HOFSTRA UNIVERSITY HONORS COLLEGE
The “Art of the Possible” No Child Left Behind, the Affordable Care Act, and Bipartisanship in the 21st Century
Jesse M. Crosson Spring 2013 Honors Thesis – PSC 100 Advisor: Dr. Meena Bose ------Committee Members: Drs. Meena Bose, Richard Himelfarb, and Rosanna Perotti
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Table of Contents
INTRODUCTION ...... 2
Research Approach, Organization, and Overall Thesis ...... 4
LITERATURE REVIEW ...... 5
Presidential Leadership of Congress ...... 5
Richard Neustadt and James Pfiffner on the President’s Basic Methods of Influence ...... 5
One Final Consideration: Andrew Rudalevige and White House Organization ...... 10
Congressional Leadership ...... 11
Skill versus Context: Floor Leadership in Congress ...... 12
A Decentralizing Force: Committee Leadership in Congress ...... 14
Outside Forces: Interest Groups...... 15
Constant Contact: Interest Groups’ Basic Methods for Influencing Congress ...... 15
Strategic Differences in House versus Senate Lobbying ...... 17
A Note on Negotiation ...... 18
CONTEXT 1: PRESIDENTIAL LEADERSHIP OF CONGRESS ...... 21
George Bush and NCLB...... 21
Moving Fast—Without Surprises ...... 21
Accountability: The One-Size-Fits-All Frame ...... 22
Delegating Authority to Congress ...... 23
Principled-Negotiator-In-Chief: Guiding Debate and Communicating a Clear Position ...... 25
Finding a Winning Coalition: Building from the Center, Outward ...... 27
Conclusion ...... 28
President Obama and the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act ...... 29
Off to a Solid Start: Moving Quickly with Few Surprises ...... 30
Cost v. Coverage: Missing the Mark with Health-Reform Issue-Fram ...... 31
Working with Congressional Leaders: Ensuring a Congressional “Buy-In” ...... 33
The Passive Negotiator: Obama Leaves Congress Guessing ...... 35 iii
Building Support from the Outside, Inward: The Obama Coalition-Building Strategy ...... 37
Presidential Leadership of Congress: Final Analysis and Conclusions ...... 38
CONTEXT 2: CONGRESSIONAL LEADERSHIP ...... 39
The “Big Four” and NCLB ...... 39
Building Upon Consensus ...... 40
The Ascension of Principled Compromiser ...... 42
A Winning Organizational Strategy: Utilizing an “Informal” Committee System ...... 47
Congressional Leadership and PPACA ...... 49
Bypassing Consensus: Congress’s Fixation on the Public Option ...... 49
PPACA and Principled Prudence: A Dearth of “Principled Compromisers” ...... 50
The Informal Committee System and the “Gang of Six ...... 54
Congressional Leadership: Summary and Conclusions ...... 56
CONTEXT 3: SPECIAL INTERESTS ...... 57
NCLB and Interest Group Influence ...... 57
Business Savvy and Civil Rights: NCLB’s Unorthodox Interest-Group Coalition ...... 59
Navigating Congress’s Relations with Interest Groups ...... 62
The “Silent” Strategy: Avoiding Explosive Controversy ...... 63
Summary and Conclusion ...... 65
Interest Groups and PPACA ...... 65
Maintaining a Broad Coalition: Close, But No Cigar ...... 66
From the White House with Love: PPACA’s Overly Centralized Negotiation Scheme ...... 68
Silent No More: Obama’s Negotiation Strategy Creates More Tension ...... 70
FINAL CONCLUSIONS AND SUMMARY ...... 73
A Common Core: Coalition-Building from the Center ...... 73
President and Congress: Achieving a Balance of Power ...... 74
Building a Credibly Broad Support Group ...... 75
Implications for Political Science and Future Research, Final Thoughts ...... 76
Bibliography ...... 83 1
“I'm a uniter, not a divider. I don't believe there's a deep divide. […] It's been my record. It's what I've done as governor. I know how to unite people. I don't like the politics of pitting one group of people against another, the politics of pointing fingers.” - George W. Bush, Republican Primary Debate, February 29, 2000
“Now even as we speak, there are those who are preparing to divide us -- the spin masters, the negative ad peddlers who embrace the politics of "anything goes." Well, I say to them tonight, there is not a liberal America and a conservative America -- there is the United States of America.” - Barack Obama, Democratic National Convention, July 27, 2004
“All government, indeed every human benefit and enjoyment, every virtue, and every prudent act, is founded on compromise and barter.” - Edmund Burke, Irish Statesman, in Speech on Conciliation with America, 1775 2
INTRODUCTION
For the past two decades, American politics has experienced a period of near partisan parity in both government and the electorate. Indeed, since 1993, the US House of
Representatives alone has changed hands three times—before which, Democrats remained in control for nearly 40 years. During this period of partisan parity, however, America has also faced some of its largest challenges since WWII: the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, and the Great Recession of 2008-2009, to name only two. Given both the urgency of America’s problems and equal breakdown of party-affiliation in the government and electorate, one might conjecture that bipartisan cooperation must have increased throughout the past two decades.
