"Civility" Defined -- But Unlikely To Be Enforced

Author: Jim Guirard -- TrueSpeak Institute

Source: FamilySecurityMatters.org -- March 30, 2007

Similar to President Bush's call in his 2005 State of the Union speech for a return to "civility" in public discourse, the recently victorious Congressional Democrats are doing much the same -- perhaps in good conscience, perhaps just for post-election (and pre-2008 election) show.

Expecting no serious action in this matter by the Congress itself, a bipartisan group of four "eminences grise" former Congressional leaders -- Howard Baker, George Mitchell, Bob Dole and Tom Daschle -- are busy searching for means of cooling down the Capitol Hill rhetoric by which today's Democrats and Republicans are daily demonizing each other.

Time will tell -- and so will the particular words today's lawmakers use when the partisan blood gets hot (even more so than it is now) and when Howard Dean's "Deaniak" Democrats are tempted to repeat the National Party Chief's most uncivil revelation that "I hate all Republicans and everything they stand for."

Although Dean and others tried at the time to "spin" this nasty rhetoric into something softer and gentler, most of the public knew that he meant exactly what he said -- and was simply engaging in a left-wing cover-up of his and his followers' true sentiments.

While incivility has many ugly faces, its primary modus operandi is that of verbal insults. Like a magnet, the language of spite and personal destruction attracts more of same. All too soon, people are "yelling bloody murder" at each other.

Knowing how disruptive and dangerous personal insults and insinuations can be, the Congress -- where partisans are always in competition and conflict -- has long had formal rules prohibiting the use of uncivil or "fighting" words in the proceedings of both House and Senate.

Under House Rule 14(b) and Senate Rule 19, for example, any Member using personally derisive names or accusations toward a colleague -- particularly those challenging his or her honor and integrity -- will be reprimanded and have these words "taken down" by the presiding officer. Repeated offenses could result in charges of Contempt of Congress.

Maybe By Gentlemen's Agreement

If for whatever reason these Rules cannot readily be tightened by law, this congressional mandate of civility might be expanded upon and applied -- by gentlemen's agreement -- to a wide range of political discourse.

These standards might apply not only in the Congress itself but also in media appearances and written comments by congressmen and senators, with serious violators condemned and ostracized as uncivil troublemakers and even formally reprimanded by their colleagues.

Imagine how much more civil and non-partisan the Congress -- and the Administrative Branch, as well -- might gradually become if each side were to forgo about twenty of the most sharp-edged "hate words" by which partisan and combative members now so routinely attempt to demonize the other side.

And what if the media and the American public were to demand that political campaigns be conducted by the same standards of mutual respect -- or at least by the sounds and appearances thereof?

While such a method might not be legally enforced, it could certainly be heavily "pressured" by public opinion. This might be done by periodic Lexis-Nexis surveys of House and Senate proceedings and of the reportage of selected major news outlets, to word-count who has been saying what -- and who, therefore, has been most guilty of hurtful incivility and attack-dog partisanship.

Here are parallel lists of objectionable words and phrases -- equal in number and in spiteful intensity on each side -- which both Republican "rabid right" and Democrat "lockstep left" would agree to ban from their respective vocabularies:

Unfortunately, such a new standard of civility in political discourse is easier said than achieved. Even if President Bush were to embrace it and require his own appointees (and persuade his congressional Republican allies) to abide by it, what chance is there outside the halls of government?

1. that the likes of Michael Moore, Julian Bond, Rosie O'Donnell, Cindy Sheehan and others of their reactionary-left ilk would give up the demonizing "fascist" and "Nazi" and "extremist" insults they hurl periodically at right-of-center Republicans?
2. that Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity and Anne Coulter would forsake all of the sharp-edged labels they use to condemn anyone who is pro-abortion, pro-gay marriage, pro-gun control, pro-Castro or anyone who is proactively left-of-center?
3. that the New York Times, the Los Angeles Times, The Nation and the Congressional Black and Progressive Caucuses -- or the Washington Times, the Weekly Standard and the National Rifle Association -- will readily abandon all or most of the disparaging and demonizing words listed above.

This lifelong conservative Democrat's prediction is that President Bush, Vice-President Cheney and most of their fellow Republicans (and even many of the radio talk show "right-wingers") would do a decent job of softening their partisan rhetoric, as the Commander-in-Chief has always been intent on doing.

But while many Democrats might initially follow suit, all too many others would absolutely refuse to abandon the language of negativity, of blame and of personal destruction to which they have become accustomed and upon which their congressional and media tactics have become so dependent -- as a Lexis-Nexis word-count of incivility over the last two decades would clearly demonstrate.

Jim Guirard -- TrueSpeak Institute 703-768-0957 Justcauses@aol.com

A Washington, DC-area attorney, writer and consultant, Jim Guirard was longtime Chief-of-Staff to Democratic U.S. Senators Allen Ellender and Russell Long of Louisiana. His TrueSpeak Institute is devoted to truth-in-history and truth-in-language in public discourse.