When did 'liberal' become a dirty word?

When did 'liberal' become a dirty word?
Clarence Page
Copyright © 2007, Chicago Tribune
July 29, 2007


The greatest triumph that conservatives ever achieved is to make liberals embarrassed to call themselves "liberal."

That thought came to mind as I watched Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton rhetorically wriggle her way, as so many liberals do, right out of using the "L-word" to describe herself.

During the CNN/YouTube debate by Democratic presidential candidates, Clinton was asked, "How would you define the word 'liberal' and would you use this word to describe yourself?"

Briefly she showed off her knowledge of the word's various meanings over the past, oh, century or two.

She pointed out how the word used to mean that "you were for the freedom to achieve, that you were willing to stand against big power and on behalf of the individual."

She lamented that the word "in the last 30, 40 years" has been "turned up on its head" and "made to seem as though it is a word that describes big government."

So, she said, she would rather call herself a "modern progressive" who "believes strongly in individual rights and freedoms" and "working together" to "find ways to help those who may not have all the advantages in life get the tools they need to lead a more productive life for themselves and their family."

Nice speech. Historically accurate too. Early liberals were opposed to the oppression brought on by big government. Adam Smith, a founding father of free-market "invisible hand" capitalism, was a classic liberal in that sense.

That sense evolved under the trust-busting of Theodore Roosevelt into a protection of individuals from abuses by big institutions in the private sector too.

Franklin Roosevelt's New Deal shifted the meaning further in favor of big government as a benevolent shield and safety net against unpredictable disasters of life.

After President Lyndon B. Johnson's Great Society expansions, it was perhaps inevitable that liberals would go overboard and lose touch with growing middle-class resentments about taxes, welfare abuse and government inefficiency.

The conservative revival found its finest megaphone in Ronald Reagan, who declared:

- "Government is not the answer to the problem. Government is the problem."

- "The most frightening words in the English language are 'I'm from the government, and I'm here to help you.'"

Democratic presidential candidates were blindsided by the Reagan counterrevolution. It took the centrist Bill Clinton to reunite the coalition across racial and class lines that earlier liberal presidents enjoyed.

But for all the efforts by the Clintons to call their politics "centrist" or "progressive" they still get tagged with "liberal" by conservatives who define "liberal" as anyone who is not their idea of conservative.

So, just once I would like to hear a leading Democratic candidate answer the "Are-you-a-liberal" question with the candor of my late Uncle James. He drove ambulances in the Army during World War II and later at a steel mill in my hometown. He was a working-class Democrat since Roosevelt's New Deal wooed him away from the party of Abraham Lincoln.

He used to define liberal like this: "Government ought to help people. You got a problem with that?" I don't have a problem with that. That sentiment clearly defines a key difference between liberals and Reagan-style conservatives, which is what all of the current Republican candidates proudly claim to be. The Democratic candidates, by contrast, admire President John F. Kennedy, but seldom claim to be a Kennedy-style liberal.

Yet, conservatives are just as vulnerable as liberals to the hubris that makes successful politicians lose touch with the way their grand theories go over with real people. President Bush, for example, found out with the collapse of his one of signature issues, Social Security reform. The more speeches he gave, the more most Americans hated his plan. Given uncertain alternatives, government doesn't look so bad after all.

In fact, when it comes to big government, it's hard to beat Bush. Under his watch, according to a study by the libertarian Cato Institute, the federal government grew more than it did under Johnson and only slightly less than it did under fellow conservative Richard Nixon -- and that's not including Bush's defense or homeland security spending.

Nixon famously said in 1971 that we are all Keynesians now, referring to the economist John Maynard Keynes, who believed government should play an active economic role. Bush might appropriately quip, "We're all liberals now."

After all, the word is available. Democrats are afraid to go near it. They don't know a good thing when they've got it.

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Clarence Page is a member of the Tribune's editorial board. E-mail: cptime@aol.com