Founders Would Be Unamused by Tea Party's 'No Taxes' Schtick

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Founders Would Be Unamused by Tea Party's 'No Taxes' Schtick



M.V. Jantzen/Flickr
M.V. Jantzen/Flickr


This basic line quickly became the reigning mantra within conservative circles. But this dogma jumbles the historical record. The patriots of 1776 didn't stage a revolution to keep government small. They revolted to keep America relatively equal.

As new archival research by economists Peter Lindert and Jeffrey Williamson documents, those colonists lived in a society that sported far more equality than mother England. In 1774, on the Revolution's eve, the colonies probably enjoyed "a more egalitarian income distribution" than "any other place on the planet," Lindert and Williamson write.



What explained the difference? In mother England, American patriots noted, wealthy aristocrats were manipulating the levers of government to enrich themselves and deny average people the "fruits of their labor."




Our founders wouldn't repeat that mistake. They would celebrate the relative equality of their young nation as a bulwark of republican liberty.

"We have no paupers," Thomas Jefferson wrote. "The great mass of our population is of laborers; our rich, who can live without labor, either manual or professional, being few, and of moderate wealth."

Added Jefferson: "Can any condition of society be more desirable than this?"

To Jefferson and his generation, equity seemed nature's way. Most colonials lived on small farms. The earth they farmed could yield only so much wealth. If government just let the economy alone, no one would ever become fabulously wealthy.

This advocacy for "limited government" seemed to make sense in an agrarian nation. But the United States didn't remain agrarian. A century after 1776, giant corporations lorded over America's economic landscape, and new industrial elites were enriching themselves at the expense of working Americans.


Over recent decades, we've lost that vision. Our top 1 percent now expropriates a greater share of national income than the old English aristocracy did.

The tea party followers and their pals don't mind this glaring inequality. But the founders cared deeply about equality. So should we.


Sam Pizzigati


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