Politics is the second oldest profession, as the saying goes. After prostitution. In both cases, it is a matter of wasting a sacred honor.
A more family-friendly term would be flip-flopper or bootlicker. If you prefer a cheap word, sycophant will do.
We have seen several stunning examples of this in recent years. The pressure to be popular and get re-elected, as well as the pressure from voting groups, are simply too much for many. Add to this today the cable opinion channels and social media that constantly bombard congressional offices and put pressure on them to behave in a certain way. For the faint of heart and those who put ambition above principles and convictions, core beliefs often melt away.
My friend, former U.S. Senator Alan Simpson, a Republican from Wyoming, once said, “In politics, there are no right answers, only a continuous stream of compromises between groups that result in a series of ever-changing, unclear, and ambiguous public choices – where appetite and ambition openly compete with knowledge and wisdom.”
During my time in Congress, if voters were unhappy with a controversial vote or a position I took, they had to sit down, write a letter, usually handwritten, put it in an envelope, address it, stamp it, and mail it. Newspapers and broadcast media only carried straight news. There were no opinion outlets or social media to fuel the constant tsunami, riling up the voting base with apocalyptic predictions should the other side win on a particular issue.
I knew I was elected to represent my constituents and that my rhetoric and votes should reflect that. I also had deep convictions that were non-negotiable. I came under particular criticism on several issues, including the impeachment of President Richard Nixon, the Trinity River Barge Canal initiative, the Equal Rights Amendment, other women’s rights issues, and a gay rights bill that I supported.
I tried to remember the wisdom of British parliamentarian Edmund Burke, who spoke about what voters can expect from their representatives: “Your representative owes you not only his industry, but his judgment. And if he sacrifices it to your opinion, he betrays you instead of serving you.”
John F. Kennedy wrote in the US Senate Profiles in Couragea collection of the stories of eight senators throughout American history who defied the pressure of a popular vote and remained true to their conscience, even when it sometimes cost them their seats.
“In whatever walk of life one may face the challenge of courage, whatever sacrifices may be made in following one’s conscience – the loss of one’s friends, one’s fortune, one’s contentment, even the esteem of one’s fellow men – each man must decide for himself which path he will pursue,” Kennedy wrote.
Fortunately, despite the dizzying sycophancy of many politicians in recent times, there are public officials who have had the courage to stand by their convictions and risk their careers for a greater cause, including the defense of the U.S. Constitution. There are excellent examples on both the political right and the political left.
Former Vice President Mike Pence is a staunch conservative and so loyal to former President Donald Trump that he became known to some as Bobble Head Mike. Yet in a moment of truth that few will ever experience, including a threat to his own life, he stood the test and remained loyal to the U.S. Constitution by refusing to accept the 2020 election results. For this, he was rewarded with ridicule and banned from this year’s ballot.
Conservative Republican Congresswoman Liz Cheney, who served as co-chair of the January 6 Law and Order Committee, lost both her seat in Congress and her position as chair of the House Republican Conference.
Another conservative Republican and member of the January 6 committee, Adam Kinzinger of Illinois, a lieutenant colonel in the U.S. military and veteran of the Iraq and Afghanistan wars, is no longer in public service.
On the Democratic side, U.S. Senator Joe Manchin of West Virginia broke the party line and opposed several measures by President Joe Biden and his own Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer. He has also decided that the world’s second oldest profession is not for him.
Arizona Senator Kyrsten Sinema’s break with her party over principles she believed to be correct also became so problematic in her home state that she decided not to run for re-election.
And then there’s Bernie Sanders, a democratic socialist and two-time presidential candidate who never came anywhere close to winning the Democratic Party nomination, yet he never wavered when it came to making his beliefs clear.
The list of those whose appetites and ambitions have “trumped” (pun intended) their previously stated beliefs is long. Few are better than JD Vance, who is now running against a man he once called “America’s Hitler” and who is guilty of “serial sexual harassment.”
At the recent Republican convention, a number of former Trump critics bowed down and paid their respects: Nikki Haley, Ron DeSantis, Ted Cruz and Elise Stefanik. They were all fierce critics of Trump, but apparently not if they could lose power or money.
In the 1850s, there was a political party called the Know Nothing Party. A famine in Ireland had sparked a mass migration of poor, uneducated, Catholic immigrants to America. The Know Nothing Party was an anti-immigrant and anti-Catholic backlash, an ugly prelude to today’s politics.
Given the demographic makeup of a country still in its infancy and finding its way, the Know Nothings can be treated with a little more leniency than the xenophobic wing of today’s Republican Party. Know Betters is an appropriate and apt term for this group, most of whom have elite educations.
Opportunism has always been a feature of the democratic process in both parties. Yet it is hard to find a time in American history that comes anywhere close to this one.
I remain optimistic and inspired by a Republican Party that passed its test during the Watergate era, when six of my colleagues on the House Judiciary Committee voted for the three articles of impeachment to remove Nixon from office. The release of the Watergate tapes provided the proverbial proof. I, along with many other members, spent twenty hours with headphones on, listening to the entire 18-month cover-up. There was no avoiding the fact that “high crimes and misdemeanors” had been committed. There is no avoiding it today, and yet some of our best and brightest minds manage to try.
The final lines of Profiles with courage teach us: “The stories of past courage … can teach, they can give hope, they can offer inspiration. But they cannot provide courage themselves. For that, each person must look into his own soul.”
One wonders: What do some of our elected politicians see when they look into their souls?
Alan W. Steelman is a former Republican member of Congress who represented Texas’s 5th district from 1973 to 1977.
As part of our opinion series “The American Middle,” this essay underscores the importance of putting integrity over partisanship.
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