If you google the name Louis Gawthrop…you’ll soon find he is an eminent scholar and professor at the University of Baltimore’s College of Public Administration. He is also the author to more than several books, including one entitled “Public Service and Democracy: Ethical Imperatives for the 21st Century.” On top of all this, he is the son of an IBEW construction electrician from the local union in Baltimore, and as a result of this lineage, he carries a special appreciation for the challenges and opportunities facing workers and their families.
I’d heard rave reviews about him before taking his ethics class about 10 years ago as part of a Public Administration Master’s program, and wondered if he could really live up to all the advance billing. To be honest, I don’t remember the content of what he said the first day he walked into class (not surprising really…I also don’t remember what happened yesterday), but I do recall being spellbound. He literally smacked of wisdom, and was full of enthusiasm, wit and charisma. He also had a gleam in his eye that suggested he had at least some of the answers to the ethical dilemmas that plague so many of us.
His lectures were fascinating, but it wasn’t long before it was evident that he was raising more questions than answers. Frustrated by the lack of tangible guidance…I pressed him throughout the course of the class to offer more in the way of clear direction, or to point to some sort of beacon we could look to when faced with a myriad of ethical questions. He always resisted, and while he might offer some literary tidbit or piece of cryptic scripture, too often he followed my questions to him with his own questions back to me. At least to me…this really was quite unsatisfying.
I suspect he wasn’t thrilled with my constant inquiries, and finally toward the end of the quarter, he finally offered up a gem. After being asked for the twentieth time to provide some nugget of genuine insight, he stopped, sat down on the corner of the desk, smiled…and said something like this…
Well…here’s what I do. Every time I’m at some moral intersection, and faced with at least a couple of choices, I always try to remember to pause. I don’t always do it…but I try. When I do, I try to take a minute and think about my menu of options, and if I’m considering something that might be questionable (we usually recognize when it is), I try to take a couple of seconds to envision what I’m about to do, and how it would look as a headline on the front page of tomorrow’s USA Today. I really try to picture the above-the-fold bold print…and all that would read it…and whether or not it’s something I’d want publicized or be proud of when they did. When I do, I often make another choice. I don’t do it all the time…but this small practice helps me more often than not.
Wow…there it was…short, straightforward and uncomplicated. I remember it resonated the minute I heard it…and to me…it seemed like a genuine jewel. Like Dr. Lou…I don’t use it all the time, and actually, even when I do, I can still make a questionable choice. This manifests itself in a myriad of ways (like whether or not to have a fifth glass of wine when four was plenty, or if I really need to be in that vendor’s suite at the 50-yard line), and though I often still choose poorly, at least I think about the ramifications. Thankfully, those times when I truly contemplate the magnitude of the potential headline…I take a better path. I remember talking to my dad about his when I was a kid, and he said something that should have resonated more. “Son…there is no right and wrong…there are only consequences.”
Where (and when) I went to high school…this song was the bomb. Have a great weekend.
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