MISSOURI WATCH: POLITCALLY INADEQUATE WOULD BE A BETTER WORD FOR IT

After the most recent session of the Missouri General Assembly, I had a university political science student conduct a telephone survey of 25 citizens, scattered throughout the state, on their knowledge of what the Legislature had accomplished -- and what it had not.

Putting it mildly, the results were astonishing.

One first should know the mechanics of the survey: Thirteen were to be residents of either St. Louis or Kansas City, with 12 to be outstate residents from all regions of the state. Their names were to be selected from telephone books by blind choice and in the event no one answered, another number was to be selected until a receptive voice came on the line. Although I had estimated the survey would require no more than an eight-hour day, its successful completion required the better part of three days because so many issues had to be explained.

New for the questions and responses:

Of the 25 Missourians surveyed, none could answer the question: "Did the General Assembly enact an omnibus welfare reform law in the session just ended, and if so, can you supply any details?"

Now welfare reform, if we are to believe the politicians in Washington, is of vital concern to the average American. But if this is so, it is not of much interest to the average Missourian? Not a single citizen contacted could say, with certainty, whether the 1997 General Assembly had enacted any measure dealing with reforming welfare assistance, which, incidentally, includes programs that cost more than 35 cents of every $1 spent by the state.

Several respondents spoke enthusiastically about the need to "end welfare fraud" and most seemed to be in favor of the concept. One poor soul responded that she believed the Legislature had enacted "something about that omnibus part," which as far as I'm concerned, brings not laughter but tears.

Only three of the 25 questioned could say whether this year's session had met any of the demands of Missouri's gaming industry (it didn't), although a couple said they were looking forward to playing the electronic games that would soon be available at race tracks, a scheme that failed to win legislative approval.

Although 17 persons polled were aware lawmakers had approved tax relief in the form of eliminating the state sales tax on food, only nine were aware of the relief afforded private pension recipients. Several respondents even denied that any action had been taken concerning private-pension tax relief, with one St. Louis male declaring firmly, "Naw, I know they didn't cut any pension taxes."

Respondents seemed equally confused about any action taken to redistribute desegregation payments now going to urban schools under federal court orders. None of the persons questioned was able to correctly identify the two proposals that were under consideration in the recent session.

Only six respondents seemed to know legislators had followed Gov. Carnahan's request to build two new prisons in addition to those now being constructed. Although six were aware of legislative affirmation, 19 agreed that more prisons were required, while none offered suggestions for alternatives.

This poll is less interesting for what it shows about the recent session than for what it shows about American democracy. It's not that citizens are scandalously uninformed. It's that they seem to believe they have a right to their ignorance. Everywhere one goes, citizens are expressing outrage about how poorly they are governed, without having the slightest idea exactly how they are governed. This is not, surely, a question of being misinformed.

No one, not even the radical right and left haranguers, are out there spreading the falsehood that lawmakers approved electronic games at non-existent race tracks or that the state had shut down desegregation payments to urban school districts. Citizens are forming and expressing passionate views about government, at the local and state and federal levels, on the basis of no information at all, or only half information that was gathered but not assimilated at the time of delivery. Or, worse yet, they think that the records of legislative sessions are a matter of opinions, like everything else, and public policy questions are to be judged not on facts but on knee-jerk views that bear no resemblance to realistic data.

Populism, that great ideal of so many of today's "reformers," in its latest manifestation celebrates ignorant opinion and undifferentiated rage. As long as citizens are mad as hell and aren't going to take it anymore, no one will inquire very closely into what exactly "it" is and whether anyone really ought to feel that way.

Pandering politicians are partly to blame. So is the way the communications revolution is eroding representative government by providing instant feedback between voters' whims and politicians' actions. In view of all this, perhaps it's no surprise that citizens have come to believe that their opinions on the issues of the day need not be fettered by either facts or intelligent reflection.

The poll just undertaken would seem to indicate two things about today's citizen: He is poorly, if at all, informed and he seems not to care. Neither is good news for the democratic process that America created two centuries ago.

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