Full disclosure:  I’ve known Rusty Crowe for well over 30 years, consider him a friend, and we’re pretty much on the same page politically.  So I’m not coming at this as a cynical reporter digging for the truth.  On the other hand, I’ll follow a wise friend’s advice: “Never make any politician look any better than they are.”  Most of what follows is selections from the recording, lightly edited for clarity, plus a few editorial comments (sorry, couldn’t help myself).

Not long ago Rebecca Horvath and I sat down with Rusty at one of Elizabethton’s finest eateries and just talked for 1-1/2 hours.  (You’ll find Rebecca’s article nearby.)  Rusty has been in the Tennessee House and Senate for 31 years and has worked his way up to the Chairmanship of the Health and Welfare Committee, member of the Education Committee and member of the Government Operations Committee.

He was first elected as a Democrat, then switched to the Republicans a few years later.  There followed several years in the wilderness as the Republicans slowly worked their way to the majority, and then to the total domination of state government they now enjoy.  For the foreseeable future, it doesn’t seem that anything threatens them. The Senate has 27 Republicans and 6 Democrats, the House 73 Republicans, 26 Democrats.  With a seeming lock on the governorship, too, there are very few states with such lopsided one-party control.  The upside:  the Republicans get their way every time.  The downside:  they own everything whether it goes right or wrong.  Another downside:  the difficulty of resisting the temptation of ideological overreach, there being no effective opposition to the party’s more-extreme elements or any need to compromise with the other side.

So far, so good.  Tennessee is consistently rated one of the best-governed states in the nation, with a healthy rainy-day fund and the highest possible credit rating.  And, from a political standpoint, it’s working for the Republicans.

A small-government conservative, Rusty is particularly proud of his work on Government Operations.  “Government operations is an interesting committee”, he said, calling it “the watchdog committee”.  “When you pass laws you have to promulgate rules to put them into effect.  In DC, the bureaucrats in the different departments promulgate the rules and they just do what they want to do.  In Nashville, we have the Government Operations Committee.  So if we pass a law…then whatever department that deals with it has to promulgate those rules to make that law work…the department comes before us and says, here’s what we have done, and then we can say, I’m sorry, that’s not the intent of what our people wanted or we passed.  Go back to the drawing board, or we ain’t doin’ it.  So we (maintain) control, the will of the people and the actions of the legislature through that Government Operations Committee…It’s a good firewall to protect us…a really good oversight…(Gov Ops) is a boring committee, not exciting, but very much needed.”

But, when it comes to oversight, Rusty worries that in some respects they may have gone too far.  “We used to have a lot of oversight committees.  We don’t do that anymore.”  Why?  “I don’t know.  The leadership just decided to take care of those types of situations within the full committees.”  While it still allows for oversight, Rusty is concerned that it doesn’t allow for digging deeply into the operations of the administrative departments.  “(I)t’s not as thorough and it’s not as direct as when you had those oversight committees, but it’s still there.  And so, anything that needs to get done, we can get done through that process.”  You’ll pardon my skepticism.  It seems to me that legislatures should, in general, spend less time writing new laws, and more time making sure that the laws on the books are being faithfully executed and fixing the laws that no longer make sense.  But the lure of the new and shiny is strong.

“We’ve been designated the most conservative Senate in the nation by the American Conservative Union…(W)hat we really proceed based on, generally, in anything we do – it’s probably the reason Tennessee is in great shape right now – we consider less government, lower taxes, personal responsibility, faith and family.  And that, really, ends up being part of our decision in everything we do.”  And yes, it’s one-sided, but “that’s because the people of Tennessee have voted that’s what they want.  And so, we (i.e., the Republicans) generally get our way, but when you are in the majority, instead of having squabbles with the other side, you end up having squabbles among yourselves to see how conservative or how moderate you want to be.”

