Congress Needs to Get a Grip

by John Lawrence

Nearly a quarter of Americans agree that “patriots may have to resort to violence in order to save our country” — the most in the nearly three years the question has been asked since Donald Trump’s presidency, a new survey by Public Religion Research Institute (PRRI) and the Brookings Institution says. https://www.prri.org/research/threats-to-american-democracy-ahead-of-an-unprecedented-presidential-election/In one of the notable understatements of our tumultuous era, Rep. Russell Fry (R-SC) recently observed that democracy “can be messy at times.” I beg to disagree. Messy is when you don’t clean up the Mixmaster after making cookies. Messy is going a month without making the bed. What is poisoning American politics these days is lightyears beyond messy; it is depressing, dispiriting and deeply hurtful to our own citizens and to observers around the world. And it is very dangerous because it fosters disdain for the basic institutions of government, especially among the young who have few memories of government functioning effectively.

No one should be under the misimpression that the Founding Fathers prized efficiency in statecraft. Nor is there anything particularly novel or surprising about passionate disagreements among the members of Congress (and the people who elect them).  “Every man who is a man, and not a jellyfish, is a partisan,” Rep. Jacob Fassett (R-NY) observed a century ago. “We were all elected by partisans because we were partisans. A man ought to have opinions and convictions.”  

But something very fundamental has changed for the worse. For decades, the standard for debate was set by Speaker Sam Rayburn who advised members to “disagree without being disagreeable.” Members referred to another member as “the gentleman” or “the gentlewoman” from this or that state; senatorial courtesy virtually prohibited campaigning against a colleague, regardless of policy differences. And any visitor to the chamber was to be accorded complete respect and deference, especially the president. But in recent years, with an increasing frequency and coarseness, prominent political leaders have embraced rhetoric better suited to ruffians than representatives. 

The deterioration of congressional comity was on full display in September, 2009, when Rep. Joe Wilson yelled “you lie” when President Barack Obama insisted that his new health law would not cover undocumented people. Nearly a decade and a half later, the disruptive Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene repeatedly heckled Joe Biden during his State of the Union, calling the president “a liar” for reminding listeners that many in the Republican party have endorsed cutbacks in Social Security and Medicare benefits.

Earlier this year, Greene called fellow MAGA conservative Lauren Boebert a “little bitch” on the House floor. This month, Rep. Tim Burchett trolled after Kevin McCarthy, denouncing him as a “jerk,” a “chicken” and “pathetic” for allegedly elbowing Burchett, a McCarthy critic. At a hearing in the Senate, Markwayne Mullins rose from his chair to threaten fisticuffs with the president of the Teamsters Union. (Mullins, who had an eyeblink career as a mixed martial arts fighter, should know better than to risk going mano-a-mano with the Teamsters.)

Ill-tempered remarks in Congress are not particularly new, but they have gotten a whole lot more commonplace and coarse. Speaker Tip O’Neill was reprimanded by the House in 1984 for denouncing the bank bencher Newt Gingrich for a grotesque distortion of Democratic lawmakers. The criticism leveled by O’Neill — “the lowest thing that I’ve ever seen in my 32 years in Congress” — seems painfully mild in today’s climate on Capitol Hill.

Confrontations have sometimes moved beyond words; the caning of Sen. Charles Sumner  by Rep. Preston Brooks in 1856 is widely known, and Yale historian Joanne Freeman has documented the frequent fisticuffs in the ante-bellum Congress in her award-winning Field of Blood. More recently, Robert Dornan throttled Tom Downey on the House floor and Don Young held a knife to the throat of his Republican colleague, John Boehner.

The use of supercharged language and threats of physical violence has escalated in recent years, further exacerbating the deep tensions that course through the modern Congress and the electorate as well. The internet-generated obsession with seeking  attention certainly bears some of the responsibility. So, too, does the apocryphal and incendiary language of Donald Trump who, among his many inciteful remarks, once called on supporters in Iowa to “knock the crap” out of potential hecklers; later, he famously (and perhaps criminally) encouraged the January 6, 2023 siege of the Capitol. Last week, he referred to political opponents as “vermin.”

Trump is impossible to corral, but congressional leaders need to work a lot harder to prevent their institution from deteriorating further into a legislative version of the Jerry Springer show. The hysterical and bullying persiflage is costing the Congress respect at home while sending a dreadful image of failed democracy around the world. Four years ago, while testifying before the Select Committee on the Modernization of Congress, I urged an updating of House rules to reprimand members who employ excessively provocative and confrontational language on the floor or in committees. In the intervening four years, it seems obvious that the problem of incendiary language (let alone physical confrontation) has grown exponentially worse. So long as the use of harsh language and physical intimidation rewards members with press coverage and fundraising opportunities but no official castigation, they will continue the behavior that brings discredit on themselves and the institution. It is time for Congress to stand up for its own integrity and sanction those who embrace vitriol and provocation instead of fulfilling their legislative responsibilities to their constituents and the nation.