Washington won’t cure America’s civic ailment

In the 1929 anniversary book for Perkasie Borough, the town fathers boasted of a thriving civic life. So many fraternal and social organizations populated the community — a remarkable 24 different groups in a town with a population of only about 3,000 people, a figure that doesn’t even include the borough’s many churches, nonprofits, the volunteer fire company, and other groups — that a large, central Fraternity Temple was built on Sixth Street to house them. More than just a building, it was the beating heart of the town’s social network. It provided a home for numerous organizations and served as a central meeting point where, even if not members of the same club, residents from across the borough would see and be seen, forging the bonds of a true community.

Today, the building still stands but its purpose is gone. After becoming the Samuel Pierce Library, the building has been converted into private apartments. This transition, from a vibrant hub of public association to a collection of private dwellings, is a quiet but powerful symbol of the transformation happening across America. This change is rooted in the collapse of one of the most vital pillars of American life: the mediating institution.

For hundreds of years, mediating institutions — the voluntary, local groups that stand between the lone individual and the massive forces of big government and big business — were where we learned to be neighbors, build trust, solve problems together, and build a civil society. Groups like the VFW, church choirs, bowling leagues, and volunteer fire companies. As these have fallen away — either entirely or atrophying to small groups of “old timers” — it’s no wonder we now are experiencing a crisis of loneliness and disconnection that leaves us isolated even when we’re surrounded by people. We have fewer friends, we know fewer neighbors, and we trust each other less than ever before.

Former U.S. Senator Ben Sasse (R-NE) diagnosed this illness in his book Them: Why We Hate Each Other — and How to Heal. Sasse argues that, for generations, American life wasn’t defined by Washington, D.C. but by the local, voluntary groups to which we belonged. These are the “little platoons” Edmund Burke celebrated. They are the spaces between the lone individual and the massive federal government where we learn to be citizens.

These institutions have been hollowed out. In their place, a gaping void has opened, and we have desperately tried to fill it with the only thing that seems big enough: national politics. As Sasse writes, “We are looking for a tribe because we’ve lost our tribes.” We no longer define ourselves as members of the Moose Club or the Garden Society, but as card-carrying members of Team Red or Team Blue. Our primary identity has shifted from neighbor to political combatant.

Lonely bowlers and the politics of despair

The statistics only confirm what we can all feel:

• In his seminal work, Bowling Alone, political scientist Robert Putnam chronicled the staggering decline in civic participation. Between 1975 and 2000, attendance at club meetings fell by 58% and the number of Americans who said they frequently had friends over to their home dropped by 45%.

• This trend has only accelerated. The American Enterprise Institute’s Survey on Community and Society found that, since the 1990s, the percentage of Americans who say they have no close friends has quadrupled.

• Religious attendance, once a cornerstone of American community, has plummeted. Gallup reported in 2021 that, for the first time, fewer than half of Americans belonged to a house of worship.

This isn’t just about being less social. It’s about the erosion of the trust and goodwill that makes a civil society function. When we don’t know the person down the street, we’re less likely to help them in a crisis, watch their kids, or trust them to hold a spare key. This disintegration of neighborliness is a uniquely American tragedy, a betrayal of the vibrant, self-governing spirit that Alexis de Tocqueville so admired when he visited our young nation. He was amazed not by our government, but by our remarkable talent for forming voluntary associations to solve every conceivable problem. So much so that the old adage was: “Put three Americans in a room and they’ll elect a president, a vice president, and a secretary.”

We have lost that talent.

As Sasse notes, nature abhors a vacuum. The human need for belonging is profound. When local communities wither, people seek that sense of purpose and identity elsewhere. They find it on cable news and social media, where algorithms reward outrage and tribalism. Politics is no longer about debating tax policy; it’s a substitute for religion, a source of meaning, and a team sport where the other side isn’t just wrong, they’re evil.

The result is the listlessness we see all around us: a rise in anxiety, depression, and the epidemic of addiction that has ravaged our country. We have forgotten how to be neighbors because we are too busy hating our fellow Americans.

Rebuilding from the bottom up

The solution to this crisis will not come from Washington. No federal program can mandate friendship. No piece of legislation can force you to join the VFW or volunteer to coach Little League. This is a cultural problem that demands a cultural solution, rooted in the conservative principles of personal responsibility and subsidiarity.

And here lies a direct challenge and opportunity for our locally elected leaders, especially Republicans at the township and borough level who understand the limits of government. While government cannot create community, it can and should foster the conditions for it to flourish. Imagine a local property tax credit for families who can demonstrate consistent volunteer hours with a recognized civic or charitable organization. Consider creating official community awards that honor not just business leaders but the unsung heroes who run the community celebrations, lead the Boy Scout troop, or organize the church bake sale. These are not big-government programs; they are conservative, pro-community policies that reward civic virtue and strengthen the social fabric without growing the bureaucracy.

Ultimately, the answer starts not with a national movement, but in our own homes and on our own streets. That means it’s time to log off Facebook and invest your time in the tangible, flesh-and-blood community around you. Join a civic group. Start a book club. Volunteer at a food bank. Invite your neighbors over for a barbecue. It is in these small, seemingly insignificant acts that we relearn the habits required for self-government. 

Restoring America’s mediating institutions can — and should — start here in Bucks County. It is the only way to heal our toxic politics and, more importantly, to heal our lonely, hollowed-out souls.

Publius Pax is a tenth-generation Bucks Countian, political consultant, and author.