After all, if Lyndon Johnson’s maxim holds—that politics is indeed the “art of the possible”— leaders must have come together to confront America’s great challenges.
In reality, however, American political leadership has amassed a mixed record on bipartisanship in the past two decades. In fact, amidst rising polarization in Washington, major legislative initiatives have just as often (if not more often) than not, fallen victim to staunch partisanship in Washington, resulting in votes along party lines or the avoidance of a vote altogether. Indeed, far from the Madisonian ideal for representative democracy, many contemporary leaders have eschewed any sort of compromise—the lifeblood of bipartisan cooperation. And while compromise may not always develop the best or most appropriate solution to a given problem, America’s separation-of-powers system would seem to require more cooperation than of late—especially considering the gravity of America’s policy challenges.
Perhaps no two modern leaders have promised so much bipartisanship and compromise
(and struggled so mightily to deliver it) as America’s past two chief executives, Presidents
George W. Bush and Barack Obama. Indeed, whether through self-descriptions as a “uniter, not a divider” or sound-bites such as “there’s not a liberal America or conservative America, but a
United States of America,” Bush and Obama began their respective terms with high hopes for 3 cooperation with the opposite party. Especially with regard to their signature first-term domestic policy achievements (education and health reform, respectively), Bush and Obama consistently articulated their desire for bipartisan cooperation following the election.
Notwithstanding this desire for bipartisanship, however, Bush and Obama’s initiatives passed with wildly different levels of bipartisanship. That is, while Republicans’ No Child Left
Behind Act (NCLB) passed the House and Senate with votes of 381-41 and 87-10 respectively, the Democrats’ Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (PPACA) passed with slim, party- line votes—and only after some parliamentary maneuvers in Congress. Given this striking dissimilarity in results, the question begs asking: why did NCLB pass with such bipartisan cooperation, while PPACA struggled through a year’s worth of intense partisan bickering?
To be certain, a complete answer to this question would warrant an entire book, if one may ever completely answer such a question at all. Moreover, though PPACA lacked bipartisanship, the bill still become law, just as NCLB had. Perhaps, then, bipartisanship was/is not as fundamentally valuable as one might think. Yet, despite these potential drawbacks, this question must still warrant at least a partial answer. For indeed, though PPACA did pass, both debate and implementation have polarized Congress and the public and consumed the attention of media and political leaders in the years since its passage—hardly the best way to address
America’s other public policy challenges. Thus, given the current need for and dearth of bipartisan cooperation highlighted above, a close examination of the politics and passage of both
NCLB and PPACA may prove helpful for future leaders interested in making careful progress on
America’s challenges. This study will strive to provide exactly that sort of helpful information.
That is, through a comparison of NCLB and ACA case-studies, this paper aims to identify the tactics, strategies, and approaches that promoted bipartisan cooperation on NCLB and partisan 4 polarization on PPACA.*1
Research Approach, Organization, and Overall Thesis
To address more precisely the above question on bipartisanship in NCLB and PPACA, this paper will compare the politics of the two bills in three contexts: presidential leadership of
Congress, congressional leadership, and interest-group politics. These contexts not only provide focus and organization for analysis—they also represent vital components of the passage of
NCLB and PPACA. Both bills came as fulfillments of major presidential-election promises, both featured strong congressional leadership, and both were strongly influenced by interest groups.
Consequently, this study will examine NCLB and PPACA through each of these lenses, noting differences and similarities in the strategies undertaken within each context. Then, after identifying such strategies and tactics, the study will conclude each major empirical section
(presidential leadership, congressional leadership, interest-group effect) by underscoring the reasons why each strategy either encouraged or discouraged bipartisan cooperation.
