David Brooks on Newshour Friday said he'd learned, contrary to the assumptions of political scientists, that people don't want power. He was talking about Congress not being willing to write specific authorities in legislation, as SCOTUS in this week's decision, says they ought to, rather than relying on agencies like EPA to decide and act.
It sort of fits with something I learned from "The First Congress", a book by Fergus Bordewich on the wheelings and dealings during 1789-91. I've learned the Bill of Rights was not the Congressional version of the Ten Commandments, words of wisdom widely debated and finally etched in stone. Some legislators saw them as rather meaningless, sops thrown to the Anti-Federalists who'd extracted the promise of amendments as part of state ratification of the Constitution.
Much more important to Congress was the location of the national capital. It took months of maneuvering and deliberations before the final compromise which settled it.
That also fits with another action this week: Congress blew up efforts to rationalize and modernize the Veterans Administrations healthcare facilities. That reminded me of a similar attempt back in the early 1980's to rationalize ASCS offices. It ended badly.
So my bottom line: Congress doesn't do well on difficult policy questions; it's much more interested in offices and jobs and will never delegate authority to agencies to change them.
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