Rome’s Tea Party pioneer?

December 11, 2010 By

You remember the tea party activists don’t you?

So, set the way-back machine for about a year ago and remember the early coverage of this movement. The key was that the tea party core, the top leaders, were all about economics, not social issues. Their movement represented a chance for the Religious Right era to come to an end in God’s Own Party, with the drive for theocracy being crushed under a kind of brash grassroots Libertarian assault. The goal was to blend pickup-truck populists with the kind of rich country-club Republicans who went hunting with Dick Cheney.

You remember those guys? Don’t you?

Thus, I was rather struck by the following Washington Post report about the signs that former Sen. Rich Santorum of Pennsylvania was thinking about running for president (or vice president or the cabinet or whatever). Here’s the top of this oh-so-familiar A1 story:

GOFFSTOWN, N.H. – It was pushing 10 p.m., and Rick Santorum was sitting at the corner table in a near-empty Dunkin’ Donuts. The garishly lit scene might have been lifted straight from the movie “Primary Colors.”

“I’m feeling like doors are opening,” the Republican former senator from Pennsylvania mused over his decaf. “Things are happening that maybe give me the impression that maybe I need to look at this seriously.”

So seriously that Santorum was on his seventh trip to New Hampshire since April. Not to mention seven to Iowa over the past 14 months and seven to South Carolina in that time.

It had been a busy day: morning meetings with influential New Hampshire Republicans and grass-roots leaders, a luncheon with the Manchester Rotary Club, a dash to the seacoast for a private audience with former governor John Sununu, a dinner with GOP activist Claira Monier, then a question-and-answer session with the Goffstown-Weare Republican Committee. Santorum had yet another meeting that evening back at his hotel. Before heading home the next day, he would get in an early-morning speech to a second Rotary chapter, a round of media interviews, more face time with GOP activists. Oh, and he’d make it to Mass at a nearby church.

Now that sounds like Santorum, a man whose politics have long been wrapped in images of his large family, his faith and the difficult task of working with both sides of Catholic social doctrines in the context of the modern Republican Party. He strongly opposed gay-rights initiatives, yet also helped fight for AIDS packages in Africa. He was the kind of senator who worked with his friend Sen. Joseph Lieberman on many bipartisan efforts for the poor — think school-lunch programs — while infuriating the world of abortion-rights activists.

Which is why I was somewhat surprised when I hit this part of the piece:

… (T)here’s the fact that the Republican establishment may not be in the driver’s seat this time. And the other fact that Santorum was a tea party kind of guy before there was a tea party.

In the recent history of Washington, few have so gleefully ransacked the established order or shown such contempt for its protocols.

Elected to the House in 1990 at the tender age of 32, Santorum made his mark as one of the “Gang of Seven” freshmen who exposed the House banking scandal. They forced the disclosure that more than half of their colleagues had written hot checks, and helped send dozens into retirement or defeat.

As a freshman senator four years later, Santorum violated the chamber’s decorous folkways by carting around a “Where’s Bill?” sign to demand a balanced budget from President Bill Clinton. He tried to have Sen. Mark Hatfield (R-Ore.) removed as chairman of the Appropriations Committee because of Hatfield’s refusal to support a balanced-budget amendment to the Constitution.

Santorum was notorious for his moral pronouncements.

So what does the “tea party” term mean in this context?

White House speechwriter Michael Gerson used to say that, during the first term of George W. Bush, there were tensions between the GOP’s small-L libertarians and what he called the “small-c” Catholics, who wanted to use new methods to accomplish old goals of social justice. In other words, Big-C Catholics like Santorum working with evangelicals and others who had similar goals.

Now, before you click comment to dissect Santorum, let me ask that you focus on the actual journalism issue here — the “tea party” label. What does it mean now? Rebels against the GOP establishment? Folks who want to slash the budget? Libertarian networks in which lots of church people are now active, since that’s where the momentum is these days?

So how was Santorum a tea-party guy before there was a tea party if much of his agenda has, essentially, been rooted in his Catholic beliefs? How does a small-c and large-C man from the Church of Rome end up as a tea-party patriarch? Does the word simply mean “rebellion” now?

I’m asking a journalism question: Do these words — tea party — have any meaning?

Now, click “comment.” Help me wrestle with that question.

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Filed Under: Catholicism, Marriage & family, People, Politics
About TMatt

Terry Mattingly directs the Washington Journalism Center at the Council for Christian Colleges and Universities. He writes a weekly column for the Scripps Howard News Service.

  • Susan

    IF the common denominator between the Tea Party and Santorum is a desire for ethical, responsible, and public-service-minded elected officials, then I would say that may be a fitting definition of the Tea Party mentality.

    And if that is a fitting definition, I would say the Tea Party is not loyal to either political party because their loyalties will be oriented to their principles and they will want to address violations of these principles no matter which party or person violates them.