Without a doubt, careful deliberation and give-and-take lie at the heart of America’s separation-of-powers system of governance. And, as was often the case as the Framers developed the Constitution itself, the only feasible path forward in such a system involves some level of compromise. Certainly, some compromises may prove “better” or more effective than other, but considering America’s partisan parity and the gravity of the issues facing the country, leaders today more than ever must rediscover the spirit of compromise and bipartisan cooperation. More than anything else, this study aims to identify ways to reintroduce this spirit into a given policy debate. To this end, after considering the tactics and strategies employed in the passage of NCLB and PPACA, this paper shall find that differences in coalition-building
*Here, one should underscore that which this study does not intend to address. First and foremost, this study in no way intends to editorialize about the content of either NCLB or PPACA, but aims rather to analyze the politics surrounding it. Similarly, this study will make no normative judgment about whether specific agreements or compromises should have ever been made. Again, that sort of research falls outside the purview of this study and would seem more suitable for a public policy paper. Instead, this paper merely utilizes NCLB and PPACA as tools to identify and explain the tactics and strategies which best promote bipartisan cooperation. 5 approaches, balance of power between the legislative and executive branches, and ideological breadth of support led NCLB to experience higher levels of bipartisanship than did PPACA.
LITERATURE REVIEW
As noted above, this study will examine NCLB and ACA from three major perspectives: presidential leadership of Congress, congressional leadership, and the influence of interest groups. Before doing so, however, this paper will first consider major political science research from each field, noting the various tactics and strategies often employed within each of the above contexts. This literature will then help to identify the tactics chosen by NCLB and PPACA leaders. As a coda, this review will also consider one major account on the “spirit” of compromise, i.e., the general conditions under which a compromise is most likely to occur. As this study uses the political science research from each major field/context to identify chosen strategies/tactics of NCLB/PPACA, such literature on the “spirit” of compromise will aid in determining whether a given strategy or tactic promoted or discouraged bipartisan cooperation.
Presidential Leadership of Congress
The first field of interest is presidential leadership of Congress. Both NCLB and ACA came to Capitol Hill as major presidential legislative initiatives, each fulfilling a prominent campaign promise. Moreover, throughout the development of both bills, the White House influenced both content and passage in major ways. Thus, an understanding of a president’s methods of influence (and the general success of those methods) on Congress will prove integral to any comparison of NCLB and ACA.
Richard Neustadt and James Pfiffner on the President’s Basic Methods of Influence
In his mid-20th Century book, Presidential Power, Richard Neustadt developed one of the first major models of presidential leadership still in use today: the president as a facilitator, rather than a director, of change. According to Neustadt, presidents experience a gap between their agenda and the formal powers granted them to execute that agenda. Thus, rather than direct the 6 change they seek, presidents must rely upon another faculty—persuasion—in order to lead the federal government. That is, a president must bargain, politick, appease—whatever it takes—in order to convince other actors to exercise his/her will. For this reason, Neustadt concludes,
“presidential leadership is the power to persuade.”
Further developing this thesis, James P. Pfiffner, in The Strategic Presidency, highlights four major objectives for presidents who wish to exercise such persuasion in the halls of
Congress. First and foremost, he says, a president must begin his legislative agenda quickly.
Indeed, not only is a fast start the only way to capitalize on the post-election “honeymoon” period, but according to Pfiffner, it establishes momentum for the rest of the term. That is, if a president struggles to pass little/no major legislation within his first hundred days in office, he will appear politically weak and inept to legislators. Feeling less “protected” by the president’s skill and popularity, partisans will prove less likely to risk political capital on presidential initiatives; and, emboldened by the president’s failures, members of the opposition will more brazenly oppose future presidential initiatives. Such a combination of events would significantly stymie any presidential legislative initiative in the future.1
Achieving a fast legislative start, however, involves a major pre-requisite. That is, a president must have articulated clear, specific ideas within a given policy area, both during and directly after an election. If he (and, hopefully soon, she) does not do so, proposed ideas will almost assuredly surprise legislators. As with any type of politician, legislators will likely balk at any such surprise, resulting in a slower, more deliberate consideration of the proposed legislation. Oftentimes, this results in the slow death of a policy initiative. If the president has not articulated clear policy ideas, he/she may still rely on another tactic: proposing a long-standing party program. Such policy ideas, because of their long-established histories, are often familiar to
1 James P.Pfiffner, The Strategic Presidency: Hitting the Ground Running, Lawrence, Kan.: University Press of Kansas, 1996: 135-138. 7 legislators and the public alike. Relying on such ideas eliminates the problem of “surprise” and allows legislators to more quickly consider a given initiative. No matter what the tactic, however,
Pfiffner urges presidents: promote well-articulated, familiar ideas, very early on in a term.2
In addition to a quick start, Pfiffner also calls attention to the White House legislative liaison operation. According to Pfiffner, legislators are most open to new ideas and relationships directly after elections, so presidents-elect should organize a liaison organization as early as possible. Doing so limits fights over cabinet confirmation and avoids any accidental snub of potential allies, due to the communications firestorm that accompanies a legislative liaison operation. Beyond early organization, however, presidents must also be sure to hire experienced liaisons to their operation. Indeed, not only will such people prove more reliable and effective, but a more experience official will obtain greater access to the president himself.3
Pfiffner’s third objective for a president’s legislative success involves courting Congress.
