The Tea Party and Civic Education

Make no mistake: The Tea Party is not Republican. It is a separate, anti-democratic, anarchist faction. The characterization is mine, although at least the first part is broadly shared. According to a Pew Research study*, “47% of the public says they think of the Tea Party movement as separate and independent from the Republican Party, while somewhat fewer (38%) say it is a part of the Republican Party, and 14% do not offer an opinion.” Even among the rank and file, “more Republicans view the Tea Party as a separate movement from the GOP (51%) than as part of the Republican Party (32%).”

In terms of civic education, the Tea Party provides examples of how radicalism can derail democracy. Tea Party initiatives deform our otherwise nearly universal understanding of democratic governance for the common good. Some of this faction’s actions undermine the ideal of the common school as an entity, and most Tea Party initiatives contribute to students’ misunderstandings and confusion about how American democracy is supposed to work. But there are some useful lessons to be learned in all of this.

Every political party is composed of an informal coalition of relatively likeminded individuals and groups. However, the coalition of the Tea Party and the Republican Party more closely resembles the type of coalition found in parliamentary democracies. Governing parliamentary coalitions often are composed of parties that, under other circumstances, would not share the same room. If the Republican Party, as some of its members aver, is operating from a “big tent” philosophy, then the Tea Party is setting fire to its corner of the canvas.

As bad examples go, the recent cliffhanger over government funding was a doozy. Tea Party radicals essentially held the Republican Party, the federal government, and, by extension, the American people hostage to the point of forcing a government shutdown in an attempt to defund what amounted to a small portion of the Affordable Care Act (or Obamacare). In so doing, Tea Partiers cost U.S. citizens and businesses billions ($24 billion according to Time), rather ironic considering the Tea Party platform is all about decreasing taxes, saving people money, and saving people from “big government.”

The government shutdown, any defensive rhetoric to the contrary, was wholly driven by this radical faction. Consequently, support for the Tea Party has declined. However, because the Republican Party has embraced, at least putatively, its radical rightwing brothers and sisters, the GOP has been tarred with the same brush. This does not bode well for midterm elections, where Republicans are likely to face stiff opposition in all but the most ardently conservative districts.

A couple of civics lessons in this national debacle should not be lost. (It was a debacle, though it could have been a greater one—with even more dire international consequences—had not a last-minute deal been brokered.) First, obstruction is not governance. The exercise of democratic governance requires finding common ground in pursuit of the common good, not clinging obstinately to an ideology with citizens, nation, and world be damned. Second, holding the nation hostage in an attempt to force on everyone the faction’s narrow ideology ultimately is a counterproductive strategy. In our democracy, fortunately, wiser, or at least more moderate, heads eventually prevail; and radicalism harms not only the larger society, and often the people in support of radicalism, but also the radical cause itself.

In Federalist No. 10, James Madison addresses the dangers of factions. Now might be a good time for students both young and old to read or reread this brief.

While conventional wisdom is that the Republican coalition cannot succeed without pandering to the Tea Party faction, it might also be a good time for thinking conservatives to rethink that position. By cutting loose the Tea Party, mainstream Republicanism might be revived by drawing back into their “big tent” those moderates who have defected rather than be held hostage by radicalism. This would not be a bad thing. It might well provide a lesson in how to reposition a party using reason in place of ideology.

* “Tea Party’s Image Turns More Negative,” Pew Research, October 16, 2013.