    I don’t think the Tea Party mentality is anything new. As far as I can tell, it’s as old as our nation and it’s not limited to secular or religious circles. It looks like a responsible rebellion against corruption.

  • Jerry

    IF the common denominator between the Tea Party and Santorum is a desire for ethical, responsible, and public-service-minded elected officials, then I would say that may be a fitting definition of the Tea Party mentality.

    I’m about as far to the left as the Tea Party is to the right and I subscribe wholeheartedly to the desire for ethical, responsible and public-service minded elected officials. In fact, that definition you gave fits many in the Coffee Party which was formed as an antidote to the various forms of Tea Parties.

    That illustrates that “tea party” has gone the way of “evangelical” and other such terms: people have fought over what it means so much that the meaning has leached away leaving only bones for people to fight over.

  • http://www.magdalenesegg.blogspot.com Rev. Michael Church

    I’m inclined to agree with Jerry, that this is one more word which has become detached — or rather, which sloppy writers have forcibly detached — from its original sense. But maybe not.

    My first question, were I a WaPo editor, would be whether Santorum actually takes part in the organized Tea Party events, and especially if he was active in the early ones. If so, you could argue that that — whatever the early reports on the Tea Party may have said to the contrary — his values have helped to define the movement, and the reporter is on target, case closed.

    But is that so? The only clue that the story gives is its offhand remark that his audiences tend to be “small.” This suggests that he hasn’t been working the mass rally circuit. Still, I could be (and probably am) over-reading a throwaway line.

  • joye

    The problem with the word “tea party” is just like the problem with a lot of political labels… you get very different answers to “What does it mean?” depending on who you ask.

    The modern world likes to play Humpty Dumpty and say that words mean exactly what I, the speaker, mean them to mean.

    In a similar vein, we tend, once we find out that someone has one position that we dislike, to clump on all the other positions that we dislike that we associate with that first position, without bothering to find out if the person in question actually holds those views.

    I think that’s what has happened to “tea party”. There are so many people who use it basically to mean “crazy/idiotic right winger who hates government”. That’s what that paragraph is about: Santorum upset the order! He pulled stunts! He made “moral pronouncements”! He’s crazy and he’s right-wing! Ergo, tea party, right?

    It’s similar to your long-standing grips about “fundamentalist” being used to mean “anyone whose religious or even anti-religious fervor exceeds what I think reasonable”. Or the way that many people on the right will say quite seriously that Obama is a Communist and a Muslim. Each word means exactly what the speaker wishes it to, dictionary be damned.

  • John Pack Lambert

    My best guess is that the term “tea party” is not being used to refer here to libertarian types who support same-gender marriage, even if the most extreme of those would still see fundamental problems with Ted Olsen’s approach of using the judiciary to force the state to recognize same-gender marriage, especially when it includes the chilling line “religious beliefs that homsexual relationsips are sinful or unequal to heterosexual relationships are harmful to gays and lesbians”. That was a finding of fact in the Prop 8 district court ruling, a finding of fact that should cause fear in any believer in religious liberty.

    Santorum so epitomized a co-existence of some historically Democrat views with his stauch social conservativism on moral issues that when he was elected to the senate his house seat went to a Democrat, becoming one of only two seats that went from being held by a Republican to a Democrat in 1994. In some ways this is similar to Joseph Cao’s house seat in Louisiana being one of only two in this election that saw a Republican incumbent defeated, however Santorum had not come to office because of a scandal, and Cao’s conservative credentials have never been what Santorum’s are.

  • Dave

    The meaning of “tea party” is presently up in the air, like the vital status of Schroedinger’s cat in the famous quantum paradox. We will learn the meaning when the next Congress convenes. If freshman Republicans submit to the leadership of the GOP establishment they beat in the primaries, and embrace social conservatism to make up a solid majority, then “tea party” means nothing. If they extract pledges of fiscal responsibility in appropriations and not just rhetoric from the GOP establishment, then “tea party” means a new day for deficit hawks.

  • Marie

    I would sum up the tea party movement into three primary categories: limited government, fiscal responsibility, increased nationalism.

    What do these categories mean?

    Limited government: The idea in the tea party is that there are things government is responsible for doing and things society as private individuals are responsible for doing. Tea party-ers take the stance that as a nation we have allowed government to overstep itself, so while some government programs are nice and even useful they are not within the role of government and should be cut.

    Fiscal responsibility: Usually centering around the idea of a balanced budget and lower taxes. These two fiscal objectives often seem like a contradiction to outsiders when considered without the context of limited government. They tend to be apposed to tax increases because of the belief that government is already full of unnecessary programs which should be cut therefor freeing up money to balance the budget.

    Increased nationalism: Tea Party-ers see themselves as patriots. In general they will oppose anyone who’s positions lean towards global government or international opinion of American ideas and policies. The first, global government, because it is contrary to the idea of limited government, and the second, international opinion, because it is seen to promote the values of another country over American decisions. Another part of increased nationalism in the Tea party is loyalty to the Constitution and the Bill of Rights. Anyone, any political persuasion, or any legal action that seems contrary to these documents would definitely come under criticism from Tea Party-ists.

