By Gene Daughtry
You've heard the old saying, "Those who forget history are doomed to repeat it." And "history repeats itself." Many of us know from recent history - say, the last 150 years - the actions of government have repeated several times. Around the turn of the last century, we had progressives that greatly expanded government.
The era around 1911 to about 1920 has become historically destructive for America. We had the creation of the FED, forced segregation, prohibition, income tax, the direct election of senators and many judicial changes. You add progressive union power and new regulatory bodies like the ICC, FTC and FDA and you have huge government expansions with some good intentions that have become overshadowed by waste, fraud and overbearing regulations today.
That era of government expansion and regulation forced a severe recession pre-1920 that was corrected in the mid-20s under Calvin Coolidge (remember the roaring '20s?). Coolidge shrank the size of government almost 60 percent, removed many burdensome regulations and reduced taxes which allowed a free market to flourish. When Coolidge left office, the government again began making changes to regulate industry and banking.
Our economy crashed repeatedly in 1929, '30, '31 and '32. Those years were presided over by a Republican, but Herbert Hoover was a self-described progressive who felt as many progressives do that everything can be managed with a public-private type approach. In 1933 Franklin Delano Roosevelt, a true progressive, stepped in and, using the crisis of the day, created some of the "social safety net" programs that are central to our current debt and put more emphasis on the government handling of the economy. Until a more conservative government took hold in the '50s, America languished in a long recessed era with little growth or prosperity.
The downward cycle began to repeat again in the late '60s. America became mired in liberal policies, new bureaucracies and more entitlements, which burdened the economy into the early '80s, when Ronald Reagan was elected. Regulations and government were cut down in size and an economic boom which lasted through the '90s, until 2006, began. By 2006, Congress once more became controlled by liberals and progressives, and America continues to struggle today to get out of our latest recession.
The Romans had a government similar to ours in the time before Christ. During those decades, prosperity of the people was slowly eroded so power and wealth could be in the hands of the leaders. Their Senate, over time, became powerless but was kept in place to maintain the appearance of control by the people. As the end of the empire neared, there was the introduction of Bread and Circuses that later became known as Cake and Circuses where the leaders knew to feed and entertain the people to distract and quell rebellion. Sounds very similar to today. With czars making policy, 47 million Americans on food stamps and distractions like Rep. Anthony Weiner, our government is doing as the Romans.
In the book of 2 Timothy, Chapter 3, it says, "But realize this, that in the last days difficult times will come. For men will be lovers of self, lovers of money, boastful, arrogant, revilers, disobedient to parents, ungrateful, unholy, unloving, irreconcilable, malicious gossips, without self-control, brutal, haters of good, treacherous, reckless, conceited, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God, holding to a form of godliness, although they have denied its power; avoid such men as these. For among them are those who enter into households and captivate weak women weighed down with sins, led on by various impulses, always learning and never able to come to the knowledge of the truth."
Seems no matter how things change, they always stay the same.
Gene Daughtry is chairman of the Pope County Republican Party.