Republicans and "small government"

[Bleach Blonde Bad Built Butch Bodies for Biden]

It just feels weird. Ever since I started following politics 20 years ago, Republicans have always been the "ban it" party. Ban abortion, ban gay marriage, ban or restrict trans healthcare for adults, keep weed banned, ban sodomy, ban porn, ban books, ban flag-burning, ban gay teachers from displaying photos of their spouse. Hell, I'm surprised we haven't had a Republican legislator propose a bill banning watermelon knives. The only thing Republicans don't want to ban is guns -- ironically the one issue I agree more with Republicans than Democrats on.

Now this doesn't absolve Democrats of their own authoritarian behaviors and ideas. Banning plastic straws and big gulps helps no one, doesn't actually do anything for the environment, and can make life worse for some people (i.e. disabled people who require plastic straws to avoid choking).

And the question also isn't necessarily about the merits of banning these things. But, the party that supports restrictions on the most intimate or private parts of our lives claims to be the party of "freedom and small government." And the fact is government has been growing like a cancer regardless of which party is in charge for the last 80 years while civil liberties are increasingly being suppressed. But if Republicans want to be moralist scolds, why don't they just say so and abandon the "small government" rhetoric which only means less taxes and more polluting rights for the (very small) owning class?

[Vice President Christian Man]

The GOP like the Dems are more or less formal coalitions and there are definitely still fiscal cons within the party, likely moreso than social cons so it wouldn't make sense for them to abandon their "small government" philosophy even if all of its members don't support it. And most of what we've seen are politicians overlooking their own views in order to support their constituents who are part of these various coalitions. It's why referendums are spotty, since most people aren't ideological purebreads to their party. And this party infighting is why the party can't take an alternate approach like limiting business interests as well, something that separated the classical liberals from the classical conservatives. Countries outside of North America may have more parties, but in reality it's just these coalitions as its own party, something the US simplifies for better or for worse.

[OSR stands with Israel]

I will repost this as it shows that all the wings of a particular ideology are contradictory to some extent. Basically the reason for this is its impossible for an super coherent ideology across the board to really represent one whole side of a nation as large as ours.

So basically this is what I would say when you hear catchphrases:

"Small Government" is representing Economic Conservatism
"Family Values" is representing Social Conservatism
"Strong Defense" is representing National Security Conservatism

And social conservatives would make the same argument in reverse that policies that break up traditional norms due to pro growth policies  are not conservative either . Anyway this is all semantics as everyone knows that what is defined as a conservative here is a coalition of different types of conservatives and not a single brand of it and all 3 contradict each other in some ways and did even in the “3 legged stool” era of Conservatism .

Economic Conservatives: They are for low taxes , less regulation, less spending , generally pro business policies and also “small government”.

National Security Conservatives: They are for maintaining  American Hegemony which means a strong national defense , tougher stance against adversaries , and intervening to promote our interests and to shape the world in our image

Social conservatives: They are for promoting traditional “family values and norms” , are very religious etc


So yes all have naturally contradictory beliefs .

Economic and National Security: Flies right into the fact of economic conservatives that spending should be cut and visa versa

Economic and Social Conservatives: Can contradict small government belief of economic conservatives and promoting traditional values of social conservatives

National Security and Social : Many times goals of nationals security conservatives can push other nations to become more socially liberal.


The job of a political party is to put all these things together and what the GOP generally has done is by choosing the ones that contradict the least from each and dropping the others. So what each has chosen is:


Economic Conservatives: Low Taxes and Less Regulations

National Security Conservatives: More Military Spending and tougher stance against adversaries(Of course what the main adversary is has also changed with time)

Social Conservatives: Anti Abortion and defending norms that have at least 40% support from the nation.

[Benjamin Frank]

The main difference here between the two parties is that the Democrats tend to focus more on pragmatism, while the Republicans tend to argue on broad 'principle.'

Democrats generally want to solve problems (though not always effectively.) The oceans are filled with plastic? Let's ban plastic straws.  I'm not sure I agree with you that there aren't good alternatives to plastic straws though.

Republicans tend to focus more on broad abstract principles, as Old School Republican's post showed, irrespective of the consequences at the micro or macro level.

The problem for Republicans, as the OSR's post shows, is not just that the Republicans are a broad coalition (as are the Democrats) but that broad principles often conflict. So, the Republican claim to be for 'small government' or 'freedom' often conflicts with the Republican claim to be for 'family values.'

