What is government?

In 1981, Ronald Reagan used 12 brilliant words that burned themselves so deeply into the American public consciousness that they are still a fundamental rallying cry of American conservativism and shape many Americans' understanding of what government means.

During the first hour of Reagan's tenure as the highest-ranking spokesman, servant, and guardian of the American government, he said: "Government is not the solution to our problem. Government is our problem."

Those words have set the progressive cause back a long way. They remain one of the purest expressions of the conservative view of government: that government should get out of the way and let the powerful trample upon the many.

George Lakoff has identified a good way to call Reagan's idea what it is: you're-on-your-own radicalism. (In fact, I may add this to the dictionary in its own right.) However, progressives still need an effective, positive way of talking about what government means to them.

Government is the people

Luckily, another president gave a speech on this subject, and luckily, he was a greater communicator than Reagan. Abraham Lincoln ended his remarks at the dedication of the cemetery at Gettysburg in 1863 with these words: "the great task remaining before us -- ...that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth."

Of the people, by the people, and for the people. The government does what the people need. The government is made up of the people. The American people and the American government are the same thing.

This is powerful idea and can carry progressives far. Here are a few things it means:

• De-funding the government is the same as de-funding the American people. Cutting tax investments isn't taking money from Congressmen. It's taking money from your neighbors. From your children. From the last person you talked to, and from the next. From the person standing next to you right now.
• Our government speaks for us. The excuse that "he's not my president" won't fly. Electoral games that result in ballots being disqualified or gerrymandering are unacceptable. The individuals we have chosen to represent us need to be held accountable to each and every American every day -- not just at election time. The American people are the boss.

Best of all, these words stop the conservative frame of "less government" in its tracks. Lincoln said that the American government is the same as the American people. Reagan said that the American government is the problem. Read Reagan's quote after Lincoln's and it sounds absurd -- but progressives know that it was what he really meant: "The American people aren't the solution to the problem. The American people are the problem." Using Lincoln's words, even in a Crossfire-style shouting match, makes it crystal clear what is important to right-wing radicals like Reagan compared to what is important to Americans who believe in the progressive traditions of liberty that Lincoln understood.

Use Lincoln's words wherever possible. Use the phrase "The American people and the American government are the same thing". If you need brevity, use "government of the people" or even "the government is the people". Say it, repeat it. Use it in letters to your newspapers, to your representatives. When they start using it, the American people will take back what already belongs to them and use our progressive traditions to lead our government forward.