David M. Tucker. Mugwumps: Public Moralists of The Gilded Age. Columbia, Mo.: University of Missouri Press, 1998. 139 pp.
David M. Tucker's Mugwumps: Public Moralists of the Gilded Age is an excellent overview of the Mugwumps. It is sympathetic to its subject, unlike others who have written about the Mugwumps. Phrases like "Old Right" abound in the post-war libertarian literature, but the image often is vague. Tucker's book shows that the 19th century classical liberals, known as independent Republicans, were former abolitionists, not bigots in any sense of the word (the few that turned out to be, such as Henry Adams ceased to be considered Mugwumps and became associated with Populism), and were very conscious of their libertarian ideology, their commitment to Adam Smith, the Manchester liberals and John Stuart Mill, with whom several corresponded. The Mugwumps were:
-A small movement, no larger than today's Libertarian Party as a percentage of the voting public, and probably smaller
-sharply differentiated from the two major parties in terms of their commitment to liberal or libertarian ideas, specifically tariff reduction (which the Democrats tended to support and the Republicans tended to oppose); hard money and the gold standard (which neither party really supported); and opposition to imperialism
-support for the newly formed (under the Pendleton Act) federal civil service, which they thought would end corruption in government and reduce the opportunity for spoils, which led the public to support corrupt government (in other words, they wanted to end special interest capture of government)
The book is very well written (although at times there could have been slightly better transitioning and linkage of ideas) and of serious interest to libertarians, conservatives, and those with an interest in the decline of morals in business and government.
Although the Mugwumps were the first post-industrial libertarian movement, they also were at the root of today's progressive-liberalism, as Richard Hofstadter has pointed out. The effectiveness of their tactics, the use of social control and groupthink to effectuate a uniform party platform, served as a model to the next generation's emphasis on big government, imperialism and state intervention in the economy. Most of all, Mugwumps pioneered the use of groupthink as a political tactic. This has been copied not only by the progressive-liberals but also by today's Libertarian Party, which borrows the Mugwumps' appellation for the Republican Party, "the party of principle".
Tucker's perspective on the Mugwumps is sharply from John R. Dobson's Politics in the Gilded Age which I blog here. Tucker has more respect for the Mugwumps.
David Riesmann has argued that in the twentieth century Americans turned from a 19th century inner directedness that involves a goal and future orientation to an other directedness that involves a focus on peers, influence from popular media, fashion and interpersonal relationships at work. But the tension between these two impulses was already evident in the 1870s.
Several of the Mugwumps, such as Theodore Roosevelt and Henry Cabot Lodge, sacrificed their Mugwump ideals for conformity to the Republicans' political demands. They refused to join the other Mugwumps in exiting the Republican Party in 1884. Both Roosevelt and Lodge had much more successful political careers than the other Mugwumps because they put politics over principle, and they did so by adopt the other-directed progressive-liberal ideas of the early twentieth century. Theodore Roosevelt may be thought of as the first other-directed American.
A few of the Mugwumps, such as Henry Adams, who rejected Mugwumpery in favor of anti-Semitism, Populism and free silver (Tucker suggests that the Adamses' exit from Mugwumpery was related to their failure in real estate speculation in Spokane and Kansas City and their hope for a silver inflation). Henry Adams became a Populist who blamed Jewish bankers for his business failings.
The most effective Mugwumps were those who played off the two-party system, favoring one or the other party depending on who was following the most libertarian course. They became famous for this in 1884, when they contributed to the defeat of James G. Blaine in favor of Grover Cleveland, who was a largely libertarian president.
The Mugwumps ran only two independent candidates in their roughly 35-year history: Horace Greeley of the Liberal Republicans in 1872 and John M. Palmer of the National Democrats in 1895. Neither fared well. There is a lesson for the Libertarian Party here. The LP would function more effectively as an election spoiler than as an independent political party.
The Mugwumps (or Independent Republicans) were mostly upper class northeasterners, mainly from New England and New York. They tended to have been educated in religious, Protestant schools and to have had a strong moral sense. Many were former abolitionists. They were not religious themselves, but their grounding and education was. They were concerned with the decay of morals in American politics, and were inclined to foresake personal gain and office on behalf of their ideals, which did not match their economic interests. In other words, many of them benefited from paper money and inflation, but they opposed it on moral grounds, and the same is true of tariffs. Many left wing historians, who lack grounding in economics and ethics, look for class or personal motives in the Mugwumps' position. Ironically, support for inflation, free silver, greenbacks and Keynesian economics is very much the position that favors the upper class, banking interests, Wall Street, hedge fund billionaires, large coroporations and corporate executvies. It was Theodore Roosevelt who benefited from his cynical adoption of progressive-liberalism, the ideology of the American upper class from 1900 to 2007. EL Godkin, Carl Schurz, Horace White and the other Mugwumps paid dearly for their idealistic commitment to morality in politics. The fact that historians have often treated them shabbily suggests shabbines in academia more than anything else.
