European Stars And Stripes (Newspaper) - July 19, 1986, Darmstadt, Hesse                                Page 10 the stars and stripes saturday july 19,1986 columns George will seeds of 1988 democratic Victory sprouting have you recently been exclaiming hot Dern no strange. In Dothan ala., president Rea Gan said the american people arc caroling hot 3cm," so Blissful Are they about tax Reform. But everything especially Bliss is written on water. And the following could be written on newsprint 28 months from now nov. 10,198s As president elect fill in the demo crat of your preference begins Cabinet making pundit with 20-20 Hindsight arc seeing that the seeds of demo cratic Victory were sprouting in he summer of 1986,when Gramm Rudman and tax Reform intersected. Tremors of the political earthquake that reduced Republican presidential Hopes to rubble began in mid August 1986, when As required by Gramm Rudman Congress was presented with a snapshot estimate of the meal 1987. The picture was not pretty. In january 1986, the Reagan administration had predicted 4 percent growth of the Economy for the year. By late july 1986, growth was 2 percent and capital investment even in the non Oil sector was deteriorating. In the summer of 1986, House Senate conferees on Tan Reform got into a genteel bidding War to see who could do most for the Middle class. Soon that class was defined capacious by to include All families earning up to $60,000. Only 15 percent of All families ram More than . Two thirds earn under$35,000. The median income is about $24,500. Tax treatment of iras was kept generous. Deduce Tib Lily of sales taxes was retained after All. These con Cessions to the Middle class were paid for by further Carl Rowan burdening musings with axes. President Reagan approved although three Yean earlier he had suggested eliminating business taxes be cause it ii unclear How hey Are raised from what would otherwise be employee compensation or from stockholder dividends or passed along in the Cost of the product. The Reagan administration was even will ing to sacrifice preferential treatment of capital gains in order to preserve the 27 percent top Rale for individuals a rate that by july 1986, had become a full blown fetish. By july 1986, the Stock Market had risen 40 percent in nine months and had doubled in four years adding is trillion to investors wealth. But one july monday the Dow Jones Industrial average plunged 61.87 Points knocking $74 billion off the value 01 stocks. This was followed in August by a big sell off As investors took their capital gains before the higher lax Rale hit the sell off fuelled the bearish psychology of business in july 1986, the Federal Reserve Board nil inter est rates but the Economy stayed Hal. By july 1986, consumer instalment debt had risen 20 percent in two Yean. The tax Bill that was signed into Law by labor Day 1986, was. Suited to extend the expansion a few More months by pumping Money into the pockets of Middle class Consumers by Hal is making the nation Al savings Rale even worse. By Spring 1987, Oil prices were rising As was inflation. Because the new tax Law ended lax Breaks in january 1987, but did not Cut rates until july 1987, i involved a one year tax increase of $20 billion in 1987 another drag on the sagging Economy. In july 1986. The supreme court declared unconstitutional the Gramm Rudman trigger mechanism. Soin August Congress used the Fallback mechanism it legislated the across the Board deficit reduction budget cuts and sent the order to the president for nun to sign. But he vetoed it. He had always Laid his defense program took precedence Over budget balancing. By july 1986, con Gress had already slashed his original fiscal 1987 de sense request the August 1986, snapshot thawed Hal even with creative bookkeeping and innovative accounting underestimating farm support Costi counting the receipts from the Sale of the untold con rail Etc the deficit estimate was going to trigger Cramm Rudman i Guillotine. That Blade makes half of its cuts in the 28 percent of the budget that is  vetoing Congress Cut order. President Reagan blew up the Gramm Rudman process. That convinced american investor and the watching world that $200 billion deficits did indeed Streich Al fir As the Eye could in july 1986, he 44th month of the slowing expansion the Reagan administration had acknowledged that the deficit for fiscal 1986, ending sept. 30, would top the 1985 record of j2i2 billion perhaps hitting 1220 billion. The fiscal 1987 deficit was As bad. By August 1987, when the snapshot showed that Tho Fin Cal 1988 deficit would be $125 billion Over the $108billion Gramm Rudman target the reaction in con Gress was Whai s a Gramm Rudmann the confusion of the autumn of 1986 produced democratic Senate and the recession of 1987-1988 reduced the presidential landslide thai today a Blissful Democrat exclaiming hot dem " supreme court nominations Are no calamity while i want to believe that i m going through a so Cay Little Nightmare and Hal the unbending conservative Wil Liam h. Rehnquist in t really about to become chief Justice of the United Stales i know Hal it is reality. I am not surprised by Rehnquist s Elevation or by the appointment of another devout conservative Antonin Scalia to the High tribunal. Alter All i spent much of the 1984 presidential Campaign warning americans Hal a vote for Rea Gan would be a vote for just the kind of court Hal is emerging. Still 1 am not among those who Wal Low in fear Hal a calamity has befallen us. President Reagan will have to make a couple More appointments before i con clude that he has successfully bound us to a dreadful future. Incredible things have happened to and within the supreme court As it has been buffeted by the tides of social and political change. Go Back 32 years when this was is ill a society in which racism and Jim Crow existed under the Protection of Law. Underfunded lawyers of the a act Legal defense fund were trying to gel the separate but equal doctrine of Pressy is. Ferguson reversed by a court made up of Stanley Reed Hugo Black Harold Burton Felix Frankfurter Tom Clark William 0, Douglas Sher Man minion Robert h. Jackson and chief Justice Earl Warren. A act lawyers prayed for just a 5-to 4 vote against Jim Crow. Wagers were made on what the vote would be but not one lawyer bet that the vote would be 9-to-0. Till this Day no one knows what Warren or some other Justice did to get these men some very conservative to Vole unanimously against school segregation. I think that in 1954 at least four Mem Bers of that court subordinated i hair per Sonal ideologies and racial feelings to what they believed was a compelling National interest. Rehnquist and Scalia just might read some new election returns or otherwise discern some new compelling demands of Justice. Those moaning that the appointments of Rehnquist and Scalia will kill the civil rights movement had belter re member that this movement has been dead for years and the supreme court did t do it. When the president of the United Stales refused even to talk to acknowledged Black leaders and the Justice department fought or refused to enforce Laws passed by Congress and blessed by the supreme court that is when the civil rights movement was killed now women s rights Scalia the father of nine children is certainly no going to be a supporter of a woman s unfettered right to an abortion. But his appointment does not bring us closer to the Day when the court will take Ameri cans Back to a total ban. Freedom of the press and libel and slander judgments my for of a Rehnquist Scalia till to the court is greater in this area than in either civil rights or women s rights. I am bothered by charges Hal Scalia is one of the greatest enemies of free speech in the american judiciary. Rights of the accused 1 expect no lurch backward to the pre Miranda Days of police abuses. Rights to privacy and Freedom from illegal searches and seizures a tide of Meek acceptance of police stale tactics has been oozing across America for Yean. The Rehnquist court will do no More to Stop it than the Burger court did but probably will not Speed up the tide. The House and Senate election this year and the election of a new president in 1988, will determine America s future in this area. In Short by political and social activism we americans have the ability to ensure Hal these court appointments do not become a disaster. Thai is if some one can keep alive and Well for a  of Yean four justices who Are Over 75. Photo