Much has been written lately about Rep. Jaime Herrera Beutler, R-Battle Ground, and her lack of response to her constituents and lack of communication.
Here is what a fellow Republican, Abraham Lincoln, said about contacts with the public, as reported by Doris Kearns Goodwin in her book Team of Rivals: The Political Genius of Abraham Lincoln: “Lincoln considered his meetings with the general public his ‘public opinion baths.’ He said that they ‘serve to renew in me a clearer and more vivid image of the great popular assemblage out of which I sprung … and though they may not be pleasant in all their particulars, the effect, as a while, is renovating and invigorating to my perceptions of responsibility and duty.’ “
Perhaps the representative can learn from Lincoln the value of regular contact with her constituents. She might learn where her responsibility lies.
