Wither Liberalism?

WITHER LIBERALISM? DID IT DIE LAST TUESDAY? I don't think so--not if you define liberalism as the belief that government can act to improve the lives of its citizens. There is still a strong public desire for protection from the vicissitudes of age, disease and economic volatility. The driving force in American politics remains the need to find shelter from The Big Fear: the economic and social uncertainties that have been visited upon the middle class in the global, postmodern era. Neither of the existing political parties completely understands the phenomenon. Democrats have been reluctant to address the social components of the Fear, the reaction against trash culture, loose morals and family disintegration; Republicans are reluctant to admit that the economic fear involves more than dismay over too-high taxes.

But something did die Tuesday. Newt Gingrich did a semicoherent war dance around it--tossing about awkward phrases like "counterculture McGovernicks" and "left-wing elitists" while promising to dismantle the "welfare-state bureaucracy" brick by brick. In a strange way, Bill and Hillary Clinton are the apotheosis of this thing. Their administration has been a commingling of two, previously unrelated, strands of liberalism that emerged in the 1960s and have reached intellectual dead ends now. If the notion of public activism is to be reinvigorated. these two tendencies will require a proper funeral.

But Gingrich is beating a fairly dead horse. Most 1960s liberals have stopped trying to "understand"--or romanticize (or participate in)--antisocial behavior. Very few defend teenage out-of-wedlock pregnancies as an "alternative lifestyle choice" anymore--and Clinton should get credit for pulling his party to the high ground on that one. Even Ted Kennedy is a prison-building, parole-bashing crimefighter now. And, one expects, all sorts of former liberal miscreants will be racing toward the center on crime and welfare reform in the next legislative session. But a residue of the old days does remain: a continued, condescending belief in different (that is, lower) standards for "protected" ethnic groups--race-based remedies like quotas and affirmative action.

The intent was benign. Many of the effects have been beneficial. But there have been disastrous unintended consequences as well, and they stem from a simple moral conundrum: diversity is an American strength, but legal distinctions made according to race are wrong. The resegregation of the South through racial gerrymandering is an awful and obvious recent example. There are others. The Clinton administration has been assiduous in raising ethnic and racial barriers in law. The Justice Department has pushed what it calls "affirmative action" well beyond the point of reason. The Comptroller of the Currency has proposed that small-business loan applicants must list the racial composition of their owners. And Health and Human Services Secretary Donna Shalala recently wrote that "race and ethnicity may also be important factors" in determining whether parents can adopt a child of a different race. The irony here--and a measure of the distance to be traveled--is that Shalala thought she was making a significant move to the center: black social workers have long believed race should be the only factor.

It is likely that an attack on race-based remedies will be the wedge issue of choice for Republicans in 1996. A referendum proposing an end to programs that distinguish by race may appear on the ballot in California--and with that state's presidential primary moved up to March. every candidate, rends no doubt. will have to take a stand on it.

These are two tremendous obstacles to a reinvigorated Democratic Party. Most Americans, surveys show, are opposed to race-based remedies. It is difficult to imagine liberals winning a public debate on this question. It is also difficult to imagine liberals winning continued support for drowsy bureaucracies populated by uncivil servants, especially with Gingrich hammering away at their funding. If government services are to be expanded (or maybe even provided) in the future, they are likely to be privatized and voucherized. And if liberalism is to revive itself, it will have to fight for such schemes--against those who oppose any sort of government activism. Bill Clinton once appeared poised to lead such a fight, but he lost his way or never believed in it in the first place. In 1992, George McGovern--himself!--calmed liberals by promising the Clinton campaign was a Trojan horse, a way to sneak 1960s liberalism past the American public. That flagrant disrespect met its just reward last Tuesday.