And, according to Pfiffner’s many interviews with government officials, the first step to doing so is giving due attention to the “little things.” Indeed, small gestures, such as invitations to White
House meals or quick references to a simple fact about a legislator’s district, create an affect of friendliness and cordiality toward the president, sometimes pre-disposing a member of Congress toward support of the president. Clearly then, a president (and his liaison operation) must take time to learn the idiosyncrasies of key legislators. Such work, of course, often proves difficult and even unnatural for some presidents. Still, however difficult, presidents must effectively woo legislators, even if through trivial gestures.4 Moreover, a president must also show a due respect for Congress as an institution. Members in no way view the president as a “boss,” and most take umbrage to their popular perception as a “rubber stamp.” Consequently, presidents must acknowledge the importance of influential members and Congress in general, both by involving
2 Ibid. 3 Ibid, 139-142. 4 Ibid, 143-145. 8 leaders (even if superficially) in the drafting of legislation, speaking positively about the institution of Congress publicly, and avoid demeaning potential allies in any way.5
Pfiffner’s final objective for presidential success in Congress is the pursuance of a “rifle”
(rather than shotgun) legislative strategy. According to Pfiffner, too many legislative proposals will cloud out the specific advantages of each individual proposal. Moreover, a high volume of proposals will take Congress longer to process. This may portray Congress as “dragging its feet,” which could prove politically deleterious for Congress (seen as “do-nothing”) and the president
(seen as legislatively weak) alike. Finally, a large legislative agenda is unlikely to be fully passed: failure on a large number of initiatives certainly looks worse than modest success on just a few. Thus, by underscoring the importance of modesty and focus, Pfiffner adds a fourth and final objective to his list of four aims for presidents in Congress.6
George C. Edwards III on the Limitations of Presidential Leadership
While Pfiffner highlights four major methods of influence for presidents, George C.
Edwards III, in At the Margins (1989), demonstrates the limitations of a number of presidential strategies in Congress. In examining such opportunities and limitations, Edwards identifies three major “strategic positions” that presidents take to lead Congress. First, the president is positioned as a major party leader. Members of Congress are inherently distrustful of the opposition party, and the president offers a rallying point for partisans in Congress.7 To capitalize on this leadership opportunity, a president may utilize a number of tactics: personal appeals, working with Congressional leaders, using incentives (either positive or negative), and/or engaging in bipartisanship.8 Each strategy, however, possesses distinct limitations: a president may easily dislike or overuse personal appeals, congressional leaders sometimes act extremely
5 Ibid, 145-147. 6 Ibid. 7 George C.Edwards, III, At the Margins: Presidential Leadership of Congress, New Haven: Yale University Press, 1989: 34-46. 8 Ibid, 70-88. 9 independently, a close election may weaken the effectiveness of bribes or threats, and the opposition may vehemently resist bipartisan cooperation.9 Taken together, these and other limitations suggest that, insofar as a president seeks influence as a party leader, such a strategy only influences Congress at the margins.
In addition to the president’s strategic position as party leader, presidents may also appeal to the public, in order to pressure Congress. Members of Congress are undoubtedly sensitive to public pressure, both because they are insecure about reelection and because many wish to reflect public opinion as a matter of true representation.10 Whatever the reason, presidents may influence public opinion in a number of ways, including advertising, speeches, appearances on news shows, etc.11 Yet despite this opportunity for influence, public-opinion tactics involve a number of limitations. First, presidents may not be skillful communicators. And even for the most adept salesperson, influencing the public often proves very difficult. Especially in today’s environment of party parody, a president’s message on a given policy proposal will not go uncontested. Moreover, the public is often either inattentive or generally unreceptive to a president’s arguments, limiting the power of a president’s persuasion. Finally, members of
Congress may themselves not be responsive to public pressure: particular members may have long-standing ties within his/her district, rarely face strong challengers, or simply oppose the president’s party and program.12 Thus, like the president’s strategic position as party leader, the influence of public appeals on Congress may only prove effective for evenly divided, controversial initiatives. Indeed, in his later book On Deaf Ears, Edwards confirms the severe limitations (as suggested by the title) of presidential appeals to the public.13
Finally, Edwards says, presidents may influence Congress through “legislative skill.”
