Thought Leadership
Congress’ digitally enhanced divide
Americans have observed dueling political ideologies since the founding of our nation, but the weaponry employed today is far more sophisticated than in 1804 when animosity between Vice President Aaron Burr and Treasury Secretary Alexander Hamilton ended with Hamilton’s demise at the wrong end of a Wogdon pistol.
The information age has allowed Congress to significantly escalate the “arms race” by employing new and emerging technologies to redraw the battlefield, increase legislative payload, and enable insurgent politicians to run successful incursions into what had long been a more conventional warfare between the parties.
To the first point, political operatives are now able to digitally slice and dice each congressional district to create safe havens for their party. With the assistance of improved technologies, we have the capacity to effectively segregate the country into red and blue, Republican and Democrat, almost at the push of a button. Consequently, demographic differences between Republican and Democratic House districts have become increasingly stark.
In such a way, the American political battlefield has been dramatically altered since the 1995 government shutdown. Long gone are the moderate Republicans and “Blue Dog” Democrats. A recent analysis showed that 204 House Republicans won their seats last year by a margin of 10 percentage points or more; and two thirds of those by more than 20 percentage points. Not surprisingly, House Republicans are more concerned about their right flank, while Democrats parry to their left. The result is a visible and palpable hole in the center – a doughnut democracy.
At a base level, the democratic system functions as it should - as a free and open society demands. Our elected representatives vote as their constituents would like and are rewarded by getting re-elected. When they vote differently, or compromise those principles, they get replaced in the next election by a candidate with views consistent with voters in that district. But through hi-tech redistricting, we have literally and purposefully divided the country. In the current political impasse, we are seeing the consequences.
Information technology has also enabled Congress to deliver dramatically larger and heavier legislative payloads than ever before – not always with sufficient time to fully comprehend the meaning or consequences of the measure. At the founding of the nation, legislation – and any amendments – were drafted by hand. Later, typewriters and mimeograph paper made the task easier. The computer age sped up that process even further, enabling Congress to rapidly draft and amend legislation.
But look at what has occurred. The Federal Reserve Act of 1913 was all of 32 pages, Glass-Steagall legislation, 37 pages, the Reigle-Neal Interstate Banking and Branching Act of 1994 weighed in at just over 60 pages, taking Congress nearly 20 years to accomplish. Compare that with the Dodd-Frank legislation passed in 2010, which consumed more than 838 pages and was passed in a period of a few short months, rather than the years typically required to consider legislation of such magnitude.
These comprehensive rewrites of American law are being employed as political weapons to nourish the troops of one side or another with provisions aimed at benefitting narrow special interest groups, further dividing the country and causing significant collateral damage to an unsuspecting civilian populace. Moreover, when we reach the point where half the country feels shut out of an important national discussion, tensions rise and trust in and among our elected officials diminishes.
Social media has now become a weapon in the ongoing battle of ideologies. Facebook, Twitter and other tools provide renegade politicians on both sides of the political spectrum a new and powerful platform from which to reach a large audience and influence public policy. Today, a single senator or House member can much more easily launch an insurgency to disrupt the government than was possible just a few years ago. And it may be the member who is least liked by his or her own caucus but who is the most “liked” or “followed” online.
The recent government shutdown brought the ideological war into the open and onto the streets. The good news is that information technology has equipped every American with the tools needed to better inform themselves and their government. But we can’t sit on the sidelines and complain. Rather, we must take up arms and let our views be known. The ease of obtaining information and communicating with our representatives in Congress has given us the power to transform our democracy so that it more truly reflects a government “of the people, by the people, for the people.”
Boggs is a partner with King & Spalding’s Government Advocacy and Public Policy practice in Washington, D.C.
Article categories
