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Tea Party Is Unbroken

The reports of the deaths of the tea party and of the American republic are greatly exaggerated.

James Anthony
March 4, 2022

The pollster that keeps getting it right, Trafalgar [1], in January and February found that likely voters preferred Republicans over Democrats in the midterm general elections by unprecedented margins of 13.2% [2] and 12.5% [3].

These numbers reflect that the Tea Party never was broken [4], never went away, and is getting stronger.

Various commentators are able to claim otherwise only because they won’t acknowledge, or they can’t see, that Progressives and constitutionalists achieve their desired outcomes by entirely-different mechanisms.

Progressives Bypass the Constitution

Progressives don’t have constitutional laws or majorities of voters on their side. They need to bypass the Constitution.

They use academic writers [5], media [6], Astroturf organizations [7], and misleading statistics [8] and polls to fabricate impressions that people are demanding government solutions. They use the resulting media storms [9] to push through big statutes that aren’t actually laws but instead are unconstitutional grants of power to departments and agencies [10].

These organizations then hire paid activists to work for years to create unconstitutional controls over us.

  • For instance, the public’s fear of thalidomide-caused malformations [11] was used to create for the unconstitutional FDA a grant of power to supposedly ensure the efficacy of new drugs [12].
  • Within a decade, this same fear of thalidomide-caused malformations was also used to create an unconstitutional “right” to abortion [13] that would trump the unalienable right to life [14].
  • Many decades later, FDA officers are still working to ratchet up [15] their old power over new drugs into a new power over off-label uses [16], by disparaging ivermectin and hydroxychloroquine [17].

This is not at all how constitutionalists work.

Constitutionalists Use Existing Powers

Constitutionalists do have constitutional laws and majorities of voters on their side. Rather than pushing for new grants of power, they need only use the powers they already have.

The actions that matter for constitutionalists aren’t demonstrations, big statutes, and big opinions.

The actions that matter for constitutionalists are voting, activism advancing legislation that limits governments, and getting constitutionalist candidates to run.

On all three fronts, the news is both good and hopeful:

  1. Voting [18] is still strong. These same voters are poised to produce yet-another wave in the coming
  2. Activism during legislative sessions is improving, although quietly and underappreciated. More activists are adapting Progressives’ confrontational politics [19]. As a result we are seeing better initiatives than ever against abortion, critical racism teaching, masking, and vaccine mandates.
  3. Candidates wait for voter support before they jump on bandwagons [20], so they build up more slowly. Even so, such candidates already have produced significant minorities of elected representatives of a quality that would earn Conservative Review Liberty Scores [21] of at least 80% pro-liberty [22].

Tea-party groups and publicity aren’t the key to limiting our governments. The key is for tea-party supporters to keep advancing along the learning curves they’re already on. They’re already getting there [23].

The Boston Tea Party reflected the desire for freedom of the majority of American colonists [24]. This tea-party resolve for freedom remains unbroken.

