The question is exceedingly simple, but the answer is about as complex as the lengthy explanation of Albert Einstein’s Theory of Relativity. Indeed, it’s so complex, I won’t deal with the national answer in this missive because some of the issues nationally are quite different than in Wisconsin (that, and I really owe the TownHall version of the blog something).
There are three basic elements of conservatism; social, judicial and fiscal. Usually, these three elements are mutually-supporting, but they are anything but synonymous. A couple of quick examples – is it judicially or fiscally conservative to support the “war on drugs”? No, but it is socially conservative. Is it judicially or even socially conservative to support a state-imposed limit on how much a local government can raise taxes? Depending on whether it is a statutory or constitutional limit, not necessarily, yet it is undoubtedly fiscally conservative.
Social conservatism, at least among the populace, is as alive and well as can be. The two referenda that were on the ballot in November both passed handily. On issue after issue, the majority of the populace at least professes to believe in the conservative position. However, the Republican Party, the only one where social conservatism is at least tolerated, has taken social conservatives for granted for years.
Judicial conservatism is somewhat in a state of flux. Whenever voters are given a choice between someone who doesn’t believe in judicial activism or a soft-on-crime approach and someone who does believe in judicial activism and a soft-on-crime approach, they opt for the former. Tempering this is the fact that there are so few contested judicial elections, especially once there is an incumbent. This allows judges to “grow” in office and see their mandate to be a “Lawgiver-In-Black”. We’ve seen this most-recently with Pat Crooks. Crooks “grew” into a Lawgiver-In-Black, reportedly because he didn’t want to face a challenge from Wisconsin’s trial lawyers. He ensured that he didn’t have any opposition in his re-election bid.
That brings us to fiscal conservatism. In my lifetime, there has been exactly one successful bid in Madison to actually reduce spending in Wisconsin – the Wisconsin Works welfare reform. One could try to claim that the 2/3rds school-finance shift to the state in exchange for limits on how much school districts can jack up taxes is fiscal conservatism, but even before the various referenda are taken into account, the net result was a shift of the money source to the state and a resultant massive increase in spending.
Outside of a micro-revolt that happened in southern Milwaukee County in 2002 that was the direct result of a massive pension scandal at the county level, and perhaps the ouster of then-Senate Majority Leader Mary Panzer over her failure to bring TABOR to a vote (which failed spectacularily when Glenn Grothman immediately went native), there has been no widespread successful voter “revolt” against high taxes. True, school bonding referenda have occassionally gone down in defeat, but when a $93 million referendum passes in tiny New Richmond, and $20-$30 million referenda routinely pass even in the heart of that revolt, one can fairly say that there is no sense of fiscal conservatism amongst the populace.
Is it any surprise that the Republican Party has paid no more than lip service to fiscal conservatism? From the Republicans’ abandonment of Scott McCallum when he proposed getting rid of shared revenue in 2002 to the aforementioned Panzer burying of TABOR in 2004, to the 2-year failure to pass the TPA the last 2 years to the current push by the Assembly Pubbie leadership to accept tax increases, Wisconsin Republicans have never been fiscal conservatives.
Why do they pay lip service to fiscal conservatism? Politics, pure and simple. The Democrats have the social and fiscal liberalism bases locked up tight. Most social conservatives are, almost by necessity, also fiscal conservatives. They have, in a bit of irony, taken to heart Gerald Ford’s words of warning – “A government big enough to give you everything you want is a government big enough to take from you everything you have.”
So, what’s my final answer? At least in Wisconsin, conservatism as a political movement is not only out of gas, but on life support, and will remain so as long as the Republican Party (or its successor) takes social conservatives for granted. Further, even though it is not popular, as long as fiscal conservatism gets short shrift, any gains from gearing toward social conservatives will be at best temporary.