Republicans frequently though tend not to be good at expounding on these principles in concrete terms which leaves them arguing based on these broad abstractions.

[MarkD]

All too many times people who talk about "small government" do not make any effort to distinguish between state and federal governments, and I think that most who do speak disparagingly of "big government" are implicitly talking only about how big the federal government has gotten, and don't really have any complaint about how big state governments are getting. Maybe there are some who do have just as much of a complaint about big state government, but it's hard to be sure since, as I said, they don't speak about "government" trying to distinguish between state and federal.

And regards to "social issues" like banning abortion and bans on gay people having the right to jobs as public school teachers, the right to adopt children, to have sex, and to get married, don't forget that those are issues which enforcing those rules generally will not make bureaucrats any more powerful than banning murder (which, if you ever try to pay attention to pro-lifers, mean the same thing -- abortion = murder to them), banning pedophiles from teaching school or adopting children, or banning incestuous marriage and polygamous marriage. These are social issues about which we are, as a society, figuring out how to distinguish between sexual behaviors that the vast majority used to detest, but which the modern left have been changing their mind, and are gaining more and more political allies in the middle. Banning same-sex marriage is a traditional state government rule; it was banned by common law for over two hundred years before the issue started becoming litigated in states like Hawaii and Massachusetts. When legislators and voters have created laws to explicitly ban SSM, doing so did not make any bureaucrats any more power than they had ever been before.

[Ferguson97]

It just feels weird. Ever since I started following politics 20 years ago, Republicans have always been the "ban it" party. Ban abortion, ban gay marriage, ban or restrict trans healthcare for adults, keep weed banned, ban sodomy, ban porn, ban books, ban flag-burning, ban gay teachers from displaying photos of their spouse. Hell, I'm surprised we haven't had a Republican legislator propose a bill banning watermelon knives. The only thing Republicans don't want to ban is guns -- ironically the one issue I agree more with Republicans than Democrats on.

Now this doesn't absolve Democrats of their own authoritarian behaviors and ideas. Banning plastic straws and big gulps helps no one, doesn't actually do anything for the environment, and can make life worse for some people (i.e. disabled people who require plastic straws to avoid choking).

Some of the things Democrats want to ban are ridiculous, but that's just a hilarious contrast in terms of severity when you look at them side-by-side. Republicans want to ban homosexuality, freedom of speech, recreational drugs... and Democrats want to ban plastic straws.

[OSR stands with Israel]

It just feels weird. Ever since I started following politics 20 years ago, Republicans have always been the "ban it" party. Ban abortion, ban gay marriage, ban or restrict trans healthcare for adults, keep weed banned, ban sodomy, ban porn, ban books, ban flag-burning, ban gay teachers from displaying photos of their spouse. Hell, I'm surprised we haven't had a Republican legislator propose a bill banning watermelon knives. The only thing Republicans don't want to ban is guns -- ironically the one issue I agree more with Republicans than Democrats on.

Now this doesn't absolve Democrats of their own authoritarian behaviors and ideas. Banning plastic straws and big gulps helps no one, doesn't actually do anything for the environment, and can make life worse for some people (i.e. disabled people who require plastic straws to avoid choking).

Some of the things Democrats want to ban are ridiculous, but that's just a hilarious contrast in terms of severity when you look at them side-by-side. Republicans want to ban homosexuality, freedom of speech, recreational drugs... and Democrats want to ban plastic straws.

Democrats are more anti freedom of speech than Republicans.

[Unpoisoned Chalice]

The one constant divide from the 1930s to the present between the major parties is on the size of the welfare-regulatory state. Most actual legislation and a significant proportion of presidential decision-making falls into this category. In practice, this makes the Democratic Party the inherent pro-government party and the GOP a permanent opposition. This is the principal reason for why "conservative governance" has been made an oxymoron.

[Antonio the Sixth]

"Small government" was always a meaningless buzzword. Modern society as it exists inherently requires an extensive state apparatus fulfilling a variety of tasks and being involved into the everyday lives of individuals. To actually roll that back, you would need to take us back to feudalism. Left and right merely disagree on which groups' interests should be prioritized by the state - the poor and oppressed for the former, the rich and powerful for the latter.

