This is an opinion column.

It was quite a day Wednesday for our federal government in action. Wait. Should that be two words or one? Either way, there’s nothing like the threat of college athletes sharing fairly in the vast sums of money they generate to trigger a march on Washington by sideline VIPs.

Some people called it SEC Day in our nation’s capital, with Commissioner Greg Sankey, university presidents, athletic directors and head coaches from across the conference fanning out to beg Congress to save major college athletics from the alleged evils of Name, Image and Likeness.

Nowhere in the 11-state conference footprint does the business of college sports mean more than it does here, and there was plenty of photographic evidence added to the record in the last 48 hours to support that proposition. Twitter was all aflutter during and after this school colors suit-and-tie summit. Judging from all the gripping and grinning in all the feel-good photos, so were Alabama’s elected federal officials.

Mike Rogers, the Republican representative from Alabama’s 3rd Congressional District, scored and shared photos with members of both the Alabama and Auburn contingents on the Hill, including Nick Saban and Hugh Freeze. Rogers called it “Iron Bowl week here in DC – only slightly less fun than the one in November!”

Terri Sewell, our state’s lone Democratic representative, shared a group photo with her clearly thrilled staff and Saban.

“Best pic ever!!” her tweet read.

Of our state’s nine members of Congress — which includes the Senate and the House of Representatives, if any of them who once coached football at Auburn needs a refresher course in civics – seven made sure to share memories of the day the Tide and Tigers came to town to talk business about ball.

Of course it’s important for our elected officials to visit with their constituents to hear their concerns. Especially when those constituents include some of the highest-paid public employees in the state involved in its most high-profile profession.

It is a profession for Alabama’s Saban and AD Greg Byrne, Auburn’s Freeze, men’s basketball coach Bruce Pearl, women’s basketball coach Johnnie Harris and AD John Cohen. Along with UA President Stuart Bell and AU President Chris Roberts, who have other responsibilities beyond athletics but none as visible, they made up the Heart of Dixie wing that flew to DC.

More interesting than the flood of photos shared by both sides was the messaging. Jerry Carl, the Republican representative from Alabama’s 1st Congressional District, tweeted a picture of himself with the Auburn group in front of a bookcase with an Auburn football helmet.

The text read: “Great meeting with Auburn University’s Athletics Director John Cohen, Coaches Hugh Freeze, Johnnie Harris, Bruce Pearl, and President Chris Roberts to discuss important issues student athletes are facing.”

Gary Palmer, the Republican representative from Alabama’s 6th Congressional District, sent out a tweet with a trio of photos of himself with a collection of Alabama and SEC dignitaries.

The text read: “It was great meeting with @UofAlabama Coach Nick Saban, President Stuart Bell, Athletic Director @Greg_Byrne and @SEC Commissioner @GregSankey to discuss issues of concern for student athletes in Alabama, the SEC and across the country.”

Barry Moore, the Republican representative from Alabama’s 2nd District, got creative, posing outside the Capitol with the big names from the Plains for the snapshot that accompanied his tweet.

The text read: “It was wonderful to meet with Auburn University President Chris Roberts, Coaches Hugh Freeze, Johnnie Harris and Bruce Pearl, and Athletic Director John Cohen to discuss current issues student athletes are facing. War Eagle!”

The italics are mine. The strikingly similar talking-points phrasing is theirs. It speaks to a concerted effort to move the goalposts, to frame the NIL issue as something of grave concern to the young men and women who compete on the biggest stages under the brightest lights, which allows their coaches, admins and programs to make the big bucks.

If that were true, if student-athletes were the ones primarily worried about the forever-fractured fairy tale of so-called amateur athletics, where were they Wednesday? Why were there no football or basketball players, swimmers or divers, gymnasts or rowers from Alabama or Auburn included in the traveling party? Why were they not invited to share their perspective on the pros and cons of NIL?

In what has become a modern-day divide between management and labor, one side was absent from the discussion. Well, all but absent. Chris Harry of FloridaGators.com wrote that every SEC school sent representatives to this NIL summit but Florida was the only school in the league to include student-athletes in its delegation. The Gators sent legendary gymnast Trinity Thomas, football player Jack Pyburn and women’s basketball player Zippy Broughton, along with AD Scott Stricklin and Executive Associate AD Lynda Tealer, who also happens to be the current chair of the NCAA Division I Council.

Kudos to Stricklin. Discussing NIL without including student-athletes in the conversation is a glaring symptom of a larger problem. Sankey, Saban, Pearl and other SEC heavyweights went to Washington to lobby for federal NIL legislation that all schools must follow in the purported interest of competitive balance – which does not exist, has never existed and will never exist.

The SEC never marched on Washington because Alabama and Auburn spend and make far more on athletics in general and football in particular than do Ole Miss and Mississippi State. Or because Saban makes about twice as much as Sam Pittman.

In that arena, the free market dictates, and time marches on. As soon as the labor force earned the long-delayed right to profit directly from its work, management that never minded the rich getting richer got all righteous about players getting paid for choosing or changing schools – a right coaches and admins have long enjoyed.

Every time you hear a coach express his or her support for players earning NIL money, you reflexively wait for the “but” you know is sure to follow. And so some of the biggest names from the college sports industrial complex blitzed Congress and threw up a Hail Mary to ask politicians, of all people, to “save” a system whose monetary policy forever has tilted heavily and unfairly toward the people outside the lines.

Like Alabama Sen. Tommy Tuberville. A politician long before he ran for office, the former Auburn coach who was paid $5.1 million by Auburn to stop coaching the Tigers joined in the photo op fun. He tweeted a picture of himself with Saban – “my friend of 30+ years” – and Bell – “@UofAlabama’s great President” – with this promise/threat:

“We are going to fix the broken NIL system once and for all – and save college sports.”

That vow would carry more weight coming from someone who didn’t break the bank after Saban broke him and his six-finger Iron Bowl winning streak 36-0. On the list of institutions that are broken and need saving, the one that currently employs Tuberville ranks exponentially higher than the one that rolls on quite nicely without him.