By Jack “Miles” Ventimiglia, executive editor of The Richmond Daily News and The Excelsior Springs Daily Standard

Freedom of the press, of speech, of religion, of assembly and to petition the government are woven, like stars in the flag, into the fabric of the First Amendment.

Reporters know that though telling the truth is made more difficult in these topsy-turvy times—when truth is flippantly called ‘lies’ and lies are defended as truth—if they do not do their duty, then no one will.
—Jack “Miles” Ventimiglia

The blood of patriots is the seed of the Republic. The founders and those who followed in their footsteps invested their lives in this country. They assured there would be freedom of religion, and from religion, so the government could neither bless nor ban what anyone believes, as occurs under radical theocracies and communist regimes. The founders secured freedom of speech, to assemble and to petition the government to redress grievances, which is denied by China, North Korea, Saudi Arabia and others that fear opposition. They also created one freedom that binds and protects all others, and has done so from before the founding of the republic–freedom of the press.

More than four decades prior to the day when Congress ratified the Constitution, colonial printer John Peter Zenger in 1733 began to publish scathing-but-true stories about the misdeeds of New York’s haughty royal governor. Zenger languished in prison for nearly 10 months for the crime of truth telling about a politician. But Zenger and his attorney made jurors understand a new concept—truth is a defense—and Zenger went free.

Shielded by truth, journalists for nearly three centuries have been free to jab their pens at those who threaten the First Amendment. There are myriad examples involving religion alone. They include news reports about Congress trying to disenfranchise Mormons in the late 1880s and extend to modern times and the painful recognition that even vile speech, such as that practiced by Westboro Baptist Church, must be permitted as a religious liberty.

Journalists help keep us free to question, learn and disagree.

Now, as in the beginning, freedom of the press abides in the courage of men and women who report the news, whether those reports arise from between white columns in Washington, D.C., or beside the fountain at Lions Lake in Washington, Missouri. A reporter’s work is often more routine than grandiose. On most days, reporters gather police and fire statistics; they report on the scandal de jour and the zoning board meeting; and they describe a range of human experiences, from a walk through a conservatory alive with iridescent blue morpho butterflies to a father and daughter found drowned on the Rio Grande’s muddy banks.

But not all journalists complete routine days. A bullet killed Ernie Pyle in a safe zone on Ie Shima during World War II; he is one of many reporters who died to bring the public truth about war. Last year, in Annapolis, Maryland, a man who rejected having his criminal record reported walked into The Capital Gazette and killed five employees. Routine days are not guaranteed.

Seasoned reporters understand the importance of safeguarding the First Amendment. They know, also, that though telling the truth is made more difficult in these topsy-turvy times—when truth is flippantly called “lies” and lies are defended as truth—if they do not do their duty, then no one will. From time to time, explosions of criticism and unfettered hate may around them rage, but because reporters are loyal to the duties of a free press, including to challenge government leaders and policies, each of the First Amendment freedoms continues to wave like stripes in a flag emerging in the dawn’s early light.

By Lee H. Hamilton

There are a lot of reasons why Congress finds itself hamstrung in Washington and discounted by the people it serves at home. But in the end, the demons Congress has to fight are its own. If it is to return to relevance, effectiveness, and higher standing in public opinion, the paths it must follow start on and wind through Capitol Hill.

For starters, Congress has gotten into some terrible legislative habits. The worst is the omnibus bill, which is emblematic of the deeply rooted issues Congress faces. These bills are thousands of pages long and they bypass pretty much the entire legislative process.

Good process is not about efficiency. It’s about bolstering your chances of getting things right. And that means handing authority back to individual members and to the committees so that what comes out of Congress can benefit from the creativity and insights of a wide range of talented politicians.

This step, however, requires another: Congress has to spend more time legislating. Its members work very hard, but not at legislating. Yet if the political and legislative process is a search for remedies to our nation’s problems, then it needs care and attention. Building expertise and finding consensus—even within one’s own party—takes patience, skill, perseverance…and a lot of time.

And honestly, if members of Congress can’t make the time to re-energize the practice of negotiation and compromise, then what hope is there? The definition of being a responsible lawmaker is to deal with divisions and to move the country forward anyway. Otherwise, each side just sits in its corner and maneuvers to beat the other at the next election and we, as a nation, spin in circles.

Finally, Congress needs to spend far more of its energy looking over the executive branch. The current hearings on the Mueller report highlight what’s been lacking: this kind of attention should be paid to every nook and cranny of government.

The point of all this is that without a functional Congress, we don’t have a functional representative democracy. I don’t expect all these things I’ve mentioned to be resolved easily or quickly. But I want to see Congress again become an institution we can be confident is playing a constructive role in our democracy. And until it gets its house in order, I don’t see how that will happen.

Lee Hamilton is a Senior Advisor for the Indiana University Center on Representative Government; a Distinguished Scholar at the IU Hamilton Lugar School of Global and International Studies; and a Professor of Practice at the IU O’Neill School of Public and Environmental Affairs. He was a member of the U.S. House of Representatives for 34 years.

As an 83-year old retired teacher with a bad gut and a bad heart, I count on Michigan’s elected officials to stand up for Medicare. Instead, Congress is stalling on two critical bills (H.R. 1398 and S. 172) that would suspend the Health Insurance Tax (HIT) and stop Medicare Advantage premiums from rising nearly $250 annually per senior. Unless Rep. Moolenar and Senators Stabenow and Peters step up, seniors like me will have to make hard choices between health insurance and other needs. Washington needs to understand that senior health care isn’t a game.