[OSR stands with Israel]

The one constant divide from the 1930s to the present between the major parties is on the size of the welfare-regulatory state. Most actual legislation and a significant proportion of presidential decision-making falls into this category. In practice, this makes the Democratic Party the inherent pro-government party and the GOP a permanent opposition. This is the principal reason for why "conservative governance" has been made an oxymoron.

Yah lets be real: Other than 1980-2008 the Republicans have been a minority party that just reacts to whatever the Democrats do rather than actually setting the agenda/narrative ever since FDR crushed them in 1932.

1980-2008 was the one exception where the Republicans actually set the policy agenda and it was the Democrats who were reacting and adjusting

[Skill and Chance]

I think MarkD has a good point here.  We should remember that in the US context, "small government" can also mean the federal government largely letting the states do whatever they want.  A state-level restriction on personal freedom doesn't resonate the same way federal interference does.  The argument would be if a majority of Arkansas wants to be officially Baptist, the small government position is let them and if you don't like it, move.  That's somewhat equivalent to libertarian arguments about the labor market/employment contracts.   

[Ferguson97]

Democrats are more anti freedom of speech than Republicans.

No they're not. The GOP is the party of book bans, shutting down protests, and prohibiting flag burning.

[OSR stands with Israel]

Democrats are more anti freedom of speech than Republicans.

No they're not. The GOP is the party of book bans, shutting down protests, and prohibiting flag burning.

"Book Bans" - Public Schools are not entitled to teach whatever they want. They are paid and employed by the taxpayer so this point is bs.

"Shutting Down Protests"- The summer of 2020 protests were riots not protests

"Prohibiting flag burning"- there is no serious attempt to do this

[Ferguson97]

"Book Bans" - Public Schools are not entitled to teach whatever they want. They are paid and employed by the taxpayer so this point is bs.

The idea that the "taxpayer" should have significant influence over what is being taught in schools is ridiculous. Schools should adhere to facts, not to the demands of the mob. (Also, merely providing access to a book in the library does not mean that schools are "teaching" it.)

[Badger]

"Book Bans" - Public Schools are not entitled to teach whatever they want. They are paid and employed by the taxpayer so this point is bs.

The idea that the "taxpayer" should have significant influence over what is being taught in schools is ridiculous. Schools should adhere to facts, not to the demands of the mob. (Also, merely providing access to a book in the library does not mean that schools are "teaching" it.)

This. Banning a particular book because 50.1% of Voters in a particular School District elected a School majority willing to remove it is antithetical to the entire concept of free speech. And often times it's not a matter of taxpayer dollars being used to buy the books, but rather taxpayer dollars being used to remove a book that's already been long purchased and sitting on Library shelves.

[The Right Honourable Martin Brian Mulroney PC CC GOQ]

"Small government" as the Republican Party's MO is misleading, I agree. But it's all a matter of branding. Everyone uses slogans to market themselves to the demographics they want to win over by hitting certain keywords. Experienced political observers shouldn't take that seriously.

The idea of the GOP as the party of small government comes from a different era, where conservative objectives aligned with a smaller federal government. For fiscal conservatives, this is pretty much always the case, and I think most of us would agree that on fiscal and socio-economic issues, the GOP remains the "small government" party.

On social issues, there has been a change. Republicans started using the "small government" slogan at a time when American society was fairly conservative, but thanks to the power of the New Deal Coalition (which included many socially conservative voters but mostly socially liberal politicians - a big part of why it didn't hold for long), institutional power was largely held by socially liberal people who made some fairly sweeping changes. Legalizing abortion and banning school prayer are two examples where the institutional powers of the 1960s and 70s were radically more liberal than the average American, especially the average evangelical and/or southerner. Those groups felt that the power of government was being used to erode their values, and the GOP won them over by taking on the role of "small government". The beauty of this was that the same slogan also appealed to fiscal conservatives and libertarians.

On foreign and defence policy, the GOP has been the undisputed "big government" party since at least the Vietnam War. Maybe things are being muddled a little bit on this front by Ukraine, though. But the argument for spending more on the military while maintaining a "small government" philosophy was easy to justify during the Cold War, when America's enemy, the Soviet Union, was the embodiment of big government.

But at the end of the day, the Republican Party is a conservative party, not a small government party. Ergo, their goal is to implement conservative policies across the board, not necessarily to shrink the size of government. Focusing on semantics misses the point.