Over at the DC Examiner, I have a piece tied to President Obama’s address before Congress tonight. It’s called “The President Talks Too Much.” An excerpt:
In recent weeks, the president has been anywhere and everywhere, with a campaign-style blitz of media appearances and town hall meetings. But, hard as it is to imagine in this era of the omnipresent president, there was a time when presidents weren’t seen much and were heard even less. There might be a lesson there for Obama.
Our founding fathers didn’t want a president who’d perpetually pound the bully pulpit. They viewed presidential speechifying as a sign of demagoguery, and thought Congress should take the lead on most matters of national policy. They expected the nation’s chief executive to pipe down, mind his constitutional business, and keep his hands to himself.
The “permanent campaign” that dominates modern presidential politics would have appalled our forefathers. Accepting the 1844 Democratic nomination, James K. Polk described the custom of the time: “the office of president of the United States should neither be sought nor declined.”
When 19th-century candidates spoke publicly, they sometimes felt compelled to apologize, as 1872 Democratic contender Horace Greeley did, for breaking “the unwritten law of our country that a candidate for President may not make speeches.”
The modern ritual of the State of the Union–with members of Congress rising to clap for every outsized promise–has grown weirdly anti-republican. Congressmen and women are members of a coordinate branch, and they ought not to be clapping maniacally like so many members of the Supreme Soviet. (George W. Bush’s last SOTU was interrupted 72 times by applause).
It would be nice if Obama returned to the Jeffersonian tradition of writing out the State of the Union and sending it over by messenger, rather than delivering it in person before Congress assembled. Of course, that’s never going to happen. There is one thing he could do, however, that would endear him to millions of Americans in the viewing public: start the speech with the following words:
“Ladies and Gentlemen: Please hold your applause to the end.”