Richard Jackson – Sand Lake, MI

Member, Better Medicare Alliance Protect Our Care Senior Task Force

By Lee H. Hamilton, former U.S. Representative and Senior Advisor for the Indiana University Center on Representative Government

One of the more striking political developments of the last few years has been the partisan sorting of American voters. It used to be that both the Republican and Democratic parties covered some ideological ground. Now, it’s so habitual for conservatives to make their home in the GOP and liberals in the Democratic Party, that party and ideological labels stand in for one another.

Still, you have to be careful. Because when you’re talking about something as complex as Americans’ political beliefs, there’s really no such thing as uniformity.

I often run into conservatives who support liberal positions on one issue or another, and vice versa. It’s very easy for political elites to overstate the degree to which ideological categories actually apply to real people.

True, the divisions that separate liberals and conservatives are real. On social issues, many find themselves sharply divided: over same-sex relationships, the place of marriage and family in our society, and, of course, abortion. This last may be the most divisive issue of all.

And they are sharply divided over the role of government and government intervention in the lives of Americans on economic matters. This is in part a conflict over welfare and the degree to which government should be involved in programs to alleviate poverty or to protect working people from the bumps, bruises, and hardships dealt out by the national economy.

Yet even here, the divisions are not as sharp as they used to be. Over and over, I’m reminded that learning a voter’s views on one issue could tell you next to nothing about his or her views on others, or may actually mislead you.

It’s pretty common these days to bemoan the ideological divisions evident in our politics, especially when the differences are weaponized for partisan purposes. But I’d argue that far from being debilitating, the political debate they give rise to is a sign of the vigor of the political system.

Sure, trying to deal with deep-seated differences is extremely difficult for a politician. But it’s also part of the attraction and the challenge of politics. And if you see voters as the complex opinion-holders they really are, common ground may not be as impossible to find as it can seem at first glance.

Lee Hamilton is a Senior Advisor for the Indiana University Center on Representative Government; a Distinguished Scholar of the IU Hamilton Lugar School of Global and International Studies; and a Professor of Practice, IU School of Public and Environmental Affairs. He was a member of the U.S. House of Representatives for 34 years.

By Lee H. Hamilton

Debate in Congress has always been contentious. The levels of vitriol may seem especially acute these days, but confrontation is not new. I can remember times on Capitol Hill when “debate” was actually more of a screaming match than a civil discussion.

Back then, we had a colleague who invariably stepped forward at these times to remind each side that if we wanted to get anything done—rather than just shout at each other for the cameras—we had to have a measure of trust in one another. We used to call this his “Trust is the coin of the realm speech.” And though we joked about it, we appreciated it—because he was right.

Representative government depends on trust. It depends on trust among policy-makers in Congress, even when they don’t agree with one another. It depends on popular trust in the people who make decisions on Capitol Hill and in the White House. It depends on trust in those who are charged with implementing those laws. And it requires trust in the institutions in which those decisions are produced and implemented.

We might have joked about my long-ago colleague’s speech, but trust really is the coin of the realm. It is a bedrock requirement of democratic governance. If there’s nothing but cynicism, deep suspicion, and lack of confidence in the system, it cannot work.

To understand how interwoven trust must be within the system, think about it from the point of view of ordinary citizens. We have to believe that our voices will be heard, listened to, and taken into consideration in the halls of power.

This means that those in power must be accountable, and that the institutions they serve in will function in predictable, rule-based ways. Which is why it is so damaging when government acts in ways that diminish trust.

If you feel that government is just helping corporations and rich people, you lose confidence in the system. If people see a government that tolerates a high degree of economic inequality in the country, and great disparities in opportunities between rich people and middle-class people, they no longer trust that system.

Yet for representative democracy to work, public officials, politicians and policy makers have to have a sufficient level of support from ordinary people. You and I have to believe that our representatives will in fact level with us rather than present half-truths and distortions, and will act in our interests. Similarly, for government to have any standing in our lives, we have to have confidence in the experts, technocrats, and frontline staff who make the system work.

This means, in turn, that government has to be able to deliver the goods, the services, the protections that people expect. So the performance of the government—its efficiency and effectiveness—is fundamental to the success of representative democracy.

It’s the same with our elected representatives. If they can’t show they’re able to function according to the rules, traditions and norms that we expect, if they are unable to demonstrate durability in the face of adversity, if they are unable to acknowledge the facts, if they cannot rise above division and gridlock and negotiate to get things done, then we lose faith. This may explain why so many have become suspicious not just of our government, but of one another.

Ironically, one cure for this lack of trust is more exposure to the system, through engagement and participation in politics or in civic life. If people are regular participants in political parties, clubs, organizations, or associations of all kinds in their communities, they are much more likely to carry some level of trust in government. And to the extent they don’t do these things, public life seems more distant and less trustworthy.

There is no doubt that my colleague was right. If the various levels of government don’t enjoy the trust of the people, if within each level the participants don’t trust one another, then representative democracy doesn’t work.

This is why the low levels of trust we see in the United States today are so worrisome. How far down this road can we go before we lose the ability to function effectively as a democracy?

Lee Hamilton is a Senior Advisor for the Indiana University Center on Representative Government; a Distinguished Scholar of the IU Hamilton Lugar School of Global and International Studies; and a Professor of Practice, IU School of Public and Environmental Affairs. He was a member of the U.S. House of Representatives for 34 years.