Letter to
the President:
Restore Justice
and Equity to the Land
by
John Brand, D.Min., J.D.
Dissident Voice
March 10, 2003
Dear
Mr. President,
Almost 100 years ago, on
January 22, 1905, thousands of Russian peasants and workers proceeded in a
peaceful march on the Winter Palace in St. Petersburg. They carried icons of
Saints and religious banners. Their purpose was to present the Czar, "our
little father," with a petition requesting relief from some of the
bureaucratic burdens imposed upon them by the incompetence, corruption, and
oppression of Russian officialdom. There was no sign of any civil disturbance,
no sign of rioting, and no sign of anything but a peaceful demonstration by the
"children" of their Czar.
Before the petition could be
presented, Cossacks fired into the crowd killing nearly a thousand and wounding
about five thousand. In June of that year, the seamen on the battleship Potemkin
mutinied and killed their officers. The stage was set for the eventual October
Revolution that installed a Communist regime with all of the ensuing terrors
that are now familiar history.
I know, Mr. President, that
at this moment you are occupied with serious affairs of the state. Your
undivided attention is needed in this critical moment of the world's history.
Yet, Mr. President, there are also other pressing problems begging for your
understanding and concern. What does it benefit if you succeed in your present
international venture but find a country beset with serious problems
undermining the spirit, the morale, and the élan vital of your people?
So, your
"children" come to you with petition in hand requesting relief from
burdens robbing them of the opportunity for the "pursuit of
happiness." Surely, at the top of the list must be the request for a more
orderly, a more dependent, and a more secure delivery of healthcare. How,
indeed, does it profit anyone to live without having health? At this moment in
time, over 40,000,000 of our citizens, your subjects, find themselves without
medical insurance. You surely have been made aware that the list is growing
daily.
We respectfully submit to
you the fact that under Managed Health Care, the delivery of timely and
adequate medical services has suffered severely. We know that health care is
expensive. But how can costs be contained while delivering competent services
when probably more health dollars than we realize are siphoned off to pay
private investors in the industry, to compensate executives with six-figure
incomes, and to drown the system in needless iterative paperwork? It seems that
each insurance company has its own regulations, required documents, and methods
of payment for services rendered and standards of eligibility. Such duplication
is not only expensive but also inefficient.
Certainly, most of your
petitioners believe in the free enterprise system. Yet a serious problem exists
that, unless addressed, can lead to unforeseen difficulties and agonizing
consequences for individuals in need of health care. In setting the agenda for
capitalism, Adam Smith pointed directly to the self-interest of capitalists as
the source that would fuel the engines of commerce. In order to turn that
egocentric dynamic into the common good, Smith relied on an "unseen
hand" that would manage virulent selfishness and produce the most good for
most people. In the almost three centuries since Smith's work, that unseen hand
has been conspicuously absent in the economic affairs of our nation as well as
that of the rest of the Western world. It is much more likely that an
observation by William Penn in one of his essays contains the germinal truth
that must be our concern. Penn wrote, "Not that men know not what is
right, their excesses, and wherein they are to blame, by no means; nothing is
plainer to them: but so deprived is human nature that, without compulsion some
way or another, too many would not readily be brought to do what they know is
right and fit." In other words, the self-interest of man must somehow be
kept in checks and balances. One does Penn no harm when assuming that he
implied that such check and balance must come from another conscious, human
source. No unseen hand is at work here.
You, Mr. President, are
quite familiar with the use of laws, executive orders, and administrative
directives to keep the wheels of commerce and industry running. You know from
your own experiences that it is the hand of man that turns the wheels of
industry and commerce. It was sheer human ingenuity enabling Enron to practice
innovative accounting methods to show favorable P & L statements. There was
no unseen hand that guided Enron's affairs. You are also familiar with the
practice of writing legislation allowing certain businesses to benefit from tax
breaks, deductions for R & R, and sundry other such practices. No unseen
hands are at work here to increase productivity and profitability that benefits
the general welfare. It is the combined effort of both houses of Congress writing
such legislation favoring business and industry. Wherever we look, we see the
hands of men at work effecting profits.
