Below is a letter from Rep. Schultheis to the head of Catholic Charities in response to objections from the latter over potential cuts in government social spending as the legislature attempts to balance the budget.

February 18, 2003

Mr. James H. Mauck

President, Catholic Charities
2525 W. Alameda Avenue
PO Box 19020
Denver, CO 80219

Dear Mr. Mauck:

Thank you for your letter to the General Assembly of January 23, expressing your concern over potential budget cuts in social programs. I wanted to write and explain more fully the views of us in the legislature who are working to increase church and faith-based involvement in social services.

First, let me say that you are correct when you note that this economic downturn has affected everyone, including private churches and charities. You are also correct that economic health and the demand for social aid are inversely related, making our job now very difficult. These facts make it understandable why you would question the argument that churches and charities can pick up whatever government stops doing.

However, here are a few qualifying thoughts that I believe should be kept in mind. First, Catholic Charities itself has only been in existence for 75 years. This is approximately the time period over which American governments have been providing social welfare. This leaves approximately 150 years of prior American history in which the indigent, elderly, handicapped, and unemployed were cared for by other means. It is useful to consider how this occurred.

Second, it is also useful to consider what happened when government began getting involved in social welfare programs. Government is by nature a bureaucratic and impersonal institution, yet as government increasingly assumed the social "compassion" role (and began to tax accordingly), this began to divert charitable resources from those who had been providing charitable services. It also reduced the societal expectation that the church and other private groups would fill this role, and reduced the value that churches and private groups placed on their performing it. Finally, the bureaucratic and impersonal nature of government social spending enabled the rise of the urban slum and a degree of government dependency that was unheard of in all prior American years.

Now, let me quickly say that none of this has ever been the design of those advocating government "compassion." It has simply been the unintended consequence of a lack of understanding of the nature of government and of the irreplaceable role that the church fulfills in human life. Government simply cannot substitute for the personal, efficient charity which the church and private groups provide.

With all this said, let me address your main arguments. First, you contend that there are no local or faith-based organizations with sufficient resources to fill the social void left by government cuts. In addition to the fact that government has no resources except what it extracts from the private sector (thus reducing private charitable resources), and that contrary to the belief of many, government does not have unlimited resources with which to expand services in tight times, I contend that there are indeed the resources in the private sector to deal with our problems. My church in Colorado Springs alone could very easily double its charitable activities (even in these hard times) with some relatively simple budget changes. The same is true of most other churches. Because of the distributed, non-centralized, efficient nature of private charity, this sort of re-allocation is very possible with the right incentive. Such an incentive could be very effectively restored to our society by reducing government social spending and having government leaders issue a public call to action to the church and private charities.

Your second argument is that better coordination and reduction of duplication should be our policy goals rather than cuts. These things are automatic in the private sector. As a result, the same dollar goes much further in the private sector than in the public sector.

Let me close by pointing out that a coherent strategy of faith-based social services has not ever been attempted since the rise of the welfare state. In other words, it is not as if we have tried what I suggest and failed. We have simply not tried. We have assumed instead that people cannot be cared for today without government-all without due consideration for the first 150 years of American history or for the repeated warnings by the American Founders against the dangers and inherent injustice (robbing Peter to support Paul) of government "compassion" and social spending. I honestly believe that until we can accumulate the political will to champion these truths at high levels of government, our ability to care for our poor in quality fashion, particularly in rough economic times, will only continue to worsen as government spending grows.

I hope this helps clarify the thinking of those of us in the legislature advocating cuts in government social spending. In the long run, charity itself is what hangs in the balance.


With gratitude for all you do,


David C. Schultheis
State Representative
House District 14