DEVELOPMENTAL CONCERNS

 

[Note:  From time to time, this blog issues a set of postings that summarize what the blog has been emphasizing in its previous postings.  Of late, the blog has been looking at various obstacles civics educators face in teaching their subject.  It’s time to post a series of such summary accounts.  The advantage of such summaries is to introduce new readers to the blog and to provide a different context by which to review the blog’s various claims and arguments.  This and upcoming summary postings will be preceded by this message.]

Elsewhere, this writer has reviewed a view of America’s past and makes the claim the nation, through most of its history, has held federalism as its dominant view of governance and politics.[1]  But it is the contention of this writer that since World War II, the nation has looked, most predominately, to the natural rights construct for that guidance. 

That occurred after the political culture was subjected to a sort of competition between the two constructs in which federalism through the years lost influence and natural rights gained influence – natural rights finally won dominance in the years after World War II and that dominance has grown in the subsequent years.

          An additional word concerning that competition should be added:  that is, that competition highlighted the vying values between representative democracy – majority rule – and the protection of individual rights.  Through the years, those who were put in charge of making the relevant policy decisions were, to varying degrees, affected by this tension.  They continuously asked:  should policy reflect what the majority, through legislative representation, wishes or should the concern over individual rights be a significant check on what legislative bodies can do?

          Prior to the twentieth century, one can say the bias was toward legislative discretion and even with the ratification of the Fourteenth Amendment that bias still held sway.[2]  But once the century turned, starting roughly with the case, Lochner v. New York,[3] 1905, concerning business interests and property rights, the courts began to tilt the scale of justice toward individual rights.  And then came the Warren Court (1953-1969) that blew open the concern for individual rights over majority rule in many areas of jurisprudence.

          Those areas included criminal defendant rights, civil rights (especially those concerning race and gender), cultural expressions, and others.  Of particular note, were issues relating to exclusionary legislation that aimed at depriving individuals and groups from equal access to opportunities and benefits.  And this was, to those favoring the turn, a positive aspect of the natural rights view. 

This writer also welcomes that turn since he judges the many aspects of parochial/traditional federalism, the version that was dominant before World War II, was ironically not as federalist in many important aspects as its basic beliefs would indicate.  That included its definition of who was entitled to be included. 

In the history of the nation, more various European nationalities – not always smoothly – were included in the partnership.  But what seemed to be the limits to such inclusion were the prejudicial beliefs and attitudes toward nonwhite people.  Predominately, the antagonism was aimed at groups of African, Asian, and people of indigenous groups background.  Race was, and still is to a meaningful degree, the bugaboo of American history.

          But can one have a truer version of federalism, one that does not depend on nationalities, race, or other arbitrary limitations?  That would be a federalism that counts on individuals taking on a partnership role that was established by the nation’s and the various states’ constitutions.  This writer believes one can and that version of federalism can be called liberated federalism.  It adopts the basic notion of “foedus” (the Latin term from which “federalism” is derived) or being leagued with fellow citizens through its founding compact, the US Constitution.[4] 

Or stated more commonly, agreeing to being in a sacred partnership.  And under that association, one can consider the natural rights’ judgement that government interference (with its authoritative power) tends to be immoral, seems foreign.  Yes, even a federated government, in structure and process, might be abusive, and it would not be acceptable if it abuses federalist values – one being the dignity of each individual making up the partnership.

But if the legislature does not abuse that and the other federalist values, it has a legitimate role in advancing the common good which along with federal liberty, includes efforts to establishing and maintaining a regulated equality.[5]  A current viable example of this debate or tension is the nation’s efforts to meet the challenge of providing medical care for all citizens. 

And these tensions are played out in schools as well as in any social arrangement dotting the American scene; but it should be formally addressed in the nation’s civics classrooms.  It – majority rule vs. individual rights – should garner an extensive look in civics lesson as those classes shift their concerns to the nation’s political culture.  Those lessons should definitely focus on the relevant contributions that political science provides – how that relevant academic field sees the above issues. 

And that is where this blog will take up this topic in the next posting, but one more word before closing this one.  One should remember that the goals of political scientists do not include making the job of civics teachers any easier.  Their aim is to advance political knowledge, not to teach it to secondary students.

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[1] That would be previous postings but instead of listing a set of those postings, the reader can get a sufficient overview from Robert Gutierrez, Toward a Federated Nation:  Implementing National Civics Standards (Tallahassee, FL:  Gravitas/Civics Books, 2020) AND, more formally, Daniel J. Elazar, American Federalism: A View from the States, (New York, NY: Thomas Y. Crowell, 1966) AND Daniel J. Elazar, Exploring Federalism (Tuscaloosa, AL:  The University of Alabama Press, 1987).

[2] Even after the Civil War and the ratification of the Fourteenth Amendment, the Slaughterhouse decisions upheld local ordinances that protected New Orleans’ establishment of a slaughterhouse monopoly at the expense of competing butchers.  This case illustrates the bias toward representative, law-making bodies over the interests of individual citizens.  One can interpret that bias as one reflecting a more federalist view.

[3] “Lochner v. New York, 198 U.S. 45 (1905),” Justia, US Supreme Court, 198, n.d, accessed September 21, 2020, https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/198/45/ .

[4] Admittedly, this writer is simplifying things a bit.  The initial segregation against “foreign” elements entering the partnership reflected the fact that federal leaguing first gained favor as it grew from religious practices among Protestant, Puritanical, congregational practices.  They formed their church-based communities through the utilization of covenants.  This tradition was established early – through the Mayflower Compact, 1620 – and they, the agreements, would commonly claim allegiance to the British crown and as such, were exclusionary by design.  For a more nuance overview of this process, see Donald S. Lutz, “Introductory Essay,” Colonial Origins of the American Constitution:  A Documentary History, edited by Donald S. Lutz (Indianapolis, IN:  Liberty Fund, 1998), xx-xl.

[5] Regulated as exemplified by laws establishing a minimum wage or minimum health care.