My father had a rule about borrowing. If a man offered to lend you something, you thanked him kindly and then found a way to do without. Borrowing a ladder meant owing a man a ladder. Owing a man a ladder meant he could knock on your door whenever he pleased, and my father did not want anybody knocking on his door.
That rule has served our family well, and I think it has served Texas well. Texas has not expanded Medicaid under the Affordable Care Act. Every year somebody asks me whether that was wise, and every year I tell them it was one of the wisest things we ever did.
Money from Washington is a borrowed ladder. It always comes with a knock on the door. First it is a form, then an inspector, then a rule about who you may help and how. Before long you are not running your own house. You are keeping it tidy for company that never leaves.
Now, a man at church once put it to me that the money was ours to begin with, our own taxes trying to come home. I do not know whether that is so, and I do not need to. I will go further than he did. Suppose every dollar of it was ours. Suppose it was sitting on our own porch with our own name written on the box. I would still leave it there. A principle is not a principle if you set it down the moment it gets heavy.
There is a man I know who works full time at a feed store outside Abilene. He does not have coverage and he does not make enough to buy it. He is exactly the kind of fellow the money was meant for, and I want to tell you I respect him too much to hand it to him. He has his pride. We are protecting it for him.
He may not see it that way. I have never asked him, and I don’t plan to. When you are doing a man a kindness, you don’t stop to take a poll. You do what is right and trust that he will thank you later, or that his children will.
The people who wanted to take the money were not bad people. They were simply in a hurry. They saw a need and wanted to meet it by the end of the week. But a state is not a week. A state is a long time, and a long time requires a firm rule, held whether it is convenient or not, whether it costs a little or a great deal.
I will vote for the Republican for Senate this fall because I want that rule held. The other side, I believe, would like to see that money come home to Texas at last, and I would rather leave it sitting on the porch.
My father never borrowed a ladder. He fell off a kitchen chair once, reaching for the gutter. He always said it was worth it.
D. M.