TO THE EDITOR:
Watching Capitol Hill these days, I’m often struck by how issues that were present at the dawn of our republic continue to reverberate. In the very first session of Congress, when members had to grapple with how to make the new government work, they also had to come to grips with how they themselves could work together.
They came from different regions, with different concerns and sensibilities. They had their own, deeply rooted personal beliefs. Yet, wrote historian Robert Remini, “cooperation and harmony…[were] essential in the beginning. The members knew it, and therefore worked together to provide a proper start to this ‘new experiment in freedom.’” Politicians who knew how to compromise, in other words, were vital to the survival of our young democracy.
They’re no less important today, though you wouldn’t guess it if you’ve been paying attention to this year’s campaigns. Politicians running for office don’t talk about compromise much — except to sneer at it. They know that voters like decisive statements about principle.
Yet there is a vast difference between campaigning and governing. While they’re campaigning, politicians want to “fire up the base” and present as stark a difference as possible with their opponents. But once you’re in office and actually have to legislate, scorched-earth tactics just alienate the people you have to work with.
This is not to say that standing on principle is wrong. Sometimes it is the appropriate and proper stance for a politician to take. But let’s be clear: taking that position has consequences. If all politicians were to decide to stick to their views no matter what and never compromise, it would create gridlock.
The most important political skill in the country today is the ability to seek and find a consensus about ways to remedy the problems facing us — and to convince both one’s political opponents and one’s allies that it’s the proper way to move forward.
We need to give our politicians room to be politicians, not standard-bearers. This requires a more sophisticated understanding of the role of compromise than the partisan commentators and activists who help shape our political debate would like to see. But without it, our government won’t work. It’s as simple as that.
Lee Hamilton
Former congressman, IN
