WATCH

ANSWERS BY OUR FOUNDING FATHERS
by Ed Magnuson

I have been told that DEA Administrator Thomas Constantine and other select members of his staff are not big promoters of the Merit Systems Protection Board (MSPB) and, in fact, would like nothing better than to have it abolished.

Why? Because they are of the self-serving opinion that institutions which utilize impartial finders of the fact to resolve difficult personnel problems are only manipulating their sacred system by uncovering such "loopholes" as unfairness, discrimination, and illegality.

In DEA WATCH's crusade for the Holy Grail the Truth this writer went back in history to find it. The 200 year old Federalist Papers, combined essays written to combat the philosophy of anti-federalism, provided answers which can be applied today.

Why do we need institutions like MSPB, EEO, and the courts?

    Answer by James Madison: "Enlightened statesmen will not always be at the helm... If men were angels, no government would be necessary... If angels were to govern men, neither external nor internal controls on government would be necessary."

    Answer by Alexander Hamilton: "... men are ambitious vindictive, rapacious... Why has government been instituted at all? Because the passions of men will not conform to the dictates of reason and justice without constraint."

Is it just to have a higher authority review the internal actions of a governmental agency?

    Answer by Alexander Hamilton: "There is no position which depends on clearer principles than that every act of a delegated authority, contrary to the terror of the commission under which it is exercised, is void... To deny this would be to affirm that the deputy is greater than his principal; that the servant is above the master; that the representatives of the people are superior to the people themselves; that men acting by virtue of powers may do not only what their powers do not authorize but what they forbid."

Should government employees speak out about opinions and actions they disagree with?

    Answer by James Madison: "If it be true that all governments rest on opinion, it is no less true that the strength of opinion in each individual, and the practical influence on his conduct, depend much on the number which ho supposes to have entertained the same opinion. The reason of man, like man himself, is timid and cautious when left atone, and acquires firmness and confidence in proportion to the number with which it is associated."

Are impartial finders of the fact really necessary?

    Answer by James Madison: "It is true that in controversies... the tribunal which is ultimately to decide is to he established under the general government. But this does not change the principle of the case. The decision is to be impartially made according to the rules... and all the usual and most effective precautions are taken to secure this impartiality. Some such tribunal is clearly essential to prevent an appeal to the sword and a dissolution of the compact..."

James Madison and Alexander Hamilton had a particular vision of what human beings were really like and the necessity for safeguards against any one leader or institution having too much power. However, bureaucrats thrive on power, the more they have, the better they like it. And that is the reason why Administrator Constantine and his select few are not ardent supporters of MSPB, EEO and the courts.