Trust in government is not at new lows. It was this bad in the early 1990s. Who knows what the public thought of Washington when Herbert Hoover or Andrew Johnson were president. The American tension with government long precedes us. "I heartily accept the motto, 'That government is best which governs least,'" wrote Henry David Thoreau in the mid-19th century.

Yet, once more, here we are. Another chapter in America's storied distrust in government.

This fait accompli was avoidable. President Obama had a brief window. The public did not suddenly trust government. But the market crash meant they no longer knew what to trust. Polls captured a public willing to give big government a (little) chance.

A progressive test case could follow. The public was, however, clearly between Obama and Reagan's government. Logic dictated the right case was crucial. It must meet the times. Otherwise the precedent could go awry.

The White House chose healthcare first. The recession gave the public no choice. The economy and jobs dominated American anxieties. This was the critical divergence. Healthcare was the wrong war because it was the wrong time for this war. The flawed stimulus was Obama's only economic fight. The great jobs bill never came. Liberals missed their moment.

The president proceeded as if there was a progressive realignment. As if he had redrawn the electoral map. Full throttle. Yellow lights be damned. Obama forced change. And he came out looking like the same old liberal.

The liberal mistakes of old were made anew. Americans spoke again of the "nanny state." The mommy party was losing the public all over again.

Why? A new Pew Research Center study offers answers. The findings bolster what we have known since at least last summer -- Americans' tension with government has reemerged. And that picture is best seen with the barometer of modern politics, independents.

Only 18 percent of independents trust government. Half believe the government presents a "major threat" to "personal rights and freedoms." In 1996, 70 percent of independents said the poor get too little government attention. Little more than half say the same today. Thirty-seven percent of independents are "highly dissatisfied" with government; they are far more likely to vote than others and two-thirds are siding with Republicans, Pew found.

The electoral repercussions are equally stark. Independents' favorable view of Democrats has fallen by more than half, 58 to 27 percent, since Obama took office. They now have a slightly more favorable view of Republicans. A plurality of independents favors electing a Republican in their congressional district. The lost middle has, foreseeable though it was, cost Obama his majority support. It was Yeats who wrote of how "things fall apart" when "the centre cannot hold."

The stewardship of government explains why things fell apart. The promised change has, ironically, brought us to a familiar place.

This distrust in government might be the American norm. Modern polling only began mid-century. This was a time defined by giants, FDR and Ike. Uncle Sam had resolved much of the Great Depression and won World War II. There was the GI Bill and federal highways. By 1958, when the American National Election Study first asked, 73 percent of Americans trusted government. This might have been the exception to the rule.

Yet, something is amiss when Watergate captures a more trusting time. Trust in government stood at 53 percent in 1972. After the Vietnam War, the rapid rise in crime, urban upheaval, great division on race and culture -- a majority still trusted Washington. Then came Richard Nixon's great scandal. By 1974, only 36 percent trusted Washington almost always or most of the time.

Liberals cheered Nixon's fall. But as historian H.W. Brands put it, liberalism fell with him. Trust in government never knew a sustainable recovery thereafter. And so neither would liberalism. Today, only 22 percent have faith in government.

There were brief reprieves. The 9-11 attacks rallied Americans toward government. But that fell away with Iraq and all the mistakes of George W. Bush's presidency. The financial crisis followed. A new president came in. And he had unusual good will behind him.

Exit polls recorded a small chance to restart big government. On Election Day 2008, a slim majority -- 51 percent -- said, "government should do more to solve problems." It was the opposite of 2000. But only 38 percent wanted the government to do more by Labor Day, according to Gallup.

Government was not doing what Americans wanted. Therefore Americans wanted government to do less.

Healthcare reform instigated the larger fight. It brought the president back to the reformers' oldest fight. But Obama realized it too late. His big issue was ultimately about big government's old issues.

The PBS documentary "Obama's Deal" has a revealing moment. White House communications director Dan Pfeiffer is discussing how the president decided to focus on healthcare.

Pfeiffer: We were sitting in the Oval Office, and we were sort of having a debate around health care at one point, and the president said, "It's about health care, but it's not really about health care. It's also about proving whether we can still solve big problems in this country." And this was going to be the test case for that.

But the test case did not meet the times. The recession carried on. A pyrrhic victory followed. And as for those big problems? Americans again consider government to be one.