Lessons of History

A few years ago, I read a biography of Julius Caesar. While nominally about Caesar, it was really a look at the fall of the Roman Republic and the rise of the emperors. (The author, whose name eludes me at the moment, is a German history professor whose specialty was the Roman Republic.) One of the big flaws in the Republic, according to the author, was that the Romans granted powers to the different offices within the government, but failed to address limits and scope of those powers. For example (and this may not be historically correct as it is from memory, but it illustrates the point), tribunes of the people were given the authority to veto legislation passed by the Senate. No limits on this power were defined. It was assumed in the aristocratic ranks that whoever would hold this office would be honorable enough to understand the implied limits and respect the rules. So abuse of power was to be prevented by appeals to personal honor.

Of course, eventually people did abuse the powers of their office. This created paralysis in the Republic and individuals began to hold power over the Senate. Thus was the precedent of elevating an individual over the elected officials established, and this led to men like Sulla, Pompeii, and eventually the Caesars.

Similar stories are told throughout history. The German Weimar Republic gave way to the Third Reich by granting extraordinary authority to the Chancellor without addressing limits or scope, thus paving the way for dictatorship. While obviously fiction, the first three episodes of the Star Wars saga demonstrate this point as well. And Orwell's 1984 was the story of how perpetual war was used to transform a democracy into the prototypical Big Brother.

There is a lesson to be learned from this history. Part of the genius of the US constitution is that it defined not only the powers and authorities of the three branches of government, but also the limits on those powers. But we must always be on guard that we do not hastily grant, either in fact or by convention, authority to one branch of government without considering the limits on those authorities.

The current administration has pushed the Patriot Act, which is nominally meant to address terrorism, but whose provisions are by no means limited to it. As shown by the Padilla case, the president has claimed the authority to detain indefinitely, without justification or right of appeal, American citizens, so long as he simply claims they are suspected of terrorism. But without having to justify the detention, there is nothing to limit that power. Now we learn that the government has claimed the authority to spy on American citizens' conversations, again without the obligation to justify this action in order to get a warrant. And need we mention the administration's claim to the right to torture captives?

I am not going to adopt the hysterical view that we now live in some fascist state. To espouse such a view is to evince total ignorance of what a fascist state actually looks like. But, as John Henke writes, the path of freedom to fascism is walked one step at a time, steps driven by fear resulting in hastily concocted changes in the name of security. While this is certainly not fascism, the nation has taken a couple of steps down that path.

Many will defend the administration's actions. Reminiscent of the Roman artistocrats, Attorney General Ashcroft effectively used the "trust us" argument, that the government would not abuse its new powers, to support the original Patriot Act. But we need only imagine what could have happened if precedents like these had been around when Nixon was president. Henke puts it,

Naturally, many people will jump to defend the administration, pointing out that, you know, terrorists and evildoers and national security and what're you, some kind of traitor who wants another 9/11? They'll continue making that argument until, say, Hillary Clinton ascends to the White House and it occurs to them that, hey, maybe giving the Executive Branch near-unlimited power to reinterpret and/or flaunt the laws might not be such a great idea after all.

One need only consider one's worst fear on who would become president to realize that this path is folly.

In the nation's fear after 9/11, we have given the government far reaching powers, such as the Patriot Act, and we have given tacit approval to presidential power plays like the Padilla case. More far reaching, we have given approval and support for a so-called war on terror, which has neither a well defined enemy (who exactly are we fighting?), nor well defined success criteria (how exactly do we know when the war is over and we have won?). This is the recipe for war without end.

It is time we learned the lessons of history and changed the direction we are headed as a nation.