References

  1. “Trafalgar: The Pollster That Keeps Getting It Right.” AMAC, 2 July 2021, amac.us/trafalgar-the-pollster-that-keeps-getting-it-right/. Accessed 4 Mar. 2022.
  2. “Generic Ballot Nationwide Survey.” The Trafalgar Group, Jan. 2022, www.thetrafalgargroup.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/TRF-Generic-Ballot-0119-Poll-Report.pdf. Accessed 4 Mar. 2022.
  3. Roche, Darragh. “Republicans Enjoy Huge Lead over Democrats in Midterms: Poll.” Newsweek, 15 Feb. 2022, www.newsweek.com/republicans-enjoy-huge-lead-over-democrats-midterms-poll-1679289. Accessed 4 Mar. 2022.
  4. Stone, Austin. “Skeptical Trump Endorsements Show the Need for a MAGA Comeback.” American Greatness, 14 Feb. 2022, amgreatness.com/2022/02/14/skeptical-trump-endorsements-show-the-need-for-a-maga-comeback/. Accessed 4 Mar. 2022.
  5. Barnard, Thomas H., Jr. “An Analysis and Criticism of the Model Penal Code Provisions on the Law of Abortion.” Case Western Reserve Law Review, vol. 18, no. 2, Jan. 1967, pp. 540-64.
  6. Chen, Andrew. “Alarmist Reporting Echoing Govt Talking Points Leads to ‘Intrusion’ on Liberties: Veteran Journalist.” The Epoch Times, 4 Aug. 2021, www.theepochtimes.com/alarmism-in-journalism-reiterating-government-line-leads-to-intrusion-on-liberties-veteran-journalist_3921475.html. Accessed 4 Mar. 2022.
  7. Malloch, Theodore Roosevelt. “The Left’s Moneybag.” American Greatness, 1 Feb. 2022, amgreatness.com/2022/02/01/the-lefts-moneybag/. Accessed 4 Mar. 2022.
  8. Best, Joel. “Lies, Calculations and Constructions: Beyond How to Lie with Statistics.” Statistical Science, vol. 20, no. 4, Nov. 2005, pp. 210-4.
  9. Boydstun, Amber E., et al. “Two Faces of Media Attention: Media Storm Versus Non-Storm Coverage.” Political Communication, vol. 31, no. 4, 2014, pp. 509-31.
  10. Schoenbrod, David. “Goal Statutes or Rules Statutes: The Case of the Clean Air Act.” UCLA Law Review, vol. 30, 1983, pp. 740-828.
  11. Gamson, William A. “How Storytelling Can Be Empowering.” Culture in Mind: Toward a Sociology of Culture and Cognition, edited by Karen S. Cerulo, Routledge, 2002, pp. 187-98.
  12. Darrow, Jonathon J. “Pharmaceutical Efficacy: The Illusory Legal Standard.” Washington and Lee Law Review, vol. 70, no. 4, Fall 2013, pp. 2073-136.
  13. Titus, Herbert. “It Is Time to Denounce Roe vs. Wade.” The Forecast, vol. 3, no. 5, Feb. 1996, theinteramerican.org/221-it-is-time-to-denounce-roe-vs-wade-html/. Accessed 4 Mar. 2022.
  14. Curry, Robert. “We Have Forgotten What the Founders Knew.” Claremont Review of Books, 6 June 2016, claremontreviewofbooks.com/digital/we-have-forgotten-what-the-founders-knew/. Accessed 4 Mar. 2022.
  15. Klein, Peter G. “Coronacrisis and Leviathan.” Power & Market, 13 Mar. 2020, mises.org/power-market/coronacrisis-and-leviathan. Accessed 4 Mar. 2022.
  16. Tabarrok, Alexander. “Assessing the FDA via the Anomaly of Off-Label Drug Prescribing.” The Independent Review, vol. 5, no. 1, Summer 2000, pp. 25-53. 
  17. Anthony, James. “Ivermectin, Hydroxychloroquine, Fast Tests Suppressed. Attorneys General Can Fight Back.” rConstitution.us, 22 Oct. 2021, rconstitution.us/ivermectin-hydroxychloroquine-fast-tests-suppressed-attorneys-general-can-fight-back/. Accessed 4 Mar. 2022.
  18. Anthony, James. “Voting Guide for Constitutionalists.” rConstitution.us, 30 Oct. 2020, rconstitution.us/voting-guide-for-constitutionalists/. Accessed 4 Mar. 2022.
  19. Anthony, James. “The Right Needs a More Confrontational Politics.” American Greatness, 6 Aug. 2021, amgreatness.com/2021/08/06/the-right-needs-a-more-confrontational-politics/. Accessed 4 Mar. 2022.
  20. Cohen, Marty, et al. The Party Decides: Presidential Nominations before and after Reform. University of Chicago Press, 2008, pp. 47-80.
  21. “Liberty Score.” Conservative Review, libertyscore.conservativereview.com/. Accessed 4 Mar. 2022.
  22. Anthony, James. “Votes Matter When a Party Requires Good Voting Scores.” rConstitution.us, 6 Nov. 2020, rconstitution.us/votes-matter-when-a-party-requires-good-voting-scores/. Accessed 4 Mar. 2022.
  23. Anthony, James. “A New Major Party Is Forming Right before Our Eyes.” American Greatness, 5 Apr. 2021, amgreatness.com/2021/04/05/a-new-major-party-is-forming-right-before-our-eyes/. Accessed 4 Mar. 2022.
  24. Anthony, James. The Constitution Needs a Good Party: Good Government Comes from Good Boundaries. Neuwoehner Press, 2018, pp. xv-xvi. 

James Anthony is the author of The Constitution Needs a Good Party and rConstitution Papers, has written in The Federalist, American Thinker, Foundation for Economic Education, and American Greatness, and publishes rConstitution.us. Mr. Anthony is an experienced chemical engineer with a master’s in mechanical engineering.

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