For a quick understanding of New York City politics, the one piece of reading we’d recommend this week would be the 41-page questionnaire that the Working Families Party is asking local political candidates who are seeking its endorsement to complete. It describes a political viewpoint that is deeply at odds with the trends toward freedom, free markets, and rule of law that are on the march in much of the rest of America and around the world.

Candidates are asked to support an increase in the state tax on incomes of $150,000 and up, and to oppose the scheduled expiration of a city tax increase on incomes of more than $100,000. They are asked to “support local legislation banning all new retail stores over 85,000 square feet” and to oppose “all efforts to privatize government functions and services.” They are asked to name services “currently provided by private contractors that should be provided publicly.” They are asked to support a local resolution opposing private accounts as part of Social Security.

“Will you oppose any use of local-enforcement agencies to enforce immigration law?” is one question. “Will you support an eventual return to a policy of free tuition at CUNY?” is another. The correct answers from the party’s point of view are yes.

It’s hard to understand the name of this political party, because if the laws sketched in the questionnaire were actually enacted, a lot fewer New Yorkers would be working. Oh, maybe a few more would be working for the government. But entrepreneurs would run away from New York City if these regulations and taxes were imposed. And private-sector jobs would disappear along with them. Why, Macy’s at Herald Square would have never existed if the proposed law banning stores of greater than 85,000 square feet had existed back when it was created. So much for the Thanksgiving Parade. And so much for growth and innovation in the city’s economy.

It’d be one thing if the Working Families Party were treated by mainstream politicians like the extreme leftist outfit that it is. But many Democrats embrace it. At least 34 of the 51 members of the New York City Council ran on the Working Families line. Senators Schumer and Clinton accepted the party’s endorsement, as did Senator Kerry when he ran for president.

The party’s questionnaires for candidates statewide are due on May 1, the day long embraced by socialists. Under the American Constitution, socialists and, for that matter, the labor unions active in the Working Families Party have every right to be politically active. For all the talk of the crisis among Empire State Republicans, the Democratic Party in New York hasn’t elected a mayor since 1989 or a governor since 1994. Surely part of the reason is the tilt toward taxes and regulation embodied in the Working Families questionnaire.