Now, Mr. President, the
citizens of this great Republic implore you to use your hands to establish a
health care system that meets the need of all the people. Past experience
dictates that this significant need not be placed into the hands of those who
seek to make a profit from the misfortune of ill health that befalls our frail
human bodies.
We most humbly petition you
to proceed with might and main to seek very strict punishment for those who
bilk the Medicare system. We all know of providers who have submitted
fraudulent bills to Medicare. We all know of physicians who have performed
needless operations. These are crimes against society -- crimes against all of
us. We entreat you to use your powerful hands to enact legislation to place
such miscreants behind bars for a minimum of twenty years. Our society can ill
afford to be robbed by such unscrupulous personages.
There are so many other
areas where the little people cannot depend on unseen hands to bring justice
and equity into their lives. The Mayflower Compact contains these words
embraced by the members of the Company, "we … do enact, constitute, and
frame such just and equal laws, ordinances, acts, constitutions and office … as
shall the thought most meet and convenient for the general good of the
colony…" The hands of our forebearers relied not upon some unseen spirit
but upon their own devices to bring about laws that were just and would meet
the general good of all the people of the colony.
Mr. President, at the
present moment, the minimum hourly wage has been stuck at $5.15 per hour for
several years. This amounts to an annual gross wage of $10,712. Social Security
taxes reduce that amount to about $9,782. When we consider state sales taxes,
gasoline taxes, and various other levies, a person on minimum wages might have
about $8,000 of disposable income. That amounts to about $667 per month. Even
if both husband and wife are working, their combined earnings to cover rent,
food, clothing, and transportation and any other expenses are less than $1,340
per month.
Mr. President, it does not
take an Einstein to reach the conclusion that a family depending on minimum
wages has a more than difficult time to make ends meet. Can we rely upon your
good hand to bring such inequity to an end? Oh, we know that the U.S. Chamber
of Commerce and various corporate interest groups will raise a hue and cry when
you use your bully pulpit to speak up for the little man. When they do, you can
certainly still their selfish voices by inviting them to support their families
on the income I have described above.
I would like to conclude by
inviting you to extend your hand to consider one more area where the unseen
hand has been miraculously absent -- even in the plain view of a most
inequitable situation. In order to provide even the most basic essentials of
life, many individuals rely upon the revolving credit of their bank credit
cards. It has been brought to my attention that interest rates of 13 to 19
percent are not unusual on those transactions. This amount is equal to about
three times what banks are charged for loans they make from the Federal Reserve
Bank. Does it not appear to you, Mr. President, that such rates charged by
banks are usurious? Myriads of families are kept in financial servitude because
no hand is raised to protect the rank and file from such a practice. You
encourage the people to spend money so the economy will again flourish. But how
can the millions spend money when their bankers get a substantial percentage of
the combined paychecks of husbands and wives?
You have proven yourself to
be forceful President since 9/11. Your hand is seen everywhere in the area of
international relations. You are not relying on any unseen hand to determine
the fate of our nation.
Can you understand why
millions are looking to you and your powerful hand to bring justice and equity
to the masses who have no political influence, no legislative clout, and no
financial means whereby they might achieve a measure of authority in the
governance of the land of the free and the home of the brave?
Your hand must become the
unseen hand in order to restore justice and equity in the land. Your hand must
provide the leadership so that the unalienable right of the pursuit of
happiness becomes reality for the little people.
Sincerely,
John H. Brand
John Brand is a Purple Heart, Combat Infantry veteran of World War II. He received his Juris Doctor degree at Northwestern University and a Master of Theology and a Doctor of Ministry at Southern Methodist University. He served as a Methodist minister for 19 years, was Vice President, Birkman & Associates, Industrial Psychologists, and concluded his career as Director, Organizational and Human Resources, Warren-King Enterprises, an independent oil and gas company. He is the author of Shaking the Foundations: Coming of Age in the Postmodern Era (1st Books Library, 2001). This article first appeared in YellowTimes.org. Email: jbrand@YellowTimes.org