The Independent Republicans had one advantage over today's libertarians and conservatives: the intellectual support of mainstream universities. Relatively few Americans were capable of thinking through monetary issues even in the 1870s. Today, probably even a smaller percentage of the population is willing to expend the effort to do so. However, when the Mugwumps could say that their ideas had the backing of Harvard economists, the public was much more likely to defer. In this sense, they provided a role model to today's progressive-liberals, who dominate our society through their control of higher education. This intrigues me because it suggests a tighter link between the ideology of higher education, economic interests and what Howard S. Katz calls "the paper aristocracy" than I used to think.
The Mugwumps had limited data on which to base their arguments, and they fell into a number of errors. The most grievous Mugwumps fell were their support for the establishment of the Federal Reserve Bank and their belief that the civil service would end special interest politics and government corruption. Their emphasis on the Fed came from three factors: (1) they believed that the Fed would be constrained by the gold standard, which Roosevelt abolished in the 1930s; (2) they believed that separating money from politics would reduce the temptation to inflate (they overrated the institutional separation of the Fed from Congress; (3) they did not anticipate Keynesian economics, which provided an ideological rationale for the inflationist view which (not to blame them, who could would have known?).
Their notions of morality led to their belief in free trade, the gold standard and honest government, notably via civil service reform. Their advocacy of sound money and free trade, which they explicitly linked to the elimination of special privilege, favoritism for the rich (the debtor class, according to their arguments, being the chief beneficiaries of paper money, then as now) was explicitly rooted in their moral sense. They saw individual achievement, self sufficiency and hard work as moral principles that protectionism and paper money would debase.
Then as now there were powerful forces arrayed against moralist and hard money positions. There was strong western agitation for greenbacks and then silver inflation by landowners (much as the subprime crisis today has been a strong motivation of reallocation of wealth to wealthy investment bankers and landowners), and politicians were inclined to support the demands for inflation. In fact, there were several greenback and free silver bills passed, that Mugwump agitation was able to stop, and some that the Mugwumps could not stop.
The Mugwumps saw the debate as one involving moral principle against personal gain. Those who favored personal gain over morals joined the regular party ranks. Theodore Roosevelt and Henry Cabot Lodge, are cited as two examples of reformers who chose to emphasize their careers as opposed to their morals. When James G. B
Gain in democracatic politics is linked to popular appeal. Hence other directedness results from focus on public opinion. However, the advances in American society came not from the political but from the creative, scientific, engineering and management fields, which do not depend on public opinion. Theodore Roosevelt was among the first other-directed, twentieth century men. In choosing personal gain and political advantage over moral belief, he set the stage for the progressive-liberalism of the twentieth century, its moral vacuity and the economic decline that will result from focus on relationships and opinion rather than achievement.
Tuesday, January 15, 2008
Monday, January 14, 2008
Opiate of the Masses
Merv of PrairiePundit posts Mark Steyn's article about capitalism and change (thanks to Larwyn). He notes that whereas the presidential candidates say that they favor change:
"it's capitalism that's the real "agent of change. Politicians, on the whole, prefer stasis, at least on everything for which they already have responsibility. ts."
But the change thatReInflateoCrat politicians advocate is not make believe. Politicians do create change. Progressive-liberal or political change is reactionary and exploitative. The name "progressive-liberal" refers not to progress or liberalization for the public, rather progress and liberalization for its privileged beneficiaries: lawyers, big business, academics and hedge fund managers.
In aiming to "deconstruct" American values, progressive-liberals aim to supplant them with values that serve their ends. Progressive liberals aim not only to staunch general progress and technological advance, which threatens established economic interests, but to intensify income inequality; shore up inept businesses; protect inefficient health care; make the poor poorer; and make the rich richer. All of this is done in the name of making the economy more efficient; reducing income inequality; providing general health care; and helping the poor. Progressive-liberalism is a vicious philosophy.
Universities have played a critical role in reinforcing exploitative political change . In the 1970s Milovan Djilas argued that communism and left wing ideology served the interests of a new class of journalists and intellectuals.
In America, political use of intellectuals to advocate and support economic exploitation of the poor takes on a specific pattern. American academics argue for cultural change that reinforces their power. They attack religious institutions and traditional values, and argue for a pattern based on groupthink, the "liberal Borg", whereby the New York Times sets an agenda which progressive-liberal cult members mindlessly follow. The progressive-liberal groupthink mentality is a social control process that serves specific economic interests. The new class, academics and journalists, is paid for this pattern with academic jobs, funding and the like.
