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was a “hard bargainer,” Johnson said, “You get ‘em for me…. Hell,
I just got you straightened out $30 million worth.”
Indecorous deals like these helped LBJ push legislation through
Congress at a rate unheard of today. The Civil Rights Act of 1964,
Medicare, Medicaid, the Voting Rights Act of 1965, and major
immigration, education, and environmental measures all became
law under Johnson. His deals were the oil that greased the creaky
machinery of government. We live every day with the results, and
while you might not like each Great Society achievement, you
surely agree that America is better off with racial equality and
cleaner air and water.
There are also
many examples of government officials either
leaving or enhancing their jobs to achieve certain political or policy
ends. In 2001, when the U.S. Senate was split 50 to 50 on party lines,
the Democratic Party leadership courted several Republicans to try
to get them to switch parties. After being promised a committee
chairmanship and seniority as if he had always been a Democrat,
Sen. Jim Jeffords left the Republican Party. With that back-room
deal, power shifted to the Democrats in the Senate for the first time
in six years.
At the state level, sitting Virginia legislators have been offered
and have taken more lucrative jobs in the executive branch, leaving
their party in the lurch. In 1998, Republican Gov. Jim Gilmore
named Democratic state Sen. Charles Waddell and Democratic
Del. David Brickley to higher-paying jobs in his administration.
Waddell’s departure immediately shifted an evenly divided Senate
to a 20-19 Republican advantage. That GOP edge became 21-19
when a Republican won Waddell’s seat in the special election.
Brickley’s resignation produced a tie in the House of Delegates.
Removing Waddell and Brickley from the General Assembly aided
the Republicans politically, while Waddell and Brickley gained
financially through increased salaries and retirement benefits.
On the other side
of the partisan fence, Democratic Gov.
Tim Kaine named Republican Del. Preston Bryant to a Cabinet
post in 2006, and then a Democrat replaced Bryant in the House.
Although the Bryant appointment did not cause a major power shift
(Republicans continued to hold the House majority), committee
assignments changed, Bryant multiplied his delegate’s salary, and
the party that offered him a job benefited from his absence.
While Waddell, Brickley, and Bryant were all well qualified
for their new positions, the appointments parallel the worst-case
theory of the Puckett affair. None of the earlier examples of political
gymnastics sparked any criminal investigation, for good reason.
Unless there’s substantially more to the Puckett story than has been
revealed so far, it’s difficult to see why an investigation or charges
would be warranted this time.
Runaway bribery prosecutions would do far more harm than
good, especially given the gridlock already facing those who govern.
It would be wonderful if public officials decided everything purely
on the basis of merit and high principle, but human nature dictates
otherwise. Hard bargaining, utilizing all available incentives, may
not be pretty, but it’s necessary if our complicated, fragmented
system is to make progress on vital fronts.
An old friend of mine, the great Virginia reformer Henry
Howell, loved to say, “There’s more going around in the dark than
Santa Claus, and hanky-panky is its name!” But Howell knew—
and so ought we—that not all hanky-panky is illegal, and a bit of
hanky-panky is unavoidable if the hardball world of politics is to
function. Federal prosecutors cannot take the politics out of politics,
and they should not try.
Dr. Larry J. Sabato is the Director, Center for Politics &
University Professor of Politics at the University of Virginia.
This article reprinted with permission from
The Richmond
Times-Dispatch
.
This summer, during budget and
Medicaid-expansion negotiations, Demo-
cratic Sen. Phil Puckett resigned from an
equally divided state Senate. His departure
left a narrow Republican majority.
Democrats were furious about the damage
done to their legislative agenda. They have
alleged that Republicans enticed Puckett
to resign by offering him a lucrative job
on the state Tobacco Commission. Yet as
the scandal unfolds, it now appears that
Democrats also offered, or “brainstormed”
about, what sort of goodies might entice Puckett to remain in the
Senate. As in most mudslinging contests, no one stays clean. But
this particular political battle has an unusual and unwelcome twist:
a U.S. Department of Justice investigation.
The evident theory of the federal investigation is that someone—
maybe everyone—tried to bribe Puckett. Bribery is a serious crime,
and should be. The core of bribery, though, is an official accepting
private gifts or money in exchange for exercising the power of his
or her office in a certain way. Prosecuting adventuresome bribery
theories is a bad idea. None of the wheeling and dealing surrounding
Puckett strikes me as criminal.
Horse trades, back-room deals and patronage are unsavory
to many citizens, but these practices helped to build this country.
When publicly revealed, sometimes these deals stink. If the stench is
overpowering, and the voters judge politicians to have gone beyond
acceptable boundaries, the wheeler-dealers will suffer in popularity,
political capital and future electoral success. For arrangements
like those that may have enticed Puckett, voters should judge—as
voters, not as a jury.
After all, wheeling
and dealing similar to the Puckett incident
goes far back and was engaged in by individuals we now regard
as eminent statesmen. James Madison and Alexander Hamilton
arranged the location of our nation’s capital in a back room
compact in 1790. The new capital was built along the Potomac—a
river whose name comes from an Indian word for “trading place.”
Madison himself earned the nickname “the Big Knife” for the deals
he cut.
In 1824, when neither John Quincy Adams nor Andrew Jackson
obtained a majority of Electoral College votes for the presidency,
the election fell to the House of Representatives. Speaker of the
House Henry Clay, who disliked Jackson, supported Adams and
helped secure his victory. In a controversial action that wasn’t
coincidental, Adams then appointed Clay as his secretary of state.
Modern history
is full of similar tales. President Lyndon
Johnson knew how to get things done inWashington, and he ran the
White House version of TV’s “Let’s Make A Deal.” His legendary
quid pro quos even had a name: the Johnson treatment. A White
House tape recording from January 1964 captures a notable exchange
between NAACP leaders and President Johnson. When asked to
nominate the NAACP’s favored candidate Spottswood Robinson
III to the federal bench, Johnson said he didn’t know Robinson at
all, had never met him, didn’t want to nominate him, and would do
so only in exchange for “credit.” After the NAACP said it would
“count” the nomination as “a favor,” President Johnson elevated
Robinson, who then served with distinction as a federal judge for
25 years. The new U.S. courthouse in downtown Richmond bears
Robinson’s name.
Even more directly, when Johnson encountered trouble with his
tax bill in early 1964, he called Republican Senate Minority Leader
Everett Dirksen. Minutes after arranging a $30 million river project
in Dirksen’s home state, Johnson demanded “two or three of your
men’s votes” for his bill. When Dirksen protested that the President
Why It Is Not Puckett-gate: Politics isn’t a Crime
By Larry J. Sabato
V