QandO

June 11, 2004

Maggie Thatcher: Reagan's Legacy
Posted by McQ

Today's NY Post carries a piece by Margret Thather first carried on Dec. 30, 1988 (as Reagan was leaving office) in National Review, in which she remembers Reagan's leadership and legacy. It puts the revisionist attempts we've been seeing over the last few days into perspective: petty sniping by opposing political ideologues. Thatcher first touches on the context of Reagan's entrance into office:

On entering office, the president faced high interest rates, high inflation, sluggish growth and a growing demand for self-destructive protectionism. These problems had created — and in turn were reinforced by — a feeling that not much could be done about them, that America faced inevitable decline in a new era of limits to growth, that the American dream was over.

President Reagan saw instinctively that pessimism itself was the disease and that the cure for pessimism is optimism. He set about restoring faith in the prospects of the American dream — a dream of boundless opportunity built on enterprise, individual effort and personal generosity. He infused his own belief in America's economic future in the American people.

That was farsighted. It carried America through the difficult early days of the 1981-82 recession, because people are prepared to put up with sacrifices if they know that those sacrifices are the foundations of future prosperity.

This is probably one of the greatest things I remember about Reagan personally. The optimism he brought to the country. The ability to again feel proud and confident about America.

And, after he did that for America, he looked to doing the same for the rest of the world. Thatcher relates:

Having restored the faith of the Amer ican people in themselves, the presi dent set about liberating their energies and enterprise. He reduced the excessive burden of regulation, halted inflation and first cut and, later, radically reformed taxation.

When barriers to enterprise are removed and taxes cut to sensible levels (as we found in Britain), people have the incentive to work harder and earn more. They thereby benefit themselves, their families and the whole community. Hence the buoyant economy of the Reagan years — then the longest period of peacetime economic growth in U.S. history, with unemployment cut to the lowest level in over a decade.

The international impact of these successes was enormous. At a succession of Western economic summits, the president's leadership encouraged the West to cooperate on policies of low inflation, steady growth and open markets. These policies kept protectionism in check and the world economy growing.

They are policies which offer not just an economic message, but a political one: Freedom works. It brings growth, opportunity and prosperity in its train. Other countries, seeing its success in the United States and Britain, rushed to adopt the policies of freedom.

She's right: "Freedom works". And that goes for economic freedom as well. Instead of "Whip Inflation Now" buttons, we got leadership not only domestically, but internatinally from Reagan that put everyone in the free world on the road to economic prosperity.

Which then allowed Reagan to turn his attention to those peoples of the world who lived under totalitarianism. To understand the hurdles Reagan faced, Thatcher puts that time in context:

President Reagan took office at a time when the Soviet Union was invading Afghanistan, placing missiles in Eastern Europe aimed at West European capitals and assisting Communist groups in the Third World to install themselves in power against the popular will — and when America's response was hobbled by the so-called "Vietnam syndrome."

And not just America's response. The entire West, locked in a battle of wills with the Soviets, seemed to be losing confidence.

Viet Nam still hovered over our national consciousness like a 500 lb. bomb. Couple what with our botched rescue attempt of the Iranian hostages (Desert One) and it was apparent we lacked confidence in our ability to turn back communism either politically or militarily. Reagan didn't buy into that and set out to change not only America's attitude, but that of the free world:

President Reagan's first step was to change the military imbalance that underlay this loss of confidence. He built up American power in a series of defense budgets. There were criticisms of this build-up as too expensive. Well, a sure defense is expensive, but not nearly so expensive as weakness could turn out to be.

By this military build-up, President Reagan strengthened not only American defenses, but also the will of America's allies. And he demonstrated that he was not afraid to put to good use the military strength he had built up.

The decisions he took in the face of strong criticism have been justified by events. He won the Cold War without firing a shot.

An incredible accomplishement by anyone's accounting, and one attributed to Reagan by a person who was in the thick of the Cold War fight at the time ... Margret Thatcher. Case closed.

Thatcher goes on to point to what I've mentioned about Reagan. He was a leader. And that, at the time, was what America and the free world desparately needed:

WHEN we attempt an overall survey of President Reagan's term of office, one thing stands out. It is that he achieved the most difficult of all political tasks: changing attitudes and perceptions about what is possible.

From the strong fortress of his convictions, he set out to enlarge freedom the world over at a time when freedom was in retreat — and he succeeded. It is not merely that freedom now advances while collectivism is in retreat — important though that is. It is that freedom is the idea that everywhere captures men's minds while collectivism can do no more than enslave their bodies.

That is the measure of the change that President Reagan wrought.

No one can doubt that President Reagan possessed the ability to lead to an unusual degree. Some of the constituent qualities of that leadership I have referred to in passing — his firm convictions, his steadfastness in difficult times, his capacity to infuse his own optimism into the American people so that he restored their belief in America's destiny. But I would add three more qualities that, together with those above, enabled him to transform the political landscape.

The first is courage. The whole world remembers the wit and bravery that the president displayed at the time of the attempt on his life. It was one of those occasions when people saw the real character of a man when he had none of the assistances that power and office provide. And they admired what they saw — cheerful bravery in the face of personal danger, no thought for himself but instead a desire to reassure his family and the nation by jokes and good humor.

The second is that he held opinions that struck a chord in the heart of the average American. He could appeal for support to the American people because they sensed rightly that he shared their dreams, hopes and aspirations; and he pursues them by the same route of plain American horse-sense.

Finally, President Reagan spoke with the authority of a man who knew what he believed and who had shown that he would stand by his beliefs in good times and bad. He was no summer soldier of conservatism, but one who fought in the ranks when the going wasn't good.

Again, that reassured even those who do not share those beliefs. For authority is the respect won from others by the calm exercise of deep conviction.

THE results of that leadership are all around us. President Reagan departed the political scene leaving America stronger and more confident, and the West more united than ever before.

She calls what he did "the most difficult of all political tasks". I call it the most difficult task of a leader.

Ronald Reagan may have made mistakes. He may have backed some poor policies a time or two. But one thing that can't be taken away from him was his ability to inspire and motivate. His ability to communicate his optimism about his country and its ability. Ronald Reagan changed the world for the better, and he did this because he was a leader.

May he rest in peace.

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