The effect of the academics' purposed cultural domination and hegemony is to distract the public from state violence and exploitation. The public is made poorer by inflationary policies of the Federal Reserve Bank, while the media advises them that inflation is low. The dollar is artificially propped up and some jobs leave the country, and the media tells the public that free trade is to blame. There is massive waste in government, and the public is told that taxes are too low.
All the while, academia distracts from its exploitative purposes by raising crank political issues: terrorism is justice; defending America is imperialism; crime is justice; taxation creates wealth; free trade makes us poorer, and so on.
The Republicans have been too often part of this process. Republicans, such as Theodore Roosevelt, supported progressive-liberalism. This element never left the Republican Party. In those days, the Democrats were free traders and the Republicans supported exploitative tariffs. Support for hard money was a minority voice in both parties. It was not until 1896 that the Republicans became the hard money party.
It is primarily because of capture of academia that the progressive-liberals have been triumphant in the last century. Now that their ideas have been discredited, it is even more crucial to them to retain control of academia. Without the reinforcement of academic propaganda, it will be difficult for the progressive-liberals to appear to be anything other than what they are: the ideologists of corruption, narrow special interest and economic decline.
Conservatives need to state their case. The Republican Party is not necessarily a conservative or moderate conservative party. It has been a corrupt or progressive-liberal party for much of its history. Conservatives must ponder the way forward.
"it's capitalism that's the real "agent of change. Politicians, on the whole, prefer stasis, at least on everything for which they already have responsibility. ts."
But the change thatReInflateoCrat politicians advocate is not make believe. Politicians do create change. Progressive-liberal or political change is reactionary and exploitative. The name "progressive-liberal" refers not to progress or liberalization for the public, rather progress and liberalization for its privileged beneficiaries: lawyers, big business, academics and hedge fund managers.
In aiming to "deconstruct" American values, progressive-liberals aim to supplant them with values that serve their ends. Progressive liberals aim not only to staunch general progress and technological advance, which threatens established economic interests, but to intensify income inequality; shore up inept businesses; protect inefficient health care; make the poor poorer; and make the rich richer. All of this is done in the name of making the economy more efficient; reducing income inequality; providing general health care; and helping the poor. Progressive-liberalism is a vicious philosophy.
Universities have played a critical role in reinforcing exploitative political change . In the 1970s Milovan Djilas argued that communism and left wing ideology served the interests of a new class of journalists and intellectuals.
In America, political use of intellectuals to advocate and support economic exploitation of the poor takes on a specific pattern. American academics argue for cultural change that reinforces their power. They attack religious institutions and traditional values, and argue for a pattern based on groupthink, the "liberal Borg", whereby the New York Times sets an agenda which progressive-liberal cult members mindlessly follow. The progressive-liberal groupthink mentality is a social control process that serves specific economic interests. The new class, academics and journalists, is paid for this pattern with academic jobs, funding and the like.
The effect of the academics' purposed cultural domination and hegemony is to distract the public from state violence and exploitation. The public is made poorer by inflationary policies of the Federal Reserve Bank, while the media advises them that inflation is low. The dollar is artificially propped up and some jobs leave the country, and the media tells the public that free trade is to blame. There is massive waste in government, and the public is told that taxes are too low.
All the while, academia distracts from its exploitative purposes by raising crank political issues: terrorism is justice; defending America is imperialism; crime is justice; taxation creates wealth; free trade makes us poorer, and so on.
The Republicans have been too often part of this process. Republicans, such as Theodore Roosevelt, supported progressive-liberalism. This element never left the Republican Party. In those days, the Democrats were free traders and the Republicans supported exploitative tariffs. Support for hard money was a minority voice in both parties. It was not until 1896 that the Republicans became the hard money party.
It is primarily because of capture of academia that the progressive-liberals have been triumphant in the last century. Now that their ideas have been discredited, it is even more crucial to them to retain control of academia. Without the reinforcement of academic propaganda, it will be difficult for the progressive-liberals to appear to be anything other than what they are: the ideologists of corruption, narrow special interest and economic decline.
Conservatives need to state their case. The Republican Party is not necessarily a conservative or moderate conservative party. It has been a corrupt or progressive-liberal party for much of its history. Conservatives must ponder the way forward.
Milton Friedman and the Federal Reserve Bank
I will ask my business seminar course to read Milton Friedman's 1962 Capitalism and Freedom, which was re-published in a 2002 40th anniversary edition. I was just re-reading it and cannot praise it highly enough. On page 44 Friedman writes:
"It is instructive to compare experience as a whole before and after (the Fed's) establishment--say from just after the Civil War to 1914 and from 1914 to date,to take two periods of roughly equal length.