    What does that definition have to do with Santorum according to the information given in the article?
    Elected to the House in 1990 at the tender age of 32, Santorum made his mark as one of the “Gang of Seven” freshmen who exposed the House banking scandal. They forced the disclosure that more than half of their colleagues had written hot checks, and helped send dozens into retirement or defeat.

    As a freshman senator four years later, Santorum violated the chamber’s decorous folkways by carting around a “Where’s Bill?” sign to demand a balanced budget from President Bill Clinton. He tried to have Sen. Mark Hatfield (R-Ore.) removed as chairman of the Appropriations Committee because of Hatfield’s refusal to support a balanced-budget amendment to the Constitution.

    Definitely a reference to fiscal responsibility. Fiscal responsibility over loyalty to party members.

    Santorum still breathes fire. In his evolving stump speech, he frames the prospect of Obama’s reelection in near-apocalyptic terms: “Democracy and freedom will disappear.”

    Not as clear as the first quote but perhaps references to increased nationalism in insinuating that Obama’s policies are contrary to American concepts of democracy and freedom.

    His agenda consists of stopping pretty much everything that has been set in motion in the past two years, starting with the overhaul of the nation’s health-care system.

    Probably a reference to limited government. Perhaps motivated by the belief that heath care is outside the responsibility of government.

    I agree that references in the article to social/moral issues confuses the idea of fitting the tea party mold. This may be the result to journalist perspective. Many Tea Party-ists are religious therefor the mistaken belief that ideals of the religious right must be the ideals of the Tea Party.

  • Marie

    Block quote error. The first sentence of the first block quote in comment 7 should not be in the block quote. sorry

  • MJBubba

    I think the definition of “Tea Party” has regional differences. On the coasts and in the West, the “small-l-libertarians” dominate. In the South, social conservatives dominate. The Midwest is more evenly divided.
    Us social conservatives have been sorely disappointed by the Republican Party (and by the Blue Dogs) for 20 years. We are hopeful that the new Tea Party congressmen and senators will be more mindful of our part of their base.

  • dalea

    From what I have seen of the teaparty, mainly on tv and online, my impression is that it is largely incoherent. The classic sign that read ‘keep your government hands off my medicare’ comes to mind. It is the opposite of the rational, highly sophisticated conservativism of William F Buckley. And it appears to bear no real relationship to actual right wing Libertarianism. The press’ presentation does not seem to be at all very helpful, just an endless procession of very angry people who are not particularly articulate or knowlegible. It would help to have better coverage, but maybe the movement does not really have a consistent theme as Marie points out. …

  • Geroge

    dalea says: It would help to have better coverage, but maybe the movement does not really have a consistent theme as Marie points out

    Having watched Tea Party organizers speak alongside Republican Party operatives, I’d add a third reason why journalistic reports make the TP seem incoherent: public speaking is hard, and a lot of new-to-politics TPers are just plain bad at it.

    IMHO, they seem incoherent in the media because they are incoherent when the media hears them (and when the press finds a speaker it can understand, like Palin or Beck, it promptly anoints them “leaders”). If you want to see better coverage, look at the journalists who leave NYC/DC to spend time talking and listeners to TPers in private

  • John Pack Lambert

    At some level I always assumed the tea party was more about style then positons. That is to say, they always seemed to me to reject building compromise in the system for an outright stand for positions now.

    How this reconciles with Santorum being the leading senate point man on the ban on partial-birth abortions, the epitome of building consensus and working towards what can be done instead of going boldly for what can not, is a good question. I guess his tactics and methods do not seem to agree with the stereotype of the tea party.

  • Brendan

    (typo on 3rd P, “Rich” should be “Rick”)

  • Jeffrey

    It seems like Tumulty was trying to use “tea party” as a metaphor for being the anti-GOP conservative. I’m just not sure it works for Santorum, who is not quite the conciliatory compassionate conservative he’s made out to be by Tumulty. It’s also fair to say that Santorum is hardly an anti-government warrior, given his government interventionist approach to social conservatism. I mean, his insertion of the federal government in the Terry Schiavo case was a major factor in his humiliating defeat in 2006.

  • learning

    I am a prolifer. Santorum is the man who helped me see the truth about the GOP when he supported Pro-choice Arlen Spector over pro-life Pat Toomey. I begain a long period of study and decided that the party insiders are not really interested in ending abortion. The GOP’s embrace of perpetual war and torture made me realize that it did not represent me. Santorum is establishment GOP in my book. The tea parties started as a Ron Paul thing who leans libertarian and is prolife. It includes folks who favor localism vs our current corporate -welfare cleptocracy. The bailouts and health care really got it going. Of course it will be co-opted by opportunist. Success will be via the grass roots keeping the pressure on.