February 20, 1973
Page 4646
THE NEW FEDERALISM
Mr. MUSKIE. Mr. President, at a time when Congress is debating the President's proposals to create a "new federalism" through such means as decentralization, budget cuts, and special revenue sharing, there have been a number of timely and thought-provoking newspaper columns and articles discussing various aspects of the proposals. Two such articles appeared today in the Washington Post and the Wall Street Journal.
David Broder's column is entitled "Political Gain: Billing It to the Poor," and discusses the impact of the administration's decisions to shelve welfare reform and legal services for the poor.
In a related article, "Putting Strings on Federal Aid," Arlen J. Large raises many questions which the Subcommittee on Intergovernmental Relations will explore in its hearings on the new federalism that begin tomorrow.
I ask unanimous consent that the two articles be printed in the RECORD.
There being no objection, the articles were ordered to be printed in the RECORD, as follows:
POLITICAL GAIN: BILLING IT TO THE POOR
(By David S. Broder)
Whatever its shrewdness as a political tactic, the Nixon administration's retreat from welfare reform and its willingness to abandon or dismember the program of legal services for the poor is undercutting the moral and logical base of its own design for reshaping domestic policy.
That is a sweeping statement, I realize, but it is the only conclusion one can draw from a consideration of the contradictions between the premises of the President's program and the actions he is sanctioning today.
A convenient starting point from which to see what has happened is a paragraph of Daniel P. Moynihan's new book, "The Politics of a Guaranteed Income," in which Mr. Nixon's first-term domestic counselor discusses the three "strategies" available to the government to assist the poor in America.
One was the "services strategy," the direct provision or financing of a wide variety of programs aimed at meeting the needs or improving the opportunities of the poor. As Moynihan notes, this was "quintessentially the approach of political liberalism in the middle third of the 20th Century."
The second was the "legal strategy," the use of the courts and the legal process to end discrimination and obtain equal access to all public programs and facilities. This approach, carried out by both private organizations and the government, was embodied, among other places, in the legal services program of the anti-poverty agency, the Office of Economic Opportunity.
The third was the "income strategy," the transfer of money to the poor via the simple mechanism of taxing-in-and-paying-out, with the goal of enabling the poor to obtain, through the marketplace, the goods and services they most valued for themselves.
Given this choice of options, Mr. Nixon's domestic strategy unfolded in clear and logical terms.
In his first years as President, we saw Mr. Nixon slowing the growth rate of domestic service programs, while putting increasing reliance on the income and legal strategy. His own words are worth recalling.
In his 1969 welfare reform message, he said: "I propose a new approach that will make it more attractive to work than to go on welfare, and will establish a nationwide minimum payment to dependent families with children. I propose that the federal government pay a basic income to those American families who cannot care for themselves in whatever state they live."
In his poverty program reorganization message of that same year, Mr. Nixon proposed that "the office of legal services ... be strengthened and elevated so that ... it will take on central responsibility for programs which help provide advocates for the poor in their dealings with social institutions. The sluggishness of many institutions at all levels of society in responding to the needs of individual citizens is one of the central problems of our time," he said.
"Disadvantaged persons in particular must be assisted so that they fully understand the lawful means of making their needs known and having those needs met."
In the light of that history, what can one say about Mr. Nixon's current domestic policy? He has carried forward his campaign against the "services strategy" full blast and in his new budget is proposing not just the slowdown, but the abolition of dozens of programs designed to provide services for the poor.
But what has happened to the other two strategies that were to substitute for it? The incomes strategy has been abandoned by Mr. Nixon. There is no welfare reform or minimum-income proposal in his budget, and none is likely to be forthcoming.
As for legal services, the outlook is equally grim. Having frustrated Congress efforts to create an independent, nonpolitical Legal Services Corporation by insisting on personal control of its board of directors, Mr. Nixon is now presiding over the destruction of the existing OEO legal services program, which has been signally successful in obtaining equal access to government benefits for its poor clients and which enjoys the strong support of the organized bar.
At the same time, he is continuing the other phases f his decentralization program by proposing to go beyond general revenue sharing into a broad range of subsidies to local governments, for them to use as they wish.
