Ethics and Etiquette: A Discussion
Judging from your posts, some of you think that I'm being unfair to Larry Summers and Lisa New for suggesting that the establishment of a wedding registry opens the door to, in my word, "ass-kissing," and that President Summers would do better to ask people who wish to celebrate his marriage to contribute money to Harvard.
I will concede that I'm a stickler for ethics, and that given the possibility of impropriety, it's best to be cautious. It's hard to say where this came from exactly—many sources, I'm sure—but I do remember one incident that affected me deeply.
After my sophomore year in college, I volunteered for a congressman in Washington, New Haven Democrat Bruce Morrison. I did the usual routine stuff—answered letters, wrote a bill to try to get New Haven on a postage stamp (it didn't pass), that kind of thing.
Like all congressional offices, ours would receive bundles of gifts from lobbyists and trade associations who wished to curry favor with the congressman and his staff. (The one I remember particularly well was a case of beer from Anheiser-Busch.) Every other office that I knew of was more than happy to take these gifts. The congressmen, who tended to underpay their staffs, knew that these little gifts could boost office morale, and didn't like to think that the staffs could be influenced by them—though of course they could be, and were.
But Morrison had run as a reformer, and he was serious about that; he made us return every single gift that came to the office. On one level, I was none too happy about that policy; I wasn't getting paid a dime to work there, and as a result, I rose at 5:00 AM on weekend mornings to work as a phone operator at the Washington Post. (Taking calls from angry subscribers who didn't receive their papers, or their comics sections—but that's another story.)
On another level, though, I admired Morrison for his position. I could see that these gifts did have an impact on the other congressional offices; you'd be surprised how little it takes to bribe someone, to create a feeling of indebtedness. ("Oh, come on, we should meet with these guys, they sent us that great case of beer....") If it didn't work, the lobbyists wouldn't have done it.
To some, Morrison's policy might have seemed priggish. But on balance, I think he was right. The gifts were designed to influence, and at least some of the time, they did. Better not to take the chance.
Now, of course, there are significant differences between gifts to a congressional office and gifts to newlyweds. But my point is twofold. First, that's one example of why I think about such things. And second, every act of giving becomes more loaded when you are giving to someone in power, someone who can do things for you. If you don't believe that, then you are living an unexamined life.
Ultimately, it's really the responsibility of the person in power to think about the issues involved...and the responsibility of the rest of us to discuss them. I've never resented it when people have discussed various ethical conundrums I've gotten into, partly because I always thought I was right, partly because the discussions had the potential to be interesting.
Perhaps I'm wrong; perhaps I'm over-reacting. But how could the discussion be a bad thing?
