My Final EconLog Post

I enjoy you’re writing anywhere I can get it. Your explanations and thoughts on monetary policy have been critical to my own understanding, and I no longer ride the waves of nonsensical arguments about easing or tightening that reason from a price change based on 25bps moves.

I like your cultural and political commentary and focus on the broader implications or shifts you see, rather than just a reaction to the issue/scandal de jour.

While I’m not a movie buff, I still find your reviews for movies compelling and accessible.

I hope you enjoy writing for many more years, and I plan on reading as long as you do.

Best wishes/

It was a pleasure reading you here over the years.  Best.

You are sounding a bit Thomistic these days lol:

Aquinas argues in De Regno that tyranny arises when rulers abandon equal justice for private passion. Depending on which vice dominates, the tyrant plunders wealth through greed, sheds blood through anger, or rules arbitrarily through willfulness. The result is pervasive insecurity: nothing is stable, no one can confidently say “this this is such and such” because all depends on the ruler’s whim. Beyond material oppression, tyrants also stunt the spiritual and moral growth of their subjects, fearing excellence and virtue as threats to their own power. Thus tyranny not only destroys safety and justice but actively suppresses the flourishing of the people.

There is no good government when justice (giving to each their due) is flaunted.  Integrity is a necessary virtue for good government.

Thanks much Scott. I dont always agree with you, and TBH dont always quite understand your thinking, but you always make me think and over the years have changed my mind on some things. BTW, I think your Bucks are kind of hosed for a while.

Steve

Everyone,  Thanks for the kind remarks.

Scott’s final EconLog post is a poignant reminder that in an era of deep polarization, integrity isn’t a luxury – it’s the bedrock of any functioning society. Drawing from his formative Watergate memories, Sumner argues that “almost everything is downstream of integrity,” warning that without it, constitutions crumble, norms erode, and nations risk becoming “failed states.” Critics might dismiss these ideas as outdated or narrowly rooted in the writings of America’s white male founders, but that misses the point: such themes are profoundly universal, echoed in voices from diverse races, cultures, sexes, and nationalities during the very era Sumner romanticizes (and beyond). Far from being the exclusive domain of Enlightenment elites, these concepts have been championed by women, Black Americans, Indigenous leaders, and global thinkers, often as tools to critique corruption and demand justice. This broad resonance doesn’t just validate Sumner’s article; it amplifies it, proving that the pursuit of truthful governance transcends time, place, and identity.

Consider Sumner’s lament about America’s slide into factionalism: politicians as “cheerleaders” rather than statesmen, with “red states” and “blue states” fracturing national unity. This isn’t a uniquely modern or Western gripe. In 1776, Abigail Adams, a white American woman and sharp political thinker, warned her husband John in a letter that unchecked male “factionalism” and “arbitrary power” would perpetuate divisions, excluding half the population (women) from the republic’s promise. She demanded inclusive statesmanship, much like Sumner’s call for bipartisanship. Similarly, Red Jacket, a Seneca chief, decried the polarizing “divisions” imposed by European settlers in his 1805 speech to missionaries, advocating for communal norms under a shared “Great Spirit” to heal societal rifts. From an African perspective, Olaudah Equiano, a formerly enslaved British abolitionist whose 1789 narrative influenced American debates, exposed how colonial animosities and propaganda deepened divides, urging moral unity against slavery’s corruption. These voices, from a woman challenging patriarchy, an Indigenous leader resisting colonialism, and an African survivor of the slave trade, illustrate that polarization’s dangers are a human constant, not a “white man’s” invention. They support Sumner’s nostalgia for a less divided America by showing how diverse peoples have long fought for unity through integrity.

