By Dale M. Rhodes, special to Statehouse Report | South Carolina statesman and political theorist John C. Calhoun will require no introduction to the readers of Statehouse Report. In the years between 1845 and 1850, Calhoun compiled the political thoughts and observations of a lifetime in a 100-page essay, A Disquisition on Government, which Calhoun scholar Guy Story Brown describes as “generally regarded from the time of its publication as the greatest American work in political theory.”
I believe that in Calhoun’s efforts to delineate the fundamental processes of just and effective government, he speaks across the generations to specific issues before the legislators and citizens of South Carolina in the present day, and hope I may be permitted to suggest some specific references and contexts:
“Nothing is more difficult than to equalize the action of the government, in reference to the various diverse interests of the community…”
The State Retirement System. Taxpayers, retirees, current employees, legislators and other groups are certain to continue to express and support the most urgently and earnestly held concerns about the future of the system. Some of those concerns may be competitive or even exclusive. I believe Calhoun would counsel the greatest wisdom, circumspection and patience among these groups, and the recognition that all groups affected may need to accept some level of change and compromise, in order to effectuate a resolution of any important force and effect.
“Some conception may be formed, how one portion of the community may be crushed, and the other elevated on its ruins, by systematically perverting the power of taxation and disbursement, for the purpose of aggrandizing and building up one portion of the community at the expense of the other.”
Sales tax exemptions. The current schedule of exemptions may very well be based in large part upon policies found to be most valid and prudent at the time of argument and adoption, and has been considered, in my experience and opinion, with vigor and analytical skill of the highest order by bodies of the General Assembly. But I believe Calhoun points us to a need for continuing review in the light of changing circumstances, and with a most particular view toward the possible, concomitant distortion of consumer spending habits, and a full consideration of the economic and social well being of South Carolina households.
“What is called public opinion, instead of being the united opinion of the whole community is usually nothing more than the opinion or voice of the strongest interest…The press is used by them as the means of controlling public opinion and of so moulding it, as to promote their particular interests…”
Gasoline tax. In the preceding session and in one of the State’s most needful hours following the 2015 floods, the President Pro Tempore of the Senate [Hugh Leatherman] strove mightily to build a consensus in support of an adjustment to South Carolina’s famously low gasoline tax. This effort was blocked, and the related discussion and negotiation utterly confused by the Governor’s assertion that total per capita taxation was already excessive, a claim shortly disproved by responsible analysis and reporting.
A central focus of the Disquisition is the concept of seeking balance and equity in governing a society comprised by vigorously competing and disparate elements and interests. The inevitable but ultimately, in Calhoun’s view, manageable result is encapsulated in the statement, “Government, although intended to protect and preserve society, has itself a strong tendency to disorder.” I believe there could be no more eloquent encouragement to the faithful, alert and active readers of Statehouse Report.
Certified Public Accountant Dale M. “Dusty” Rhodes lived and worked in Columbia for 40 years, including 29 years in state government, before retiring to Richmond, Va. Have a comment? Send to: feedback@statehousereport.com
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