On Monday, Nov. 15. President Joe Biden signed into law the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act. This $1.2-trillion bill provides funding to state, county and local governments across the country, on which many federal level elected officials will run in 2022. Meanwhile, state, county and local governments will begin debating how to use these funds that will be allocated to their jurisdictions or asking their residents and constituents how they feel these funds should be spent.
Regardless of what you think about the bill or the Biden administration, the fact that it was passed on a bipartisan basis with Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky joining with his counterpart across the aisle, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer of New York, House Democrats and not an insignificant number of House Republicans, speaks to the fact that American-style democracy can succeed if everyone benefits from legislation, even if it’s a bit selfish.
Republican and Democratic federal officials can return to their constituents cash in hand and help make improvements to roads, bridges, rail lines, infrastructure, water resources, extending internet service, etc., to compete in a 21st-century world.
Meanwhile, officials down the jurisdictional chain can use the funding to improve their communities — and certainly a large number will use the fact they are making improvements with “free” federal funds to bolster their own reelection campaigns [“free” being misleading considering we pay federal taxes].
As self-serving as all this may sound, this is how representative democracy tends to function: Officials elected to office negotiate for use of public monies, make deals and then return to their communities to tout what they accomplished, hoping their voters will send them back again.
For decades, however, American political figures have ignored this, and instead tried to stop “the other side” from legislating. Presidents Bill Clinton and both George Bushes faced opposition not on policy but on partisanship. Republicans in Congress opposed President Barack Obama simply for being Obama, then Democrats opposed President Donald Trump for a whole host of reasons with partisanship certainly being one of them, and now with the Democrats back in the White House, Republicans have taken up the mantle yet again. Rather than being the “loyal opposition,” i.e., the party to press for moderation and compromise but relent when a negotiation satisfies both sides, our parties now oppose on principle, regardless of the facts, just to prevent the majority from scoring a win.
The success of the infrastructure bill stands in stark opposition to Biden’s Build Back Better Act which is effectively partisan on its face. Republicans are simply not involved in the conversation, but in Democrats’ defense, it doesn’t seem like any of them want to be anyway, lest they be labeled as “traitors” by colleagues on the far right.
But the act is certainly not an anomaly. Under presidents Trump, Obama, the Bushes and Clinton, the opposition party fought against legislative action simply to prevent the president or party in power from achieving a win, whatever it might be and whoever American might benefit.
The founding fathers wanted a robust debate and disagreement before achieving a compromise, but the “compromise” point was the key: It was a feature not a bug. Republicans or Democrats are so cowardly that they think acknowledging the other side might have a good legislative idea means that they will then get crushed the next election.
The truth is: Bad candidates lose, regardless of the good bills they pass.
We can dream of a world where partisanship is not existent and party affiliation is outlawed but until then, we should encourage our elected leaders to work down the middle for compromise to benefit us all.
Americans are moderate by nature and when our elections are decided by a 52-48 margin, we shouldn’t expect our elected leaders to govern from the far right or far left, but rather as near to the middle and near to the electorate as possible. That’s what could get them elected over and over rather than simply appealing to the “base” on the fringes.
We encourage more moderate officials, more bipartisan legislation, more working across the aisle and more bills that both sides can sell at election time as a win for the American people. We must make our politicians earn their reelections through compromise and accomplishment not rhetoric and bluster.
Christopher Fox Graham
Managing Editor