In effect, he is telling the poor, "Don't come to Washington with your problems. Get what you need from your local government."
To do that to the poor, without giving them the financial or legal resources to wage the fight for their rights in those thousands of local communities, is not a strategy for achieving social justice and simultaneously reducing the power and influence of the central government.
It is a callous sacrifice of the minority who are poor to the political tactics of attempting to create a Republican majority from the many who are complacent and comfortable.
It is a disillusioning spectacle for those of us who thought Mr. Nixon was attempting something more worthy.
PUTTING STRINGS ON FEDERAL AID
(By Arlen J. Large)
WASHINGTON.– "The answer to many of the domestic problems we face is not higher taxes and more spending," President Nixon said in his State-of-the-Union message. "It is less waste, more results and greater freedom for the individual American to earn a rightful place in his own community – and for states and localities to address their own needs in their own ways, in the light of their own priorities."
Well, the governors and mayors and local folks will drink to that. So will such good Nixon Republicans as Caspar Weinberger, the new Secretary f Health, Education and Welfare; Sen. John Tower of Texas and Sen. Edward Gurney of Florida.
But even these men, not to mention Democrats who don't like Mr. Nixon's decentralizing plans, feel the inevitable urge to use their offices to solve problems. Because they hold federal offices, their handles on the problems tend to be federal handles. So in the months ahead there's reason to expect resistance to Mr. Nixon's proposal to abolish some 70 existing Washington-controlled grant programs. (In their place would be broader "special revenue sharing" distributions for education, manpower training, law enforcement and urban development.) Mr. Nixon may or may not have the force of logic on his side, but he is confronted with a force of political nature.
It showed up when Mr. Weinberger was patiently explaining the virtues of state and local decision-making the other day to a skeptical Senate Labor Committee. The Senators were troubled because $138 million in federal grants earmarked categorically for libraries in this year's budget appears to vanish next year.
No it doesn't, really, insisted Mr. Weinberger. A lot is budgeted for special revenue sharing for education, and local decision-makers can buy all the libraries they want with that.
THE SIXTY-FOUR THOUSAND DOLLAR QUESTION
Then a Senator asked what would happen if a great many states shunned libraries and put their special revenue sharing money into other kinds of educational activities.
"If I found that were happening in a significant number of states, Senator," replied Mr. Weinberger, "I would not hesitate to recommend that we do something about it, and that might take the form of an additional categorical program."
So the priorities of those local decisionmakers could be "wrong" after all, as judged by decision- makers in Washington, even by good Nixon Republicans. Lack of statehouse devotion to libraries could lead to categorical federal grants for libraries, just as it led to this federal program in the first place. By Dewey and his decimal system, the United States is going to have libraries.
This isn't to suggest that Mr. Weinberger and his Nixonian associates are a bunch f hypocrites who aren't really serious about returning power to the people. They obviously are serious. Many of the narrowly targeted parcels of federal cash are indeed going to be freed for broader use at local discretion. But there's a limit to the number of strings that can be removed. Because federal law can override state and local law, Washington's officials and lawmakers always have the power to "do something" if they're interested enough. String-tying goes with their jobs.
Sen. Tower f Texas, for example, sees a "void" in the federal effort to train nonskilled people for better-paying jobs. Spanish-speaking trainees can't always follow courses conducted in English. So the Senator is sponsoring a bill earmarking $120 million over a three-year period for bilingual job training programs. Other sponsors include such pro-administration Republicans as Barry Goldwater of Arizona, Wallace Bennett of Utah and Strom Thurmond of South Carolina, plus several liberal Democrats. The bill appears to run counter to the administration's plan to fold narrow-category training programs into a $1.3 billion special manpower revenue sharing program.
"This is a general social problem involving minority groups all over the country," says Mr. Tower, explaining why he thinks it needs visibility in its own category. He says he'd be willing to see bilingual training programs folded into special manpower revenue sharing "once we get them off the ground, but in the early stages they should be separate."
