Norman Rockwell and the Half-Shekel

Upon being described as a “friend of the working classes,” George Bernard Shaw insisted he “had no other feeling for the working classes than an intense desire to abolish them and replace them by sensible people.” The quip raises a question asked by many current politicians, especially with the reshuffling of the electorate: How does one befriend the working classes? Do they want government to put more cents (or dollars) in their pockets, or to respect their sensibilities?

This week’s Torah portion Ki Tissa has much to teach on the subject. Everyone is commanded to bring a half-shekel to help construct the mishkan: “The rich shall not give more and the poor shall not give less.” [Ex. 30:15] Economists would object to this as regressive taxation; in California, by contrast, the wealthiest one percent pays half of all income taxes, whereas the bottom half pays less than 1%.

But such economic dependence can foster political paternalism. The wealthy exercise disproportionate influence on public policy, with politics’ golden rule being “Whoever has the gold makes the rules.” If, as Nobel Laureate Bob Dylan observed, “Money doesn’t talk, it swears,” then failing to pay taxes removes one from public discourse. One British journalist made the point explicitly: “I am not arguing we should be careless of the needs of struggling people [but we] should be careless of their opinions.” In others words, the rich should put food into the mouths of the poor — and then ignore the words that come out of them.

The Torah favors a different model. R. Yerucham Levovitz (1873-1936) explained the commandment reminds us “there is no difference” between the rich and poor, who are fundamentally equal. And Dr. Rachel Anisfeld, a contemporary scholar, connects the role of the half-shekel to the need of Adam (and by extension, all of us) to connect with another to become whole, and fulfill our purpose.

Foxhole egalitarianism

Social equality and interdependence were celebrated in the World War II-era, when millionaires and orphans shared foxholes, tanks and planes, and trusted one another with their lives. Norman Rockwell’s iconic 1943 painting “Freedom of Speech” depicted a man with a blue collar (and leather jacket) standing to speak before a town hall; two men with white collars (and jackets and ties) twist their heads to listen, because they care about his opinions and consider them worth hearing. Many working-class voters value and desire that respect — recognition that their opinions matter — more than the figurative offer of free pizza so long as they keep quiet while elites make all the decisions.

Rockwell’s speaker does not wear the same clothes as the listeners, and likely drives a cheaper car and lives in a smaller house. But he stands as their civic equal. As David Goodhart, the author of “The Road to Somewhere” explained, “People are prepared to trade economic gain for political agency and the prospect of a society that takes them more seriously.”

Rockwell’s speaker does not wear the same clothes as the listeners, and likely drives a cheaper car and lives in a smaller house. But he stands as their civic equal. 

Franklin Roosevelt thus advertised his party as the one that “believed in the wisdom … of the great majority of the people, as distinguished from the judgment of a small minority of either education or wealth.” In 1945, the Supreme Court likewise confirmed that public policy was a communal endeavor, finding that “right conclusions are more likely to be gathered out of a multitude of tongues, than through any kind of authoritative selection.” This confidence in the wisdom of the crowd has eroded in the last 80 years.

Predistribution or Redistribution?

Many contemporary Democrats believe the path to electoral success is to restore the principles not of Roosevelt’s New Deal but Lyndon Johnson’s Great Society, with higher taxes for the rich and more transfer payments to the poor. But the working class really prefers Roosevelt’s version of liberalism. More than 800 years ago, Maimonides wrote that the highest form of charity is a job, and evidence shows that workers agree.

A recent study, “‘Compensate the Losers?’: Economic Policy and Partisan Realignment in the U.S.,” indicates that redistributive taxation policies are (and always have been since polling began in the 1940s) less popular among high school graduates than among those with college degrees. Instead, the supposed beneficiaries of redistribution actually prefer “predistribution,” policies designed to provide opportunity and self-determination. Specifically, they favor the New Deal’s promise of guaranteed employment. They want the civic standing and social connections they derive from work, not the financial reward of a government-issued check.

Working conditions also matter. During the New Deal, “independent contractor” status was available to any Californian who decided how to complete his work projects (whether blue- or white-collar), even if someone else prescribed which work to do. But when the Legislature recently narrowed the range of independent work, it created exceptions only for those whose work is “original and creative” or “predominately intellectual.” But mechanics as well as screenwriters want the scheduling flexibility that enables them to bring their kids to after-school activities.

The shift from predistribution to redistribution in student loans likewise alienated the working class. The GI Bill enabled veterans to choose how to allocate their benefits; they could use them to pay college tuition, or to start a business. By contrast, the more recent policy of canceling student loans would help future professionals but exclude the gardener who is paying off his truck loan (as well as the graduates who dutifully paid back what they owed).

The closing of the American town hall

Perhaps the most pernicious change since the 1940s is the exclusion of the working class from public debate. The real-life analogue to Rockwell’s speaker was Grace Marsh, who was arrested in 1943 for distributing pamphlets against the wishes of the corporation that owned the town — and its sidewalks. The Supreme Court ruled in her favor, insisting that her right to speak could not be lost “simply because a single company has legal title to all the town.”

But today’s workers have no chance to speak at — or even attend — a Rockwellian meeting discussing important questions. Contemporary Grace Marshes have been banished from the “sidewalks” of corporate-owned internet sites (what the Supreme Court has deemed “the modern public square”), often at the urging of governmental officials, and state censors demanded (and achieved) the removal of truthful information on the ground that the public could not be trusted to evaluate it properly.

Due to that distrust (the opposite of Roosevelt’s belief in the “wisdom … of the great majority of the people”) COVID policy disregarded their needs. Families with backyards and pools hardly noticed shuttered playgrounds and beaches, but those in cramped apartments suffered. Private schools remained open while public ones stayed closed. And almost 70% of graduate-degree holders could work from home, and lost their commute; only 17% of those who never attended college could do so, so they lost their jobs — and the social connections derived from them.

The lesson of the half-shekel is that everyone contributes to a mission in which everyone shares. Under FDR, everyone was expected to work (even if the government had to create the job) and everyone was expected to join the war effort. As with the half-shekel contribution, there were no class-based exemptions. LBJ, by contrast, offered separate deals for rich and poor. Unlike the 1930s, there was no universal expectation to work; Johnson exempted the poor from work through loose welfare policies. But unlike the 1940s, there was no universal expectation to serve, as Johnson exempted the student class from military service. The Torah imperative, neither to favor the poor nor defer to the rich (Lev: 19:15), but to treat all according to the same standard, would do much to restore our national community.

Mitchell Keiter is the author of “Forum for the Common Man: How Robins v. Pruneyard Integrated the Marketplace of Ideas with the Marketplace of Goods.”