Returning to Our Roots

We are living in an age of austerity and, together with most Europeans and the Japanese, will probably have to endure it for some time to come. The truly wretched “compromise” on the debt limit that Barack Obama agreed to last August only underscored the political weakness of those of us who anxiously defend the welfare state and dream that, one day, it might provide a decent living and excellent health care for every wage-earner, while also helping to reverse the heating of the planet.

But a single-minded defense of government is neither a sensible nor a fruitful response to the crisis. Once the Left had a major part in creating a vibrant civil society. Labor unions, women’s groups, community organizations, advocates for racial minorities and immigrants, and a press written by and edited for the common man and woman educated millions of Americans about politics and culture and helped to elect liberal office-holders who enacted such landmark reforms as the Social Security Act and the civil rights bill. Left activists constantly made demands on the state, but they seldom put their faith in or bet their future on politicians. They understood that the first concern of any elected official is to preserve and extend his or her own tenure and power.

Gradually, this healthy skepticism eroded. However flawed, the New Deal, the Warren Court, and the Great Society all demonstrated that a caring government could aid millions of people whom institutions of the left...