MISSOURI WATCH: IN PERSPECTIVE, BIG GOVERNMENT IS A FACT OF LIFE

Every time I hear some politician talk about today's political revolution or the unique time in which we live or the painful changes now occurring in America, I recall an earlier time in our history when there was indeed a revolution and times were indeed unique and when monumental changes were indeed being made.

I'm not talking about 1995. Rather I'm talking about a century ago. Conditions then were greatly different than today. In 1890, the nation's population was 63 million; today it's 258 million. In 1890 the rise of huge corporations and exploding cities threatened to reduce freedom and definitely posed significant threats to life as it was known for our grandparents and great-grandparents.

Those who tell us that America has never experienced greater challenges than in the 1990s must not be aware of what life was about, say in the 1850s, in our nation. If that generation survived to 1895, they witnessed far more upheaval than Americans born in 1950. We're just not talking about the Civil War. The nation was moving from a farming to an industrial society. In 1850, only one city, New York, had more than 250,000 people; about 85 percent of us lived on farms or in small rural towns. By 1890, the population had nearly tripled and the urban population was a third of the total.

It would not be wise to ignore the changes in more recent years. We have witnessed the inauguration of computers, the explosion of television, which was in 9 percent of our households in 1950 and in 98 percent today, and a civil rights evolution that has changed all of our lives.

As dramatic as these changes may be, they are less threatening when viewed with those in the last century. Annual steel production in this country went from 13,000 tons to 11 million tons between 1860 and 1900; the number of factory workers more than quintupled in the same time frame; our rail network went from 9,000 miles to 250,000.

Like today's changing society, the revolutions occurring in the second half of the 1800s were desperately resisted by the vast majority, for we truly believed that our democracy was rooted in self-reliant farmers and craftsmen. There was no more American frontier, only the rapidly increasing metropolitan regions that some predicted would overrun millions of acres of farmland. Yes, there were exaggerations of doom even then.

The changes fostered at the end of the last century produced not only fear and anxiety, but frustration and anger. America became an intellectually and ideologically divided nation with the traditionalists insisting we were all goners and the optimists foreseeing a rosy future that never quite seemed to materialize for the vast majority of families.

Today, of course, the "enemy" has changed faces, at least on the -surface. A century ago, the "trusts" and "money interests" were the goblins that were the natural enemy of the people. If you substitute today's cries against "big government" and "high taxes" for "big business" and "corporate greed" you will have some understanding of what your forefathers were extremely worried and deeply frustrated about.

Between the start of this century and the Great Depression, Americans sought to protect themselves in a variety of ways, from laws regulating railroad rates to antitrust rules. Big government wasn't a problem back then; Uncle Sam spent only 3 percent of the national income in 1929. And as disturbing as all of these early problems were to our ancestors, none of them could devise any satisfactory way to eradicate them.

Government began to get bigger as the economy wrestled with the Great Depression, which was occurring not only in our country but throughout the world, and it became even larger when we sought to defeat opposing military powers that threatened not only our borders but our basic freedoms. No one can look back at either of these two crises and suggest that no effort should have been made to meet them. Government grew larger not because of the political ideologies of those running it but because it seemed to be the only plausible method to combat two life-destroying threats to the very fabric of America.

Today we are witnessing what Newt Gingrich has claimed is a "revolution," but he exaggerates the extent of his changes. The GOP "contract" seeks to reduce spending to 18 percent of our Gross Domestic Product by the year 2002, down from 21 percent now. This cut would be large, about $210 billion in today's dollars, and some programs will end, but federal spending will still be about a fifth of the nation's income---a far cry from 1929's 3 percent. Just as importantly, the spending priorities will remain basically unchanged.

As further proof, let it be noted that today's programs for the elderly, principally Social Security and Medicare, account for 35 percent of federal spending, and despite Gingrich's claims and with his blessing, this total will be an estimated 43 percent by 2002. You really don't have much of a cost-cutting revolution going if your plans call for a spending increase of 8 percent in programs for just one segment of the nation's population.

Just as our early ancestors were unable to contain the momentum of industrialization, today's generation is unlikely to do anything more than slow the momentum of big government in the foreseeable future. We may be able to empower the states, but it should be noted that the states are being "empowered" with federal gifts of dollar bills. And any state official in Missouri who believes he will soon have the right to control the basic direction of any of these block-grant programs is a whole lot dumber than he even suspects.

As shocking as the Republican reform suggestions may be to some, the truth is that virtually every paragraph of the Gingrich contract confirms the continued role of big government, even if some of its presence is trimmed. Programs that are being saved are programs deemed essential to the vast majority of Americans, even if some would prefer higher fiscal numbers.

The reality is that bigness, whether in business or in government, eventually becomes too big to contain. When that occurs the best that can be hoped for is slowing its growth.

~Jack Stapleton of Kennett is the editor of the Missouri News and Editorial Service.