"The Government that is big enough to give you everything you want is big enough to take it away." -- Gerald Ford.
This quote has been oft misattributed to Thomas Jefferson, Barry Goldwater, Ronald Reagan, and even Abraham Lincoln.
This misappropriation of a meaningful message could no better symbolize the incongruity of the ideas of a conservative with his inability to articulate them in a coherent message.
Thomas Jefferson, early President far more famous for his Declaration of Independence, did what he said he would: he shrank the size of government, reduced the size of the military, and impounded funds appropriated by Congress when he deemed the appropriations unconstitutional.
Barry Goldwater, the Father of the Modern Conservatism, characterized the domestic overspending as a greater threat to the United States than the Soviet Union. Despite a proper appreciation of the threatening nature of government largess, Goldwater's exaggerated outrage against budget should not have crowded out the national concern over the menacing threat of Soviet dominance.
Ronald Reagan, embodiment of Conservative resurgence, essentially won sixteen years later the election that Goldwater had lost. In eight years, Reagan closed one federal office. At the same time, the budget deficit increased dramatically because of much-needed tax-cuts without the necessary spending cuts. Surging military spending may have bankrupted the Soviet Union, but the crushing debt accrued may end up bankrupting the United States. For all of his Reagan's popularity as small government advocate, Columnist George Will recalls that for all of Reagan's blusterous anti-government rhetoric, his conservatism gave the American people permission to hate government yet love it at the same time.
The final misattributed origin of Gerald Ford's caution, Abraham Lincoln would by today's standard be (justifiably) branded a RINO (Republican In Name Only). A big spender who increased the size and scope of government, he instituted an income tax and imposed national hegemony at the expense of states' rights. In furtherance of civil war against the seceding states, Lincoln illegally misappropriated monies without Congressional approval, suspended habeas corpus, expelled a dissenting Democratic Congressman from the Union. He even instituted a draft, which sparked protests throughout the United States, culminating in the New York Draft Riots, forcing him to call federal troops to quell the insurrection. If nothing else, Abraham Lincoln was all "big government" without the "conservative".
Leaving aside the Chief Executives who did not caution against Hand-Out government, President Gerald Ford (and by extension Thomas Jefferson) represents the quiet the fiscal restraint desperately needed in this country, and the message essential to long-term success and integrity for conservatives in the long-term. They were small government conservatives. These executives resisted the temptation to throw money at domestic problems through executive order or Congressional intimidation.
In the annals of United States History, Gerald Ford does not figure prominently. Yet executives who advocate restraint will not be prominent (Fellow small-government President Thomas Jefferson held his tenure as President in such low esteem that he did not even include his Administration on his tombstone as one of his chief accomplishments. He placed precedence on his role as founder of the University of Virginia!). The Presidents who make the history books are the Presidents who did too much, who expanded the power of the Presidency at the expense of Congress, who ruled more as autocrats vs. constitutional representatives.
If Conservatives want to achieve any long-term success, they must stick to their principles. That begins with attributing ideas to their proper sponsors, and understanding the errors that will ensue in failing to do so.
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