ONE WOULD THINK that the historical perspective of a newspaper that has been published for 179 years would cover more than the last several months. Yet in a Sept. 16 editorial, “Asleep at the switch,” scolding Governor Carcieri for budget deficits, The Journal fixed the blame for these shortfalls on his recent management, with an accompanying nod to larger factors. For anyone who might know something about what happened before 2008, there was a surprising absence of any mention of the General Assembly, except to praise it for the passage of the fiscal 2009 budget.

I suspect the editorial writers of The Journal have access to old newspapers. They might want to rifle through the files back to 1941 and note that since that year the Rhode Island House has been controlled by one party, the Democratic Party, and that, since then, no Republican has filled the office of speaker of the House, the office with the most influence on the state budget. Indeed, with the exception of a few years in the 1950s, when Republicans held a majority in the state Senate, both houses of the General Assembly have been controlled by the Democrats since 1941.

If The Journal’s editorial writers were to couple these historical facts with the knowledge that the final form of the state budget is completely dependent on the speaker of the House, the House Finance Committee and the House in general — all of which have been controlled by the Democrats — they might begin to form an opinion about why the budget is in dire straits quite different from the odd judgment that Governor Carcieri is responsible for our budget woes.

Perhaps they are satisfied with the results of one-party rule?

Sixty-seven years. Three generations. Think about that for a while. Nearly seven decades of one continuing network of people who set the priorities, award the contracts, hire the personnel, create the laws, make the decisions, confirm the judges, pass the budgets, appropriate the money, and decide who benefits from state government’s special deals and who does not.

Is it possible that the budget problems Rhode Island is experiencing today have roots in the fertile soil of 67 years of one-party rule?

We learned through recent budget discussions that there are three major areas of state spending: personnel; Medicaid and social services; and local aid to towns and cities. Think about how spending in those areas has been shaped by a one-party General Assembly. The Democratic Party has written the labor laws under which we now operate. It has appropriated the money for contractors and state workers and social service agencies who do work for the state and who depend on maintaining the status quo. It has relied on these very same special interests to get re-elected. The Democrats have written laws that regulate education. They control how state money is used by towns and cities, particularly how that money is spent on schools and teachers. They have relied on the support of these very same teachers to be re-elected. Some legislators have been paid leaders of teachers unions.

Do you begin to see how one group’s controlling how business is done in the state might lead to budget problems?

Once reminded of all this practical history, Journal editorial writers might have put the recent history of the Carcieri administration into that context. Here comes a person from outside of this system and he begins to examine and question how priorities are made and money is spent in the state. He offers solutions. He proposes new directions. He is constantly rebuffed and ends up vetoing three budgets, vetoes that are effortlessly overridden by the one-party Assembly. He works hard to reform government, to change its spending habits, to change our tax structure to attract business, to turn a shamefully failing education system around, and to do the very things that even Journal writers recognize in their editorial would be essential to changing the fortunes of Rhode Island. Is he met with any willingness to listen, cooperate, or support? No. He is met with fierce resistance by all those who want things to stay just as they are in Rhode Island.

Why change something that has worked so well for 67 years?

Seeking blame for our present budget problems is not helpful in solving them. Understanding the real causes does, however, suggest how Rhode Island might reverse the decline that it is in. Entrenched, self-serving powers have brought us to where we are today. It is not more complicated than that. Voting those powers out is the first step in solving our financial mess. New leadership at the General Assembly is the only path to the real change — the radical and revolutionary change — we need right now.

In a small state where so many suffer from our fear of bucking the status quo, change in the General Assembly should not be a remote prospect, and perhaps in this year of change it isn’t. But regardless, whatever the odds and whatever the political risk, an established newspaper like The Providence Journal should not be afraid to identify the problem truthfully and act as an agent for that change.

Giovanni D. Cicione, a lawyer in private practice, is chairman of the Rhode Island Republican Party.