QUISLING HEADS TO HADES :

Moving South, to the Domain of the Princes (JOHN TIERNEY, 6/14/02, NY Times)

In this column, Washington has generally played the role of the Great Satan. It is both the antithesis and the nemesis of New York. My favorite explanation of the New York-Washington relationship, not to mention the history of urban civilization, is the economist Brad DeLong's theory of merchants versus princes.

Cities have always been created by merchants, the peaceful deal-makers who flourish under the protection of a relatively hands-off prince. The city becomes cosmopolitan as the merchants import money and talent: entrepreneurs and artisans to create industries; artists and entertainers to serve the new class of patrons.

But the city's growing wealth and glamour eventually attract the age's most ambitious princes. Once these conquerors add the city to their empire, their taxes and decrees drive away the merchants and artists. [...]

Dr. DeLong's study did not include New York, but it is easy for a non-economist to spot a similar trend here in the last century. The city's population grew rapidly for the first three decades, doubling to nearly 7 million by 1930. But as Fiorello LaGuardia and Robert Moses consolidated their power and allied themselves with the rising New Deal princes in Washington, the growth slowed, and the population stagnated at 7.8 million from 1950 through 1970. It fell by 800,000 during the 1970's, when Washington's princes were working especially hard to rescue urban America.

Congress's "urban agenda" was scrapped by its Republican princes during the 1980's and 1990's, and Washington's benign neglect coincided with a rebound in New York's population. The merchants gained power, and today one of them is prince. If Michael R. Bloomberg is anything like Lorenzo the Magnificent, the city will prosper.

A couple of things recommend this column. For one thing, Mr. Tierney, unlike his colleague Paul Krugman, appropriately refers to "Dr. DeLong, an economist at the University of California at Berkeley". The non-political description is apt in this case because Mr. Tierney is citing him solely for his economic expertise, whereas it was wholly inappropriate for Mr. Krugman to portray Dr. DeLong as a mere economist when citing his favorable statements about Bill Clinton's economic policies--policies which Dr. DeLong himself takes credit for formulating.

Second, Mr. Tierney is a notorious thought-criminal, the libertarian in the NY Times' woodpile. In one hilariously hysterical profile, Libertarian Rhapsody, Chris Mooney, 9.10.01, American Prospect), it was even suggested that Mr. Tierney is some kind of ideological cancer growing on the Gray Lady :

What is this man doing at the Times? In seven years of writing "The Big City," Tierney has built a reputation as a provocateur whose journalistic sallies tend to target New York City's liberal elite. Underneath the urbane, whimsical-prankster sensibility, however, is a fairly straightforward ideological mission. Despite its title, Tierney's column is not entirely a reporter's notebook of random musings about Gotham. It's closer to a series of briefs for laissez-faire.

It will be interesting to see if he can bring a less credulous coverage of government to his new position in the Times's Washington bureau.

Posted by Orrin Judd at June 14, 2002 10:49 AM