Florida's Sen. Gurney wants to do something about crime and violence in the public schools. He's sponsoring a bill creating a new category of federal aid to grade schools and high schools which develop plans for making classrooms and corridors safer. "My proposal is a direct attempt to deal with a serious and complex problem," says the conservative Republican. A co-sponsor of his bill is California's liberal Democratic Sen. Alan Cranston.
The proposed new anti-crime aid would be voluntary; only those school districts wanting it need apply. Nevertheless, local authorities tend to squirm within the narrow confines of such categorical programs.
The squirming is very evident in some 750 turn-of-the-year answers by mayors to a questionnaire from a Senate subcommittee on intergovernmental relations chaired by Democratic Sen. Edmund Muskie of Maine. The subcommittee asked whether the mayors preferred revenue sharing-type cash or the old-fashioned categorical grants. The answers were overwhelmingly in favor of revenue sharing's looser rein.
A common complaint about categorical grants was directed at the red tape, delays and changing guidelines imposed by the granting agencies, especially the Housing and Urban Development Department. "The city of St. Paul often wonders if the federal agency has misplaced the city's address and phone number," grumped Mayor Lawrence Cohen.
But then Sen. Muskie asked a follow-up question: As revenue sharing and block grants take on more of the load, would the mayors favor a cutback in the old categorical programs?
Some mayors just said "No"; Mayor Charles Bott of Stockton, Calif., put down "an emphatic NO."
For many, it clearly was a matter of taking all the federal money they could get, in any form. "The city of Austin recommends the creation of a mix of federal aid programs utilizing (A) revenue sharing for the general support of local government, (B) block grants for greater flexibility in meeting local priorities in broad functional areas and (C) a limited system of categorical grants to focus on national priorities," wrote City Manager Dan Davidson of Austin, Texas.
It's attention to "national priorities" that naturally worries national politicians like Sen. Muskie. He still supports the already passed general revenue sharing, but thinks the way most cities are using the no-strings money they've received under it is a bad omen of what would happen if broad-purpose special revenue sharing replaces Congress' cherished categorical programs.
In their questionnaire replies, the mayors ticked off the main ways they'll spend their first slice of general revenue sharing, among them public works, parks, higher police salaries, more police radios, libraries, street repair, fire trucks, ambulances, storm drains and garbage disposal.
Officials of both San Antonio and Chattanooga reported they're deliberately going for one-spot purchases instead of expanding services that would have to be cut back if revenue sharing ends someday. Dearborn, Mich., was among the few cities stressing social benefits; all of its general revenue sharing money is going "for low income apartments for the elderly.
In a recent speech to state legislators, Sen. Muskie said these findings indicate that if federal categorical programs are abolished, the local spenders of special revenue sharing won't attack the problems that worry Congress. "The money will go to the most powerful – and that means, by and large, the most privileged – elements in every local power structure," he said.
The same point was made in his questionnaire reply by Lewis Murphy, Mayor of Tucson. While praising block grants and revenue sharing, he added this argument for keeping congressionally targeted categorical programs: "An entire community may not give a high priority to an identified and documented problem of great significance, because that problem may impact on only a small segment of the community not having high visibility. This reason should continue to be the specific purpose for categorical funding."
SENATOR JAVITS' OBJECTIONS
Liberal Republican Senator Jacob Javits of New York objects to the administration proposal for giving local authorities the option of picking up the tab for community action agencies or letting them die. These agencies now are federally funded organizations of the poor, local agents of Lyndon Johnson's War on Poverty. Sen. Javits notes that they have been in so many fights with city halls over the years that "it is not reasonable to expect that states and cities will come running to the assistance of their former antagonists if the federal lifeline is cut."
Now many people in and out of the administration think the War on Poverty itself is a mistaken failure, and that the disappearance of community action groups would be wise policy. And red tape and bureaucratic hassles surrounding other narrow-category federal programs of the '60s clearly have produced a local backlash that aids the President's drive to decentralize the decisions of government.
But it doubtless won't happen as fast and as completely as Mr. Nixon would like, regardless of the merit of his proposal. There will always be cities somewhere so starved for money that they're willing to swallow federal strings to get it. And there will always be that bill hopper in Congress, tempting lawmakers to solve the problem of anything from poverty to that unbuilt library in Prairie Dog, Nebraska.