Sen. Tom Cotton, center, and Rep. French Hill at the town hall.

There’s regular intelligence, and there’s emotional intelligence, which is the ability to recognize and control your own emotions and to influence the emotions of others. If you’re a member of Congress, you need both, but if you’re a member of Congress participating in a town hall, and you can only be blessed with one, it’d better be emotional intelligence.

I write that paragraph after attending Monday’s 2 p.m. raucous town hall hosted by Sen. Tom Cotton and Rep. French Hill, where it didn’t matter what kind of intellectual arguments they made because they weren’t going to change many minds among the 750 attendees – some of whom totally supported them and many of whom were totally opposed. All that mattered was that they kept their cool amongst the booing, jeering, shouted interruptions and personal attacks, and they did.

This is one odd way we do political discourse these days. A Republican congressman – just as Democrats did in 2009 – hosts a town hall for some reason. Advocates alert the like-minded to converge and attack. The member of Congress stands on a stage before a mostly hostile room where audience members take their turns asking questions – most pointed, some insulting, and some better than the ones asked by journalists. Many in the audience cheer. The member of Congress answers – sometimes well, sometimes lamely. Many boo regardless.

That was the case Monday. When Hill said Congress must repeal Obamacare, the crowd reacted with a mixture of loud boos and cheers. Asked if Congress would subpoena President Trump’s tax returns, Cotton said Trump is still being audited, that he has completed a statement of financial interest, and that everyone knows where he does business because he attaches his name to his buildings. Few were convinced. At one point, some audience members chanted, “Lock him up” regarding Trump, an echo of the “Lock her up” chant in the 2016 campaign that Republican politicians unfortunately did little to tame.

The frustration expressed by many in the audience is explainable. All of us have a vision for how this country should look, but, in a democracy of 300 million people, none of us will get our way. Average Americans of all persuasions feel silenced in comparison to big money donors. The system is beset by partisan bickering and is unable to solve problems, even when compromise should be possible. Elected officials inflame the uncivil climate with their own rhetoric. If a politician uses the word “liberal” as an insult, then it should not be surprising that his liberal constituents feel insulted.

Town halls can be useful. They let members of a political minority express themselves in solidarity with kindred spirits. They remind elected officials, who tend to focus on their base of supporters, that some of their constituents feel intensely differently. At their best, they may even expose a member of Congress to new information. I don’t know if it has anything to do with the town halls, but Cotton’s rhetoric on health care has become more balanced after years of his merely criticizing Obamacare. Certainly, I would rather live in a country where average citizens loudly express their disapproval with the authorities than one where such behavior is not tolerated.

But we’ve all learned certain rules for dealing with other people, and those rules shouldn’t change in a town hall setting. Interrupting, shouting insults, putting people on the defensive, speaking without listening – these are not the most effective communication tools. Elected officials, especially polarizing ones like Cotton, know some of their constituents disagree with them, but for every person jeering at them in a town hall, there are hundreds at home or work whose votes cancel theirs out. Some make the calculation that it’s worth being yelled at for an hour or two in order to look like they’re representing everyone. Playing the martyr may even form the basis for a fundraising letter somewhere down the road.

If I were to design these meetings, I’d keep the disagreement and some of the passion, but I’d add a lot more civility to the discourse. I’d have less yelling and jeering, and more shows of hand – importantly, with the expectation that they might actually affect a congressman’s thinking. And I’d have more town halls, period, at accessible times of day.

But then, while all of us have a vision for how this country should look, none of us will get our way. I’ll try to keep my cool about it.

By Steve Brawner
© 2017 by Steve Brawner Communications, Inc.

In 1776, the United States declared its independence from the British monarchy. In 2017, the United States government looks like the British Parliament.

In Britain’s parliamentary system, there aren’t really separate legislative and executive branches, and partisanship is designed into the system. Voters elect members of Parliament (MPs) based largely on the MP’s party affiliation. The party winning a majority (or leading a majority coalition, because there are more than two) forms a government. The party’s leading MP becomes prime minister – currently Theresa May, who represents the town of Maidenhead. Other leading MPs administer parts of the government, much like our Cabinet. The other ruling party members, known as “backbenchers,” go along with their leaders on important matters unless they feel compelled to engage in a “backbench rebellion” – enough of which can bring down the government. The minority party, meanwhile, functions as a loyal opposition with limited power as it awaits the next election.

That sounds a lot like how we do things here, now. Last Friday, Justice Neil Gorsuch became the Supreme Court’s latest member based on the wishes of the ruling party, the Republicans. They pushed his nomination through the Senate over the objections of the minority party, the Democrats, who never had any intention but to oppose him. Democrats tried to use one of the minority party’s last remaining tools, the filibuster, where debate continues indefinitely unless ended with a 60-vote majority. In response, Republicans changed the rules to end the filibuster for Supreme Court nominees, a move Democrats had done for lower courts and Cabinet officials in 2013. The changes are permanent.

A couple of weeks earlier in the House of Representatives, the majority party leaders, Speaker Paul Ryan and his lieutenants along with President Donald Trump, attempted to replace the Affordable Care Act (Obamacare) with their own concoction, the American Health Care Act. The AHCA was created with little involvement from many rank-and-file Republicans and with absolutely no input from the minority Democrats. It failed as a result of a backbench rebellion when various Republicans said no.

In the past, the next step in the American political system might have been for Republican leaders to work with Democrats to write a bill that could win majority support from the centers of both parties while the wings on the right and left were left out. But we’re a British system now. Such bipartisan cooperation happens less often these days because the centers of the two parties are now far apart and pitted against each other. If Republicans go back to the drawing board, it will be to create something to appease their own backbenchers.

This is happening because of evolving political norms and larger societal forces. The United States is no longer so united. The country whose motto once was the Latin phrase “E pluribus unum” – “out of many, one” – increasingly might be better described by “E unum pluribus.” As a result, American voters, once cussedly independent, increasingly are becoming straight-ticket voters who pull the lever based on the “R” or the “D” by the candidates’ names.

Acting like a parliamentary system would be acceptable if it matched the designs of the Constitution. Unfortunately, it doesn’t. The Constitution doesn’t even mention parties, and George Washington warned against them in his farewell address. The struggle for power is supposed to be between the three branches of government, not two political parties. Members of Congress are elected not to follow their party leadership but to serve their own constituents and states.

The United States government can at least function as a parliamentary system when one party controls both the presidency and Congress, as Republicans do now. However, American voters commonly elect one party to control one branch and the other party to control all or part of the other, which can’t happen in Britain. When that happens, as it did from 2011-16, the result is gridlock and, potentially, abuse of power by one of the branches, probably the executive.

In short, American democracy’s informal habits reflect a British system without that system’s formal structure. Either the structure needs to change, or the habits. I’m not sure which would be easier, or even if either would be possible.