Joseph Boyett, Author & Consultant
SOME OF THE THINGS YOU WILL LEARN FROM READING
GETTING THINGS DONE IN WASHINGTON
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- The first American Constitution, which mirrored much of what conservatives advocate today in
terms of the balance of power between the federal and state governments, became an
embarrassment to the nation. It was so bad the founding fathers decided it couldn’t be fixed and
had to be discarded entirely.
- The founding fathers committed treason when they wrote a new Constitution. They were so
worried that people might find out about their treason that they met in secret.
- The architect of the Constitution and one of the most influential in getting it adopted was a small,
sickly, shy, bookish scholar who spoke in a voice so soft people had to strain to hear him. He was
just the kind of pointy headed intellectual conservatives despise.
- If some delegates to the first Congress had their way, Barack Obama would now be introduced as
“His Highness the President of the United States and Protector of Their Liberties.”
- A 30-foot high, 200-foot long pile of horse manure in New York City was one of the catalysts for
passage of the pure food and drug act and creation of the Food and Drug Administration.
- Executives in the Department of Agriculture fed toxic substances such as formaldehyde and
sulfurous acid to healthy young men to find out how the poisons affected their bodies.
- President Theodore Roosevelt refused to disclose to American consumers unsanitary and
dangerous practices in the country’s meat packing plants even thought his own investigators had
documented the disgusting practices.
- Medicare was passed in part as a result of a legislative practice called “salami slicing.”
- Colonial America had plenty of Maximum Wage laws to restrict how much workers could be paid
but no Minimum Wage laws guaranteeing them even a subsistence wage.
- Congress passed the Sherman Act in 1890 to rein in big business and prevent monopolies. It
was used instead to bust unions.
- The man who had the most to do with the passage of the first Civil Rights law in over 80 years in
1957 used his enormous legislative skill to kill Civil Rights legislation proposed just one year
before. He switched sides in one year.
AND MOST OF ALL YOU’LL LEARN
FIVE KEY THINGS PROGRESSIVES MUST GET RIGHT TO GET THINGS DONE IN WASHINGTON
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