Charter Day Remarks, 2002
February 9, 2002
Since September 11, we all inhabit a different world-a world not of our making and not much to our liking-but a different world. The immense tragedy of that day taught us yet again how great is the power of evil, but how much greater are the forces of freedom. Like all of you, I have found not just solace-but inspiration-in the strength of our President, the courage of our soldiers-and the unity of our people. We have seen a strong and welcome rebirth of patriotic feeling-a feeling reflected in our determination to destroy utterly that malignant web of lunatic terrorists who count life cheap and who erred-fatally-in their belief that America had gone soft-that we had grown too rich and too lazy to fight for what matters most. They are finding out now the strength of American power and the power of American unity. And so it is now time for us-as it was for those who went before us-to give proof to our enemies that we mean it when we say "Don't tread on me."
Yet patriotism, if it is to mean anything important -cannot be reduced to a simple shout of loyalty-cannot be long sustained by affixing flag decals to anything that moves. Still less can true patriotism be nurtured if every honest doubt expressed about the wisdom of American policy is treated as traitorous.
"Patriotism" wrote Samuel Johnson "is the last refuge of a scoundrel." And he was right. What is pure and powerful becomes corrupt and cowardly in the hands of those who raise a false standard of preening patriotism.
We have within us the power to touch a deeper-a more profound-cord of patriotic feeling-but only if we trouble to ask: "what is it about our country that commands not just our affection-but our love? What is it in the American story that sustains our strong belief that this nation is and always has been "as a city upon a hill;" that we are and always have been "the last best hope of earth;" that we are and always have been "the great arsenal of democracy"?
Answers to hard questions like these open a path to understanding the deeper meaning of American patriotism. We love freedom-yes-freedom is America's oxygen. But the future of American freedom depends critically upon education. Jefferson knew it when he so wisely said: "He who hopes to be ignorant and free, hopes for that which never was and never will be." Education is the only effective antidote to ignorance-and it is education that makes possible enlightened and active citizenship-which is itself the foundation of a civil and civilized society. So for me-the essence of thoughtful patriotism is the citizens' solemn commitment to work tirelessly for a more just and more tolerant America.
We can test the vitality of thoughtful patriotism in a thousand ways. Most of us first think of patriotism as defining love of country-and so it does. But love of country is not the only test of a thoughtful patriotism. Equally relevant-indeed perhaps of more immediate concern to us-is how we measure our love of this Commonwealth. For we see reflected in the measure of Virginia's happiness-how deeply we care about protecting her enduring greatness. And-quite frankly my friends-by this perhaps more unconventional test-the news is not good.
In a short span of years, we have gone far toward abandoing a seventy-five-year-old bedrock tradition of fiscal prudence. At the end of a decade of economic abundance beyond the dreams of prior generations, Virginia's public finances are in a shocking state of structural insolvency. That is a sobering phrase-and an even more sobering condition. We all owe a debt of gratitude for the candor and the courage with which our new Governor has told us not what we want to hear but what we need to know.
Do you not wonder how it is that we could have allowed such a thing to happen? In her last book-The March of Folly-Barbara Tuchman chronicled a curious phenomenon: the pursuit by governments of policies contrary to their own interests.
"Mankind," she wrote, ". . . makes poorer performance of government than almost any other human activity. In this sphere, wisdom, which may be defined as the exercise of judgment acting on experience, common sense and available information is less operative and more frustrated than it should be." "Why," she concludes, "why do holders of high office so often act contrary to the way that reason points and enlightened self-interest suggests?"
Were Ms. Tuchman still alive and writing additional chapters for her book, our Commonwealth, I fear, would be a prime candidate for inclusion in the new edition. Beyond the usual tension between personal ambition and the public good, too many of our leaders have focused their philosophy too narrowly and too inflexibly on principles of dubious utility. Chief among them are these:
- Virginia' government can never be too small or too cheap.
- It is always a good time to cut taxes.
- It is never a good time to raise them.
Some claim that these are conservative principles. Perhaps they are, but not when applied with such insistent rigidity that almost all other considerations are crowded out. It is no part of a legitimate conservatism to regard repeated tax reductions and simultaneously increased borrowing as a road to anywhere but where we have arrived: insolvency.
And what are the consequences of this persistent folly? In the coming months, the wreckage will become apparent in all corners of the Commonwealth:
- on this and other campuses where educational opportunity and academic excellence will be casualties
- on our roads-where yet more congestion will be our certain fate
- in our public schools, where our children will learn less and be more poorly equipped to meet the challenge of the future while being taught by teachers whose economic circumstances become increasingly dire.
- in the lives of our most vulnerable citizens-whose pain and desperation will be intensified because of an indefensibly penurious public policy.
How could we have allowed all of this to happen? It is not complicated-really. There has been a dual failure-of principled leadership and informed citizenship. We have -regrettably-recently experienced a style of leadership reminiscent of Barbara Tuchman's description of Philip II of Spain. He was a leader of whom she said "No experience of the failure of his policy could shake his belief in its essential excellence.
"But-we-we the people-must bear the larger share of responsibility. We have wanted too much to believe what we knew could not be true: that consistently lower taxes could be had without degrading any of the public benefits to which we believed ourselves entitled. And now the bills have come due-the free lunch turned out not to be free-and we are paying the price of our delusion.
The way out will require a sharp reversal of the way in. We need a new style of leadership built on candor, based on faith that our people can see beyond self-interest and firmly focused on a sound vision of Virginia's future. But we must also see a renaissance of active citizenship-a rediscovery of thoughtful and vigorous participation in the political process. We must be sure our leaders know that we know that we have been played for a sucker's game-with the inevitable unhappy results. We must demonstrate a new maturity and-a new realism-based upon a true conservatism-once better known as fiscal responsibility. We should no longer contenance the perpetuation of a political culture so far removed from reality that it is thought to require courage to tell the truth.
The Governor has put the brutal facts before us and the stark truth on the line.
Virginians must now do their part-confronting the crucial question: What kind of Commonwealth do we want and how much are we prepared to pay for it?
The Governor and General Assembly cannot answer this question alone. They both need and deserve our help and support.
Governor, let me assure you of this-here at William and Mary you will have it.
Who can now doubt that as Virginians we must face the challenge of hard times and hard choices? But-you know-the right to choose-is the greatest privilege of free men and free women. And as we turn to face these challenges-we are not alone-we have the consolation and the promise of history.
Only two weeks after the signing of the Declaration of Independence, Virginian John Page wrote to his close college friend Thomas Jefferson expressing a wish shared by American patriots in all times of crisis.
"God preserve the United States," Page wrote, "We know the Race is not to the Swift, nor the Battle to the Strong. Do you not think an Angel rides in the whirlwind and directs this Storm?"
John Page believed that divine providence would protect our new nation against the superior power of a great empire. His faith was justified.
And so to the faith of John Page and his fellow patriots- I say-amen-but to his words I offer this amendment: God preserve Virginia-do you not hope an angel rides in the whirlwind and directs this storm?
When historians write the history of our time, the answer to the question of whether an angel was found to ride in this whirlwind will not depend upon divine providence. No-not upon that-but rather whether this generation of Virginians found the heart and found the strength to preserve and protect for our posterity the honor and honesty of the Commonwealth it was our great privilege to inherit.