Rusty is proud of his role in reducing taxes.  “As a result, we now have more money coming in, we exceed projections, we have people wanting to come to Tennessee, and from a fiscal perspective – think about this – we’ve done away with the gift tax, the inheritance tax, the Hall Tax will go away this year, 30% of the tax on food, we’ve done away with agricultural taxes, we’ve really diminished a lot of manufacturing taxes, no income tax.  The more we’ve done that – even as a conservative I’ve thought to myself, gosh, are we going to have enough money to run the state? – but…the more you give back to the communities and the businesses, the more they hire, the more they create, the more they generate, and we have exceeded projections by far and, obviously, we balance our budget every year, and we’ve done so the last several years without any new debt, which was great…We are very lucky we have that tradition in Tennessee.”

In the 2021 session, according to Rusty, the legislature had to deal with 3 things:  the normal business, the Covid 19 crisis, and fending off the federal government. “(W)e had to stand up to them on all these things like the bathroom bills, the Covid passports, the inoculations, the doing away with guns, the Critical Race Theory, all those things we had to deal with this year to try to keep Tennessee stable as Tennesseans feel it should be.  You know, to keep Tennessee, Tennessee…It’s a struggle to keep everything together because we have those 3 divisions of the state and they’re all distinctly different.”

The push to incorporate Critical Race Theory into the schools is particularly troubling: “It’s really interesting, the reaction I’m getting from some of my trusted African-American ministers.  They were very concerned that we passed that.  I said to them, guys – they were concerned that that was going to keep our schools from teaching about slavery and the Trail of Tears and all those things we see as possible negatives in this country – no, no, no, this bill does the opposite of that.  It says you shouldn’t try to pit white against black, should not try to teach the antithesis of what Martin Luther King taught, that race is more important than character – which is what they’re trying to do.  But what you should teach is the true history of all those areas – slavery, Native American problem, all that stuff needs to be taught.  So that bill was very balanced…Obviously people that don’t know what we did think we’re keeping our schools from teaching what they need to teach.  That’s not the case.”  I mentioned that I posted an article not long ago entitled “Racism in the Name of Anti-Racism Is As Racist As It Gets”.  “That’s exactly the bottom line!  It is!  We had a young student come to (Senator) Jack Johnson from Franklin County – her mother did – saying that she was ashamed to be white and ashamed to be an American.  And that was the straw that broke the camel’s back.  That just should not happen.  A black young lady coming to you saying things like that, either.  And to pit one against the other is the wrong approach.”

Illegal immigration isn’t just a federal issue.  The states are being burdened, even Tennessee.  Like Rebecca and I, Rusty has mixed feelings:  Little or no sympathy for illegal immigration and those who profit from it, but great sympathy for the desperate people willing to risk their lives to come here, legally or not.  It’s a terrible moral and practical dilemma that seems to defy solution.  Recently a small facility run by a nonprofit group in Chattanooga, which was caring for young illegal “children” who are actually teenagers, was shut down when a case of sexual abuse was uncovered.  “We’re not sure that anyone is coming in to Tennessee now…the governor is meeting, really as we speak, to try to figure out what to do about this, how we should react…We don’t know who these people are, if they’ve been tested (for Covid 19), but when they come to us we have to pay for their education, their health care, you name it.  It’s crazy.  It’s an out-of-control situation.  We’re not sure how to approach it because we don’t have the authority to deal with those contracts (with social service agencies, which are handled by the federal government).  I heard that the governor of one state met with the (agencies) and they all decided together, we’re not doing this (anymore).  I think she essentially said, if you want to do business with the state, you’re not going to do this…I think that’s where you’ll see us come down if they try to form other (agencies) to do it.  We’re not going to let it happen.”  “I do feel both ways.  When some work so hard and diligently to become citizens and do it the right way, it’s just not right to allow those who would break the rules to do it.  So how do you do it compassionately and in a way…obviously, if the federal government would work together with the states, it could be done.  But they’re not going to, they’re going to do it their way, and their way is to let in as many as they can without restrictions…The problem is that the wrong message was sent by this administration.  The previous administration sent that message that, no, this is not going to happen…We can’t have a country without borders, we’ve got to find a way to stop this, or if we’re going to try to help these people, the right way to do it.  This is not the right way to do it.  I don’t think anybody has the answer.  I wish we did…It’s a question mark, and the only action we’ve taken, as far as I know, is to let the federal government know that we’re not happy.”

More in Part 2.