Analysing Recent US Presidential-Congressional Relationships
| Author | Joseph J. Hogan |
| Published date | 01 March 1985 |
| Date | 01 March 1985 |
| DOI | 10.1111/j.1467-9248.1985.tb01565.x |
| Subject Matter | Article |
Political
Studies
(1985),
XXXIII,
122-128
Analysing Recent
US
Presidential-
Congressional Relationships
JOSEPH
J.
HOGAN
Robert Gordon’s Institute
of
Technology
Studies of presidential-congressional relations during the 1970s in the United
States argue that the balance of power between the two institutions was tipped
in favour of the legislature. The reasons cited for this shift normally refer to
internal reforms enacted by the 91st Congress. These reforms decentralized
power and fragmented the legislative process in ways that constrained presi-
dential influence. The passage
of
presidency-curbing legislation in the wake of
Watergate, and related changes in the political climate also made Congress, the
media and the public more suspicious of presidential leadership. The 91st
Congress also opened its deliberations to public scrutiny and participation,
which led to interest groups converging on Capitol Hill, and made the
president’s task of building governing coalitions more complicated. At the
same time fiscal stress prompted a new redistributive politics in which the ‘new’
Congress and public policy groups were able to frustrate presidential proposals
to
adapt
to
economic scarcity. A concurrent decline
in
American party
structures weakened the capacity of political parties to unite what the Constitu-
tion had separated. When combined together these changes were said to have
produced a more assertive, independent Congress which made
it
more difficult
(some pessimists said almost impossible) for a ‘post-imperial’ president to
obtain congressional and public approval for his governing policies.
Four recently published works on presidential-congressional relations in the
1980s consider what presidents can do to develop and extend their capacity to
bring leadership to an increasingly fragmented governing community
in
Washington. In addition, these studies also present and appraise the means that
President Reagan employed to achieve
his
sweeping budget and tax legislation
victories
in
1981, thereby providing an early analysis of presidential-congres-
sional relations during Reagan’s administration.
The various recommendations for what Paul Light styles as ‘Winning the
No
Win Presidency’2 are rooted in the shared view that in today’s Washington
‘there are considerable advantages for presidents and their staffs to exploit. As
I
For
more details see the collection
of
essays contained in Anthony King (ed.),
The New
American Political System
(Washington,
D.C.,
American Enterprise Institute, 1978). and Thomas
E.
Mann and Norman
J.
Ornstein (eds),
The
ivew
Congress
(Washington,
D.C.,
American
Enterprise Institute, 1981).
Paul Light,
The
President’s
Agendu
(Baltimore, Johns Hopkins University Press, 1982),
p. 217.
0032-321 7/85/01/0122-07/$03.00
0
1985
Politicul Sludies
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