I take my title from Shakespear’s play, Richard III. The main character, Richard, who is about to become king of England. is not a nice person. It is no surprise that he becomes a terrible king. The play is a tragedy (everybody dies). Although the time the play was written (1593) and the time depicted in the play were very different from our political situation today, the politics of power were similar. A few centuries later, another English writer, Lord Acton, said, “Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely.”
Although the current political situation in the States is not the same as that in Shakespeare’s time or, for that matter, the hypothetical time of King Richard III, the fundamental truth of power’s tendency to corrupt remains. The robber barons of the nineteenth century in the States demonstrated the fundamental truth of Lord Acton’s dictum: power corrupts. As the recent history in the States has also demonstrated, it is easy for politicians to become increasingly corrupt the longer they remain in office. Some, of course, are already corrupt and seek political office because they want the power that will let them profit from its application. Corruption is in individuals rather than in the system. While democracy has a built-in self-correcting mechanism, it is not perfect.
One of our greatest presidents, Abraham Lincoln, said, You can fool some of the people all of the time, and all of the people some of the time, but you can not fool all of the people all of the time. Unfortunately, some people are fairly easy to fool, and not everyone needs to be fooled to control the political process. People can be manipulated to vote against their best interests with the verbal equivalent of sleight-of-hand techniques.
This may be especially true given our reliance on mass media, which delivers the same message to more people than had been possible previously. During WWII, radio provided the most current information about the war and politics. TV didn’t become viable for news delivery until the 1960s, and news shows were typically 30 minutes of headline information. “Old school” reporters did their best to get the facts right, even if they favored a particular viewpoint. Currently, however, many of our “news” shows are promoting a point of view. We have “conservative” shows and “liberal” shows. Those who have a particular view point, can find broadcasts that will support (and reinforce) it. It isn’t always easy to separate fact from fiction.
Although the current political situation in the States is not the same as that in Shakespeare’s time or, for that matter, the hypothetical time of King Richard III, the fundamental truth of power’s tendency to corrupt remains. Theoretically, democracy is the antidote to the corruption of “royalty.” It doesn’t always work that way, however, because morality depends more on the character of individuals than on the political system. The robber barons of the nineteenth century in the States demonstrated the fundamental truth of Lord Acton’s dictum: power corrupts. As the recent history in the States has also demonstrated, it is easy for politicians to become increasingly corrupt the longer they remain in office. It is also true, of course, that those who choose to run for office may be corrupt to begin with and see political office as the path to wealth and power.
Those of us who are old enough can remember when the Democrats were considered the party of corruption. The Republicans now seem to be more corrupt. They have mastered gerrymandering to help ensure their control of congress regardless of what most people want. Gerrymandering can be corrected by redrawing the districts. It might also help if we had term limits to ensure that no one remained in office long enough to become corrupted.
The principal problem with term limits is that whatever limits were set would force some qualified people out of office just as they were gaining enough experience to be effective legislators. Being effective on the job has a learning curve. Financial gain is, of course, only one of the possible corruptions. Control of the land and related resources is also an issue, and—sad to say—race and ethnicity also divide us in unfair ways. There is probably no good way to ensure that all our politicians are honest and hard-working. Power definitely corrupts, and it is up to the public to decide when an elected official has become corrupt. A long time ago, Pogo (as created by Walt Kelly) said, “We have met the enemy, and he is us.” Perhaps when “we” are better, we will have more honest politicians.
