What Role do We Want Government to Play in Our Lives?

If you listen to the discourse over the role of government should play in our lives during the past election cycles, one might think it is a new issue. It is not.

The issue of the role of government in our day-to-day lives goes back to the earliest days of our republic. It is one of the main causes of the American Revolution. Our Founding Fathers did not want the British Parliament to pass laws affecting their lives without their say in their raison d’être.

This carried forward into the debates our Founding Fathers had in the Continental Congress after we gained independence. The role of government in the life of U.S. citizens was front and center during the discussions held during the Constitutional Convention.

After the war, two political parties emerged – the Federalists and the Democratic-Republicans – and each had opposing views on the role of government. For the record, the Democratic Republicans became the Democratic Party in 1824. Their opponents, the Federalists closed up shop in 1835, although as a force in American politics, they were done by 1812 when Monroe was elected.

Founded by Thomas Jefferson and James Madison, the Democratic-Republicans wanted the power of the Federal government to be limited to just interstate commerce, foreign policy, and defense. They did not want to have any national debt. If there was a disagreement between the rights of the Federal government and a state, the Democratic-Republicans believed the state should be given preference.

The Democratic-Republicans did not want the Federal Government to go into debt, and a standing army and navy was an anathema to their political beliefs. From an economic perspective, they envisioned a world where farmers supported the economy and did what they needed to do to produce food for themselves and the small cities that existed on the coast. Oddly, the Democratic-Republicans opposed what we would call investments in infrastructure, which at the time would be considered roads, bridges, canals, and harbors that would facilitate the sale of agricultural products.

Federalists were led by Alexander Hamilton and John Adams. They saw the Federal government as a catalyst to spur economic growth. Most Federalists saw the beginnings of what became the Industrial Revolution and wanted the Federal government to find ways to encourage and invest in this innovation.

The majority of the Federalists were from the Northern states and wanted the Federal government to facilitate trade with other countries. International commerce required a strong currency, like the British pound, and as noted earlier, in the country’s infrastructure.

To protect the growing U.S. Merchant fleet, which, at the time of the War of 1812, was the second largest in the world, Federalists wanted a Navy with the capability to protect our coasts and shipping. And, as the country expanded westward, an Army to protect settlers.

All of the Federalist ideas required that the Federal government raise money, and through the Constitution, it had the right not only to do so but also to establish government agencies to carry out its policies and spend the taxes that were collected.

Now, 250 years later, we are still debating the issue of what role we want the government to play in our lives. Generally speaking, one party – the Republicans – wants to limit the power of government, and the Democrats believe that a bigger, more intrusive government is often the answer. The French expression – le plus ça change, plus c’est la même chose – the more things change, the more things stay the same, is appropriate.

Cartoon of Congressmen fighting over the Alien & Sedition Act of 1798. Artist unknown from the Library of Congress.