“We Exist in a Marketplace of Favors,” The World of Realpolitik

We are a contentious species, we bicker, at times dissemble, and at the same time speak of ethics and morality.  

In classrooms, twenty-five hundred years later we regal Socrates as a great teacher, and forget he was condemned to death for teaching the youth of Athens to think critically (Socrates needed a union!).

We just celebrated the 250th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence, with fitting fanfare, and ignore the decade that followed. The Articles of Confederation created a loose combination of states, somewhat like the European Union of today. The former thirteen colonies, now states, charged each other tariffs, used different currencies, and the debts incurred during the revolutionary war mounted.

 Alexander Hamilton and James Madison convinced George Washington to be the presiding officer at a Constitutional Convention. In the Spring of 1787 the fifty-five delegates trickled into Philadelphia. The Convention was not publicized, no press, shades drawn, the debates in the boarding houses and taverns undoubtedly vigorous. 
There are no official minutes, except for the results of the votes.  Madison kept notes, asked speakers for copies of their notes, in his will Madison restricted the release of his notes until fifty years after his death. The SCOTUS members who claim to be originalists better have access to an accurate ouji board.  In September, exhausted, the delegates completed the proposed constitution and passed along to the states for ratification, nine states were required for approval.

Hamilton and Madison wrote what we would call op eds, published in newspapers throughout the thirteen states, called The Federalist Papers. The eighty-five essays, each a few pages long, covered a wide range of topics. Federalist # 10 discussed factions.

The Union as a Safeguard Against Domestic Faction and Insurrection From the New York Packet. Friday, November 23, 1787.

To the People of the State of New York:

AMONG the numerous advantages promised by a well constructed Union, none deserves to be more accurately developed than its tendency to break and control the violence of faction. The friend of popular governments never finds himself so much alarmed for their character and fate, as when he contemplates their propensity to this dangerous vice. He will not fail, therefore, to set a due value on any plan which, without violating the principles to which he is attached, provides a proper cure for it. The instability, injustice, and confusion introduced into the public councils, have, in truth, been the mortal diseases under which popular governments have everywhere perished; as they continue to be the favorite and fruitful topics from which the adversaries to liberty derive their most specious declamations. … 

Complaints are everywhere heard from our most considerate and virtuous citizens, equally the friends of public and private faith, and of public and personal liberty, that our governments are too unstable, that the public good is disregarded in the conflicts of rival parties …

 Liberty is to faction what air is to fire, an aliment without which it instantly expires. But it could not be less folly to abolish liberty, which is essential to political life, because it nourishes faction, than it would be to wish the annihilation of air, which is essential to animal life, because it imparts to fire its destructive agency.

The latent causes of faction are thus sown in the nature of man; and we see them everywhere brought into different degrees of activity, according to the different circumstances of civil society. A zeal for different opinions concerning religion, concerning government, and many other points, as well of speculation as of practice; an attachment to different leaders ambitiously contending for pre-eminence and power; or to persons of other descriptions whose fortunes have been interesting to the human passions, have, in turn, divided mankind into parties, inflamed them with mutual animosity, and rendered them much more disposed to vex and oppress each other than to co-operate for their common good. So strong is this propensity of mankind to fall into mutual animosities, that where no substantial occasion presents itself, the most frivolous and fanciful distinctions have been sufficient to kindle their unfriendly passions and excite their most violent conflicts. 

The current opposition factions within the UFT are “…more disposed to vex and oppress each other than to cooperate for the common good.”

From Shanker to Feldman to Weingarten to Mulgrew, factions have attempted to undermine, to “vex,” to seize power and threaten the future of the union.

Effective leaders use whatever tools are available, they negotiate across the table, they trade favors with the powerful, they derail enemies.

The Class Size Reduction Law, carefully crafted, steered through the dark hallways of Albany by a legislator with young public school children, the governor signed to assure a NYSUT/UFT endorsement, sharply criticized by the opposition, failing to understand it was not an outcome achievable at the bargaining table.  

As the conservative press attacks the UFT, as Bloomberg and his minions seek to destroy the union the opposition have become their unknowing allies 

Our nation’s factions have tossed stones, today the enemy is Trump, ripping apart public schools and unions as the Democrats bicker among themselves.

Mulgrew has developed an excellent relationship with the Speaker of the City Council, the second most powerful person in the city, a relationship chastised by the opposition.

The Speaker of the Assembly and the Majority Leader refused to approve a state budget that eliminated the cap on charter schools, the UFT has endorsed Democrats across the state and the Speaker and the Majority leader held up the approval of the budget until the Governor backed off.

Yes, we “…exist in a marketplace of favors,” Tier 6 passed, in spite of the governor’s lukewarm attitude, she couldn’t risk alienating teachers across the state.

Yes, paraprofessionals deserve a raise, more than a year of one on one lobbying and the enthusiastic support of the Speaker resulted in a 49-0 vote. Once again, the opposition caucuses opposed the pathway and criticized the unwavering support of the Speaker.

Yes, we live in a “marketplace of favors,”  effective leaders search out the most effective pathway to achieve the goals of their members, and factions, perhaps unknowingly, perhaps by design act to undercut and derail.

 Madison was correct: So strong is this propensity of mankind to fall into mutual animosities, that where no substantial occasion presents itself, the most frivolous and fanciful distinctions have been sufficient to kindle their unfriendly passions and excite their most violent conflicts.