A Rage for Justice: The Passion and Politics of Phillip Burton.

• Author: Meyerson, Harold

The era of big government may or may not actually be over, but during the past year alone, Keynesian liberalism has certainly become the stuff of histories. Three notable, often brilliant accounts of postwar liberalism appeared in 1995. Two--Nelson Lichtenstein's biography of Walter Reuther and Kevin Boyle's The UAW and The Heyday of American Liberalism, 1945-1968--deal with the United Auto Workers, the anchor tenant in the house of '40s, '50s and '60s liberalism. The third, John Jacobs's marvelous biography of San Francisco Congressman Phillip Burton, is both a riveting and scholarly account of liberalism's fiercest and most able proponent on Capitol Hill during the late '60s and '70s.

Like Lyndon Johnson, Burton was above all a virtuoso at legislating--to the invariable benefit, in his case, of working people, the poor, and the environment. As Jacobs documents, Burton was a major force behind the enactment of OSHA, SSI, mine safety laws, and a vast enlargement of the national park system. Just as important, it was Burton more than anyone who transformed Congress from a semi-feudal network of unaccountable committee chairmen to a body where party caucuses actually could control the general direction of legislation.

And as with any history of Johnson's career, Jacobs's recounting of Burton dwells lovingly (and necessarily) on legislative machinations. Rube Goldberg had nothing on Burton when it came to cobbling together vast improbable machines. Burton consistently traded votes with conservative Southern members who wanted agricultural subsidies in return for their support of his agenda; he maintained a bloc of supporters whose votes could be moved around when the occasion demanded. (He once boasted he could get "110 votes to have dog shit declared the national food.")

Burton bills were exquisite political constructions. "Is there any state other than Kansas that did not end up with a park?" Bob Dole complained about one of Burton's masterpieces. Once, while talking with one of his proteges, California Congressman George Miller, Burton allowed that he regarded the GGNRA--the Golden Gate National Recreation Area--as "a thing of beauty." Miller responded that the park had many lovely features. "Not the place," said Burton, appalled. "The bill."

Jacobs's biography is particularly instructive in light of Newt Gingrich's ascent. Like Gingrich, Burton was no centrist; and like Gingrich, he was nonetheless able to build a cadre of congressmen...