficient time to properly judge long stopping distances and decide whether to stay on the gas pedal and continue through the intersection or hit the brake and come to a safe, controlled stop.  The yellow light is a product of the country road.  Typically, it does not even exist in the city, where the traffic light contains only a two part cycle, going from green directly to red.  Long stopping distances are of minimal concern in the physical confines of the city, where things happens faster.

At state road intersections the traffic light for the small town crossroad tends to be red for a long time.  The change to green allows as many cars to pass through safely as the short cycle permits, depending on driver reaction time.  Logic predicts better than chance that when reaction time is coordinated, more cars pass.  When it is uneven, there will be fewer.  Those cars toward the rear may be destined to wait for more than one cycle to get through.

The change to green also elicits familiar reactions drawn from the range of driving habits.  The daydreamer returns to earth just in time to barely clear the short cycle before the light is red again.  The impatient floors his older car, the one with the manual transmission, carburetor and loud exhaust pipes.  Invariably the car jerks and stalls out.  He’ll have to await the next cycle, as will the angry people stuck behind him.  The risk tolerant tests fate, taking a chance after due circumspection, and crosses against the red light.  If there are no other cars around, no traffic camera to record the transgression, then what’s the harm?

In a multi-racial, economically stratified, complex industrial society, the traffic light serves as a useful metaphor for the ordinary citizen’s interaction with change.  Some actually prefer a red light.  It represents the safety and comfort of what they know, indispensable to the measured progress of an established order whose inconvenience is trifling and may be overlooked.  For on occasion, when the light turns green, all hell breaks loose, and chaos abounds.  This is to be avoided at all costs.  Others come out on the opposite side, detesting the red light as evil and the mortal enemy of progress.  For them, the traffic light is always, or should always be, green in a perfect world.

But suppose there were a powerful force which had little interest in permitting the traffic light to change.  What happens then?

(Editor's note:  The second and concluding segment in this two part series continues the discussion of change in the context of The Traffic Light, touching upon issues ranging from civil rights, to access to affordable health care, to record levels of wealth disparity in the US today.)


-Michael D’Angelo

Compromise Is Not a Dirty Word

What is necessary to unite the rigid ideologue with the political expedient who believes in nothing? ...

Success is sometimes merely about getting along. Even when there are issues which divide, consensus is borne of close relationships. The importance of identifying common objectives among those with differing viewpoints on various issues cannot be understated. The individual who shuns consensus and surrounds himself with like thinkers is destined to lead a minority.

Compromise is not a dirty word. Our constitution is in fact the first great compromise, national in scope. The southern bloc would not sign off until a Bill of Rights was secured. In the US Senate, the power of small states equals that of large states, assuring the protection of the minority interest. If Alexander Hamilton wanted necessary support for his capitalist system, he needed to induce southern skeptics by offering to locate and build the new capitol city in the nation’s South.

Those guided by strict adherence to ideology become dangerous, when they are unyielding and their majority moves to dominate self-righteously. They do not compromise. The governed only get to march, the music, cadence and beat pre-determined. Rigid minds leave no room for differing viewpoints, which reflect the spectrum of human needs. Yet in certain respects we do need those who demand more than humanity can deliver, aggravating as they can sometimes be.

On the other hand, some are guided simply by political expediency, believing in little or nothing other than the upward mobility of ambition and self-interest. They are confounding, having risen without commitment to any general ideology. Since they function without program, principle or consistency, they, too, are a dangerous lot.

Between the two extremes lies an area ripe for compromise. Suppose the whole loaf is not available? Does one not accept a slice or two or maybe only just a few crumbs? The democratic system requires that this point be fairly understood.

For some in politics, it is sufficient that “the duty of the opposition is to oppose.” The need to suggest alternatives, to curb internal radicalism and irresponsibility, is irrelevant. Truth and reality have little substance in the shadows of political gamesmanship.

Against this backdrop a president heads the responsibility of government. At home, needed legislation is proposed: a national health insurance program, a comprehensive civil rights bill, labor legislation to raise the minimum wage, investment in jobs creation through infrastructure improvement to spur the domestic economy. Meanwhile, constituents raise cane about employment, adequate housing, education. But taxes must be slashed, expenditure cut from budgets, in apparent contradiction.

