by Burt Folsom: Posted on BurtFolsom.com
Burt Folsom, Hillsdal College Professor
The Progressive Movement started in the early 1900s, and my Hillsdale colleague R. J. Pestritto observes that progressives, then and now, want “a thorough transformation in America’s principles of government, from a government permanently dedicated to securing individual liberty to one whose ends and scope would change to take on any and all social and economic ills.”
In other words, where our nation’s Founders would urge churches and local charities to help people in distress—on a case by case basis—the progressives would use state power to tax the citizens and create programs to give money to certain groups in society. Over time, those programs become entitlements.
Our first two progressive presidents were Theodore Roosevelt and Woodrow Wilson. On Roosevelt, President Obama recently likened himself to Teddy because of their mutual desire to use the state to redistribute wealth. In 1910, Teddy Roosevelt gave a famous speech in Kansas in which he said, “The really big fortune, the swollen fortune, by the mere fact of its size acquires qualities which differentiate it in kind as well as in degree from what is possessed by men of relatively small means. Therefore, I believe in a graduated income tax on big fortunes. . . .” In other words, someone who has a large fortune, “by the mere fact of its size,” needs to be taxed and treated differently from someone with less money. The assumption is that the large tax on this “swollen fortune” will be used wisely by the government to improve the lives of needy people.
The Founders did not believe such a strategy would work. They believed, as James Madison said, that government could not “control itself”—that when power is concentrated, it is abused. Put another way, the Founders believed that if government leaders had large amounts of money, they would use it first to solidify their power, and then use it to redistribute to groups who would support the party in power. Poor people might get some money, especially if they were willing to support those politicians anxious to redistribute funds.
Therefore, the Founders advocated equal protection of the law for all citizens, which in the 1800s led to the end of slavery and to rights for women. Those reforms became the inevitable result of the talk of freedom, natural rights, and the use of government not to redistribute wealth, but to protect people’s rights to make free choices as to what to do with their wealth and their lives.
President Woodrow Wilson argued that such talk of “equal protection of the law to all citizens” may have been good for the 1700s and 1800s, but by the 1900s we had more educated leaders (like himself) who could be trusted with greater power. Wilson supported a progressive income tax, and in his presidency that income tax increased from being 7 percent on top incomes to 77 percent. Wilson believed the government needed more revenue to fight World War I and to enact good programs for targeted groups in society. Later progressive presidents, like FDR, raised the income tax on top incomes to more than 90 percent.
When Barack Obama today argues for more taxes on the rich, he is square in the middle of the progressive tradition of taking from one group to redistribute to another group “for the good of society.” We also find that many of the recipients of President Obama’s subsidies include companies like Solyndra and groups such as the public sector unions—all of which support his presidency with some of the money they receive from the government.
We would do well to remember the words of James Madison: “If men were angels, no government would be necessary. . . . In framing a government which is to be administered by men over men, the great difficulty lies in this: you must first enable the government to control the governed; and in the next place oblige it to control itself.” If not soon controlled, the progressive government will bankrupt our nation, and devastate the liberty of all citizens.
Burt Folsom is a professor of history at Hillsdale College. His is also a columnist and the historian-in-residence at the Foundation for Economic Education in Irvington, New York. You can visit his blog at burtfolsom.com.
Dr. Folsom has written several books. One of the most popular ones is The Myth of the Robber Barons in which he discusses the differences between political entrepreneurs and market entrepreneurs. In New Deal or Raw Deal: How FDR’s Economic Legacy Has Damaged America (Simon & Schuster, 2008), Folsom examines the disastrous effects of massive federal spending under Franklin Roosevelt during the New Deal years of the 1930s. The sequel to his work on the New Deal is his latest book, co-authored with his wife, Anita Folsom: FDR Goes to War: How Expanded Executive Power, Spiraling National Debt, and Restricted Civil Liberties Shaped Wartime America (Simon & Schuster, 2011).
