An Open Letter to Rep. Ben Cline

Dear Congressman Cline:

Thank you for your service to our country.

I live in Front Royal, and I am therefore your constituent.  I am now a rather old man and old-fashioned.  I am of the belief that our Constitution created a representative form of government and that my representative is accountable to all citizens residing in his district.  This means, of course, that my representative considers the views of those who voted for him as well as those who did not.

The brilliance of James Madison assumed that we would disagree.  He assumed that shipping states, for example, would differ in their political views from inland states, but by checks and balances, our system would produce results that all could live with, even though they did not get all the policy options they desired.

Compromise is essential to the proper function of our government.  However, compromise is sorely lacking in current Congressional affairs.

We might disagree on what policies the federal government should advance, but we have things in common.  We both were educated in New England.  You attended law school at the University of Richmond.  My brother is a graduate of that school.  We have both spent our working lives living in Virginia and working in Washington, DC.  Most importantly, we are both citizens of the United States and, I assume, we both want what is best for our country and our children.

You and your Republican colleagues have told the American people that the actions of a mob on January 6, 2021, that desecrated the seat and system of our government, the US Capitol, were a patriotic expression.  I do not believe that, and I doubt that you do either, despite the rhetoric employed by your party to placate the views of the leader of your party, Donald Trump.

We differ in our views on the treatment of immigrants.  There are millions of undocumented immigrants in our country who live peacefully among us.  The President maintains that all immigrants residing in our country should be treated as violent criminals.  He says he wants to deport violent criminals.  On that, I agree with him, but his actions show that many immigrants who have been deported have broken no laws save crossing our borders without documentation.  With some experience in Latin America and the Northern Triangle, I can tell you that many of the people crossing our border were running for their lives. Seeking asylum and yearning for a better life for one’s children is no violent crime.

The President maintains that he did not lose the 2020 election because his narcissism does not allow him to accept that in 2020, the American people rejected his candidacy.  You and your party entertain this fiction to stay in the good graces of your leader lest he seek a candidate to challenge you in the next election.

Congressman Cline, there are worse fates that can befall a person than to lose a Congressional election.  Compromising your integrity to keep peace in the Republican family, acting on the sole purpose of self-preservation, seems to me a far worse fate.

When Democrats reach out to you or the President or your Republican colleagues, we are frequently dismissed as “left-wing lunatics.”  I am nothing of the sort.  I worked for a U.S. Senator, and we accomplished a great deal through bipartisan cooperation.  I helped to write the Uniform Minimum Drinking Age Act in 1984.  Senator John Danforth (R-Missouri) played a key role in our success.  I worked on mass transit legislation supported by Republicans, not based on ideology, but on the fact that their constituents relied on it.  As a representative of Mothers Against Drunk Driving (MADD), I had a hand in presenting awards to both Joe Biden and Strom Thurmond.

Beginning in the 1990s, the Republican Party no longer found it sufficient to disagree with Democrats because they represented different localities with different interests, but rather to label Democrats as somehow evil.  Both of our parties began to treat the other as enemies, using every wedge issue we could lay our hands on.

We must not be enemies.  No party has a monopoly on the truth.  Collectively, we can do much better for the American people.

Robert F. Kennedy has long been my political hero.  He said, “We must bind up the wounds that divide us and make us brothers and countrymen once again.”

No more labels.  No more wedge issues.  Our fellow countrymen need better and deserve better.

As we approach the great American holiday of Thanksgiving, let this be the time that we try to find ways to work together and bind up our wounds.  That would really be something to be thankful for.

Sincerely,

Thomas J. Howarth
Front Royal, VA

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