What begin as well-intentioned foreign policy initiatives in support of democracy on distant horizons in Asia, the Middle and Far East devolve into confrontational quagmires. Civil unrest erupts and spreads, involving unstable, unfriendly and sometimes hostile regimes. It is right to send troops, but then they turn and we must get out. Apparently, we must be internationalist and isolationist at the same time. The opposition moves further to curb the powers of the presidency. Who can be trusted in government?

Demagogues and irresponsible attackers rarely with substance cause irreparable damage to individual reputations, the State Department, Foreign Service and America’s reputation. Talented people who may be in the position to save us from future agonies are silenced or driven out, as the nation pays a heavy price. Life at the extremes has the awful consequence of compelling otherwise reasonable minded citizens into simplistic, unsustainable positions.

The times require patience, understanding, tolerance. Instead, the rabid demand quick and precise answers according to their own ideology of what is right and wrong. They have little patience with the UN, with diplomacy, with rational talk. It is much easier to claim that our leaders --- weak-kneed and soft-hearted --- are selling us out to the socialists. There is little wonder that the ordinary citizen seems confused or has a difficult time judging just what is going on.

The decade following World War II was perilous by any measure. But President Truman stood up to the grave national security threat posed by the Russians and the Chinese on the one hand, and to the unpredictable trend of harsh domestic critics on the other. It was a testament to an extraordinary display of strength and fortitude.

-Michael D’Angelo

Andrew Jackson: Where There's a Will ...

“He is a much abler man than I thought him,” commented one US Senator from Pennsylvania, “one of those naturally great minds which seem ordinary, except when the fitting emergency arises.”

Andrew Jackson, genuine American hero, enjoys an iconic, champion of the common man reputation, earned strictly on merit.  He is perhaps best known today as a highly distinguished military general and two term president.  And of course there is that face on the $20 bill.  How did it get there?

Like most of us, the colorful Andrew Jackson was not the Senator’s son.  Rather, he was the epitome of a self made man.  His father had died before Jackson was born, in the year 1767.  When he was still very young, Jackson's mother left him and his older brother to care for the Revolutionary War soldiers, who had been wounded in action and were convalescing.  As a result, he had grown up as an orphan, on his own.

During the Revolutionary War, a British soldier arrogantly demanded that the young boy get down on his knees and clean the soldier’s boots, immediately.  At the time, he was but age 13 and quite impressionable.  When Jackson refused to obey the order on grounds that he was a prisoner of war, the soldier lashed out at him with his sword.  Jackson ducked and partially deflected the blow with his left hand, blunting its full force.  The resulting deep gash left a permanent indentation on Jackson’s skull and fingers, the episode serving as a reminder for the rest of his life of his extreme contempt for all things British.

Later, at age 39, already having achieved the military rank of General, Jackson had gotten into a scrap with a local braggart on the frontier of western Tennessee.  It seemed incredible that the slightest misunderstanding over the “merest word play” should lead to tragedy.  However, each demanding “satisfaction” from the other, the two agreed to a duel.  Jackson’s adversary was a man of local prominence, who was also known to be one of the best shots in Tennessee.  For his part, Jackson knew that neither his aim nor speed at the draw of a pistol was any match.

Understanding this, together with his second, he devised a plan.  The two calculated that the only way he could survive the duel, and win, was to let his adversary draw first and hope that the wound inflicted upon him would not be fatal.  Amazingly, the plan worked.  His adversary’s quick shot had shattered two of Jackson’s ribs and buried in his chest, but it had missed his heart.  Whereupon, Jackson calmly raised his left arm and clenched it against his throbbing chest, took aim with his own pistol, and fired.  The bullet struck his adversary in the chest, passed clean through his body, leaving a gaping hole from which he bled to death.

The bullet in Jackson’s own chest could not be removed, because it was lodged so close to Jackson’s heart.  The wound never healed properly, his discomfort was considerable.  For many years thereafter, Jackson suffered intense physical pain, on account of a gunfight to restore his reputation.  “I should have hit him,” Jackson said at the time, “if he had shot me through the brain.”

What set Jackson apart was his willpower, which was not ordinary, nothing normal or even natural.  It was superhuman, almost demonic, sheer total, concentrated determination to win and thus achieve his goals, at whatever cost.  Consequently, as the preceding story serves to illustrate, Jackson was capable of extraordinary feats of courage, daring and persevering in the face of incredible odds.  Nothing less than victory was acceptable.  Defeat was unthinkable.  This fierce exercise of will, supported by supreme self-confidence and a healthy measure of talent, shaped his considerable triumphs.