"The second period was clearly the more unstable economically, whether instability is measured by the fluctuations in the stock of money, in prices, or in outputs...(E)ven if the war and immediate postwar years are omitted, and we consider only the peacetime years from, say, 1920 through 1939 and 1947 to date, the result is the same. The stock of money, prices and output was decidedly more unstable after the establishment of the Reserve System than before...
"...the crude comparison should at least give the reader pause before he takes for granted, as is so often done, that an agency as long established, as powerful, as pervasive as the Federal Reserve System is performing a necessary and desirable fundtion and is contributing to the attainment of the objective for which it was established."
Things have recently become worse than they've been in a long time. Perhaps it is time to abolish the Fed. Since the Democrats are asking for change, and an elimination of the Fed's disruptive inflationary cycles would certainly constitute change, this is the year to do it.
"It is instructive to compare experience as a whole before and after (the Fed's) establishment--say from just after the Civil War to 1914 and from 1914 to date,to take two periods of roughly equal length.
"The second period was clearly the more unstable economically, whether instability is measured by the fluctuations in the stock of money, in prices, or in outputs...(E)ven if the war and immediate postwar years are omitted, and we consider only the peacetime years from, say, 1920 through 1939 and 1947 to date, the result is the same. The stock of money, prices and output was decidedly more unstable after the establishment of the Reserve System than before...
"...the crude comparison should at least give the reader pause before he takes for granted, as is so often done, that an agency as long established, as powerful, as pervasive as the Federal Reserve System is performing a necessary and desirable fundtion and is contributing to the attainment of the objective for which it was established."
Things have recently become worse than they've been in a long time. Perhaps it is time to abolish the Fed. Since the Democrats are asking for change, and an elimination of the Fed's disruptive inflationary cycles would certainly constitute change, this is the year to do it.
Sunday, January 13, 2008
The Origins of Progressive Liberalism
The modern progressive-liberal movement may be said to have its earliest origins in the presidential campaign of 1884 when the Independent Republicans or Mugwumps (named after the word for young Algonquin Indian chieftain) bolted the Republican Party to fight the candidacy of James G. Blaine (R-ME), whom they associated with corruption and feared would scotch the Pendleton Act that had recently established the federal civil service. Instead of Blaine, whom they hated, they supported Grover Cleveland (D-NY). Theodore Roosevelt was linked to the Independent Republicans as was Harvard University's president, Charles Eliot, the New York Times, the Nation, the New York Evening Post, and Harper's Weekly. John M. Dobson* writes of the Mugwumps, the progressive-liberals' precursors:
"In their energetic promotion of Cleveland and their unstinting criticism of Blaine, the Mugwump journalists sometimes exceeded the bounds of objectivity. If they avoided telling outright lies, they were guilty at least of telling only part of the truth. Seldom content with straightforward statements of fact, the Mugwumps interpreted and twisted their stories to suit themselves. Editorializing about Blaine in late September, for example, the New York Times stated, 'There is no speculation which he can resist, but, rich as he is, he has never earned money by any business or profession...' Blaine did initiate a libel suit against and Indianapolis Democratic newspaper...But many Americans considered it somewhat unsportsmanlike to go that far..."
Mugwumpery may be viewed as the roots of liberalism not because the Mugwumps' ideas were like the twentieth century's progressive-liberals' (they were more like today's conservatives') but rather because their approach to ad hoc adoption of a singular idea, intense social pressure to conform to politically correct doctrine and the use of the media to create social conformity to their ideology is very much the technique that the progressive-liberals adopted in the early twentieth century and continue to use today.
*John M. Dobson, Politics in the Gilded Age: A New Perspective On Reform. New York: Praeger Publishers, 1972. p. 141.
"In their energetic promotion of Cleveland and their unstinting criticism of Blaine, the Mugwump journalists sometimes exceeded the bounds of objectivity. If they avoided telling outright lies, they were guilty at least of telling only part of the truth. Seldom content with straightforward statements of fact, the Mugwumps interpreted and twisted their stories to suit themselves. Editorializing about Blaine in late September, for example, the New York Times stated, 'There is no speculation which he can resist, but, rich as he is, he has never earned money by any business or profession...' Blaine did initiate a libel suit against and Indianapolis Democratic newspaper...But many Americans considered it somewhat unsportsmanlike to go that far..."
Mugwumpery may be viewed as the roots of liberalism not because the Mugwumps' ideas were like the twentieth century's progressive-liberals' (they were more like today's conservatives') but rather because their approach to ad hoc adoption of a singular idea, intense social pressure to conform to politically correct doctrine and the use of the media to create social conformity to their ideology is very much the technique that the progressive-liberals adopted in the early twentieth century and continue to use today.
*John M. Dobson, Politics in the Gilded Age: A New Perspective On Reform. New York: Praeger Publishers, 1972. p. 141.
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