I finished reading Coolidge by Amity Shlaes today. It wasn't an exciting read but that was no surprise. What struck me was the view into a time before our government grew out of control.
There was a budget. That budget had a surplus and the surplus was used to pay off the debt incurred during WWI.
The last time in recent history that Congress passed all 12 appropriation bills was 2006. The Congress is a disgrace, shoveling out bills with thousands of pages and giving the lawmakers a couple days to read and debate before voting.
Coolidge's Cabinet had only ten members. Coolidge clearly saw the distinction between what was appropriate for Federal government and what belonged to State government.
The current president's cabinet has 23 members. It appears that most every state has a department for agriculture, a department for education, a function for environmental protection and so on. So why do we need a Federal department for functions that are covered at the State level? Is it just easier for all the lobbyists to show up in one place rather than going to 50 state capitols to make their case? Making things easier for lobbyists is kind of like making it easier for a salesman to take your money.
Coolidge, while governor of Massachusetts, faced a police strike in Boston. The police thought they had the governor and the mayor backed into a corner. The police got fired. The Massachusetts National Guard filled in for a while. The striking police did not get their jobs back; they were replaced with new recruits.
Does that sound a little like Reagan with the air traffic controllers strike? Now we have teachers unions that won't even let our children go back to school. Our politicians, who take contributions from those unions, wring their hands and just let it go on.
Coolidge had something seldom found today among politicians: solid principles and moral integrity. He didn't use a lot of words. You don't need a lot of words to tell the truth.