Andrew Jackson’s most distinguishing physical feature was his bright, deep, blue eyes, which could shower sparks when passion seized him.  Anyone could tell his mood by watching his eyes; and when they started to blaze it was a signal to get out of the way quickly.  But they could also register tenderness and sympathy, especially around children, when they generated a warmth and kindness that was most appealing.  Unfortunately, the artist's depiction on the $20 bill offers the ordinary citizen but a tantalizing glimpse.

-Michael D’Angelo

Andrew Jackson vs the Politics of Extortion

“The bank, Mr. Van Buren, is trying to kill me, but I will kill it.”  Andrew Jackson addressed his future vice president very quietly, without any passion or tone of rage.  Nor was it a boast.  Just a simple statement of fact.  …

October 2013 brings the ordinary citizen face to face with yet another economic crisis, this one self-inflicted.  A threatened refusal by Congress to honor obligations already incurred finds the government on the brink of default for the first time in US history.  Former President Reagan has once warned that the failure to act would result in consequences which are “impossible to predict and awesome to contemplate.”  The script is familiar, however muddled the outcome may now appear.

The status quo is born of the larger, desirable idea of a common culture or identity.  Hard earned and built with the blood and sweat of prior generations, the culture evolves deliberately.  It cannot, must not, be casually discarded.  But on uncommon occasion the status quo breaks down, and change becomes necessary.  What happens then?  Does anyone realistically expect that the status quo will not push back?  A comforting fact is that today the ordinary citizen is not alone.  We have faced these demons before.

The nation’s early days featured a period known as the Era of Good Feeling (1816-1824).  It was marked by a rare absence of partisan conflict.  At the same time widespread corruption began to infiltrate and plague many American institutions.  Andrew Jackson saw that period not as an Era of Good Feeling but rather as the Era of Corruption.

No institution at the time was perhaps more corrupt than the Bank of the United States (BUS), which had been the sole, central banking institution in the nation.  The BUS was a banking monopoly, headed by a director who was the subject of a political appointment, not answerable to the electorate.  It was discovered that many Congressmen were on open “retainer” to the BUS, and as such more than eager and willing to do its bidding.

Andrew Jackson had articulated the fundamental doctrine of Jacksonian Democracy long before his election to the presidency in 1828:

The obligation of the government to grant no privilege that aids one class over another, to act as honest broker between classes, and to protect the weak and defenseless against the abuses of the rich and powerful.

President Jackson saw the danger and corruption inherent in the set up of the BUS.  He argued that not only was the BUS corrupt but so was all of Congress for supporting it, among other reasons.  Appealing over the head of Congress directly to the ordinary citizen, Andrew Jackson sought to “kill” the BUS.  In its place he proposed a number of smaller, state “pet” banks to promote competition and fair play.

Not surprisingly, the Congress whose members were financially reliant on the BUS fought bitterly to oppose its demise.  The BUS quickly brought on economic depression which was well within its power, occasioning tremendous hardship upon the ordinary citizen.  At the same time the BUS issued an ultimatum carefully disguised as a media campaign.  It told the ordinary citizen that all President Jackson had to do was abandon his efforts to kill the BUS.  The depression would then lift and things return to “normal.”

The battle became so vicious that the Congress went so far as to publicly censure the president for his actions on the road to the demise of the BUS.  An undeterred Jackson sought to make the issue of whether to re-charter the BUS the central issue of his re-election campaign in 1832.  His advisors said the issue was too hot, too risky, that any action as to the national bank’s continued existence should come after the election.  Jackson ignored them.  He gave the ordinary citizen a clear choice, challenging him to vote either for Jackson or the BUS.

Of course, and as always, the ordinary citizen sustained Jackson, the BUS suffering its ultimate demise in the name of necessary reform.  A thoroughly embarrassed Congress was left with no alternative but to revoke the president’s censure and issue in its place a resolution of public gratitude.

The banking crisis left an enduring moral impression on the national conscience.  It also capped a fascinating period in American history.  According to the Congressional Budget Office, the Jackson administration was the most productive in history in dealing with government debt.  Inheriting a federal debt of $58 Million in 1828, President Jackson reduced it to $33,000 (that’s 33 Thousand dollars) by 1835.  No wonder the BUS hated him.