At the heart of Sumner’s piece is the idea that integrity is the “sine qua non” of effective governance. Without it, laws and structures are easily evaded. This echoes across eras and identities. Phillis Wheatley, an enslaved Black American poet, captured this in her 1773 poem “On Virtue,” portraying moral integrity as the “bright jewel” essential for liberty, subtly indicting the hypocrisy of slave-owning founders who preached freedom without practicing it. Mercy Otis Warren, another white American woman and revolutionary historian, reinforced this in her 1805 History of the Rise, Progress, and Termination of the American Revolution, arguing that public virtue (integrity) sustains republics, while its absence invites tyranny regardless of gender. Globally, the ancient Chinese philosopher Confucius, whose Analects (influential in 18th-century Europe and Asia) emphasized ren (benevolent integrity) as the foundation of stable rule, aligns here; even in the founding era, such ideas resonated in the Qianlong Emperor’s edicts, which prioritized moral leadership to avert dynastic decay. These examples, from Black women poets, female historians, and Asian ethical traditions, underscore Sumner’s point: integrity isn’t optional; it’s the universal glue holding societies together, adaptable even in oppressive contexts.

Sumner wisely stresses informal norms over rigid laws, noting how governments (like sneaky banks) evade restrictions without behavioral guardrails. This theme finds powerful echoes in Black American voices of the time. Benjamin Banneker, a free Black astronomer, confronted Thomas Jefferson in a 1791 letter, arguing that the Declaration’s ideals were hollow without norms of equality: white leaders’ evasion of anti-tyranny principles perpetuated slavery. Lemuel Haynes, the first ordained Black minister in America, echoed this in his 1776 essay “Liberty Further Extended,” insisting that true governance requires “inward principles” of virtue beyond mere laws, lest corruption turn liberty into bondage. Indigenous perspectives add depth: Mohawk leader Joseph Brant, in his 1780s letters to colonial officials, demanded adherence to treaties’ spirit, not just their letter, to prevent the corrupt “evasions” that ravaged Native lands. These critiques, from Black intellectuals and Indigenous diplomats, don’t contradict Sumner; they enhance him, showing how norms of integrity have been invoked by marginalized groups to hold power accountable, making his argument more robust and inclusive.

Scott’s demands for truthful, non-corrupt politicians who honor laws’ intent and attract talent through better incentives, and his warning about long-term decay into “banana republics” resonate historically as calls for systemic renewal. Equiano’s narrative demanded “integrity and humanity” from leaders to end slavery’s lies, while North African historian Ibn Khaldun’s 14th-century Muqaddimah (still studied in the 18th-century Islamic world) described societal “cohesion” (asabiyyah) as the bulwark against corruption-fueled collapse—ideas that parallel Sumner’s optimism that “somewhat idealistic people” can be elected. Wheatley’s poetic odes to virtue, like her 1775 tribute to Washington, urged a broad moral focus to avert failure, much as Sumner shifts from specific issues to systemic integrity.

His article emerges not as a relic of founder-era thought but as a living echo of humanity’s shared wisdom. From Abigail Adams’ gendered pleas to Red Jacket’s Indigenous critiques, from Wheatley’s Black poetic vision to Confucian and Khaldunian ethics, these diverse voices affirm that integrity’s absence invites ruin, while its pursuit fosters resilience. Sure, the founders’ writings (which Sumner implicitly channels) were penned by white men in a flawed era, but their ideas gained universality precisely because others—women, people of color, global thinkers—adapted and expanded them, often in defiance of exclusion. This isn’t naive universalism; it’s a candid acknowledgment that history’s discomforts make these themes more urgent today. Sumner’s farewell isn’t just a personal reflection—it’s a rallying cry for all of us to demand better, drawing on centuries of cross-cultural insight. If we heed it, perhaps we can avoid the “failed state” he fears. Thanks, Scott, for the reminder; your words bridge eras and peoples in the best possible way.

I think the points about integrity are well taken.

but I’m surprised that you made no mention of the press in your comments here.

Perhaps it wasn’t the case for the entirety of our nation’s history, but it was in our lifetime the case that the press spoke truth to power and called out and highlighted these integrity issues. Where now the mainstream press is with few exceptions nothing more than cheerleaders – and deflecting interference runners – for their favorite team.