Returning to the present, it matters little that two national elections with affordable health care as a featured campaign issue have been lost, as efforts to “repeal and replace” similarly failed.  And it matters little that a conservative-leaning US Supreme Court has also reviewed the law and found it to be constitutional.

The present crisis finds an entrenched but failed status quo seeking to destroy the 2010 Affordable Care Act, the Obama administration’s signature legislative achievement, by de-funding it.  The ultimatum is similarly orchestrated.  If the president would only accept delay in implementing the provisions of affordable care, the ordinary citizen is told, everything will be fine.  The approach cannot be appreciably distinguished from the bank robber who instructs the teller: “Put your hands up, do as I say, and nobody will get hurt.”  It's a last ditch effort in death spiral.

In the process of attempted political blackmail, who knows what dark times may yet await the ordinary citizen?  But the similarities to Andrew Jackson's dealings with the BUS are unmistakable, the result to come perhaps no less fundamental.

-Michael D’Angelo

A Congressman's Mystique

What is the motivation that drives political lawmakers?  Is Congress a representative sampling of America’s very best?  Or are other human factors at play?

Some believe that how much we think we know, measured up against how little in reality we actually do know, is the difference between book smart vs. experience smart.  It’s knowing that the lessons learned as a kid on the playground in grade school may be more relevant and important than the high-minded intellectual concepts studied later in professional school.  It’s also the difference between knowing when to talk, and knowing when to shut up and listen.  Others say it’s the difference between amassing knowledge and gaining wisdom.

At some point, the brain logically shifts from consideration of “what is the law” to “why is it the law.”  How many times do we find ourselves uttering the familiar words, “If I only knew then what I know now.”  There is always more to learn.

More and more these days, whether it’s about politics, religion or even the local Little League program, I find myself questioning the motives of the leaders involved.  What do they have to gain, or lose, should a particular policy which is being put forth prevail?  Or whether the institution permits discussion of any changes to its arranged order?  When we’re dealing with human nature, doesn’t it seem that self-interest is typically the proponent’s top priority?  Even (and especially!) if it does not appear to be presented that way?  And is the delivery of the proposal true and unbiased, as Jeffersonian simplicity would demand, or are the familiar forces of physical and psychological manipulation hard at work?

Membership in the US Congress provides an illuminating example.  When I was in grade school, I believed that the 535 individuals who comprise the legislative body charged with the unenviable task of lawmaking (435 from the House of Representatives and 100 from the Senate) were idealists.  They maintained character and integrity first and foremost and stood on a higher intellectual plane.  These lawmakers subordinated their own self-interests, bestowing favor instead upon policies for the benefit of the masses of ordinary citizens.  After all, this was the oath they had taken to public service.  They were distinguished citizens, people we looked up to with great respect and admiration for all that they had accomplished and stood for.  And as for those in the Senate, the more reserved, deliberative body, all the more so.

I continued to believe in this line of thinking for many years, until learning Abraham Lincoln’s views.  Many ordinary citizens are unaware that Lincoln was a member of the House of Representatives in 1846, where he served a brief, two year term, some 15 years before he was elected president.  I was much pleased to learn that Lincoln shared at the outset the same speculations and musings about the character and motivations of the men who filled the seats of Congress, and who he was about to meet, encounter and interact with.

But when he had occupied his own seat, then-Congressman Lincoln's views quickly changed.  He became extremely disappointed, finding members by and large to be “men of mediocre ability and only local reputation.” [1]  This was a huge letdown for Lincoln, the thought striking me also with a dull thud.  Further pondering, however, provoked another sobering question: If that was the makeup of Congress then, could it possibly be any different now, with the threat of another federal government shutdown looming on the near horizon?  Being somewhat familiar with the players, I was pretty confident of the answer.

-Michael D’Angelo

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[1]  Of course, Congress consisted only of men at the time.  Lincoln mentioned one great exception in John Quincy Adams, the former president, who was one of only two former Presidents to do so (Andrew Johnson later served in the US Senate in the post-Civil War era).  According to Lincoln, JQA was “distinguished alike for his rocklike integrity and his implacable hatred of slavery.”  He was elected to the House of Representatives, serving Massachusetts for eight consecutive terms from 1831 until his death in 1848.