9 Ibid, 89-99. 10 Ibid 100-107. 11 Ibid 125-136. 12 Ibid, 108-125. 13 George C. Edwards, III, On deaf ears: the limits of the bully pulpit, New Haven: Yale University Press, 2003. 10
After vividly downplaying this particular strategic position (and the attention afforded to it by political scientists), Edwards highlights a number of legislative skills a president may employ.14
These include most of Pfiffner’s strategies (or formulations thereof): bargaining, personal appeals, consultation of prominent members of congress, setting legislative priorities for
Congress, moving quickly, and structuring choice (framing an issue favorably).15 Yet, like
Edwards’ other strategies, each of these approaches possesses specific limitations: a tight budget may prevent logrolling (a major bargaining tactic), appeals can confer weakness on a president if members do not respond, members’ suggestions may conflict with the president’s ideas,
Congress may resist the president’s agenda-setting and issue-framing, etc.16 Consequently, perhaps more so than the president’s other strategic positions, Edwards concludes that a president may find legislative skill useful only at the margins of coalition-building.
One Final Consideration: Andrew Rudalevige and White House Organization
Beyond the strategies and limitations underscored by Pfiffner and Edwards, another political scientist, Andrew Rudalevige has highlighted the importance of yet another factor—
White House organization—that influences a president’s success in Congress. As Rudalevige indicates in Managing the President’s Program (2002), modern presidents have tended toward centralization of executive control in the White House, in an effort to more efficiently direct the massive Washington bureaucracy.17 This trend, however, often confounds presidents’ efforts in
Congress in two major ways. First, centralization disrupts a congressperson’s usual information channels to the executive branch. Indeed, because the various bureaucratic departments in the executive branch closely mirror committees in Congress, members of Congress rely upon those offices to share information with the executive branch. Centralization alters this connection,
14 Edwards, At the Margins, 186-213. 15 Ibid. 16 Ibid. 17 Andrew Rudalevige, Managing the President's program: presidential leadership and legislative policy formulation, Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 2002: 115-116. 11 rendering Congress inherently skeptical and uneasy about a president’s legislative proposal.18 In addition to this disruption, centralization also exacerbates cultural differences between the executive and legislative branches. White House staffers often view members of Congress as parochial and narrow-minded, and members of Congress find White House staffers to be arrogant and quick to equate the president’s interests with the nation’s. Centralization forces
Congress to deal directly with such staffers, exacerbating tensions between the branches.19
Of course, centralization negatively affects certain initiatives more than others. Complex policy proposals that cut across multiple departments and congressional committees, for example, are particularly susceptible to the disadvantages of a centralized executive branch.20
Moreover, these disadvantages notwithstanding, Rudalevige does not oversell his findings: the disadvantages of centralization may in many cases not outweigh the managerial advantages. Still, if presidents wish to succeed in Congress, Rudalevige urges them to consider the organization of the White House, in addition to more commonly accepted strategies and factors.21
All in all, then, presidents may influence Congress in a number of different ways— ranging from their position as party leader to the way they organize the White House. Still, current political science literature reminds us: presidents are limited in their ability to push legislation. Politicians and commentators alike must bear this in mind, in order to understand the real importance of presidential leadership for any one initiative.
Congressional Leadership
The second field of interest in this study is that of congressional leadership. Especially since the late 1980s and early 90s, congressional leadership has played an integral role in successful cooperation (or lack thereof) within the legislative branch. Congressional leaders played a key role in both NCLB and ACA, and this study will consider the following literature in
18 Ibid, 116-118. 19 Ibid, 118-119. 20 Ibid, 124-130. 21 Ibid, 155-156. 12 order to analyze the role of congressional leaders in the coalition-building around both bills.
Skill versus Context: Floor Leadership in Congress
According to Davidson, Oleszek, and Lee in Congress and Its Members, two major models of congressional leadership prevail today. The first, conditional party government, focuses on the unity of the political parties, in order to determine the overall strength of congressional leaders. That is, leaders will prove more powerful in times of extreme party unity, while the individual members and/or rank-and-file will remain more powerful when the parties are fragmented. Conversely, the second model of congressional leadership, the pivotal voter model, focuses on the ideology of the members themselves. According to this model, members on the margins of a voting coalition hold the most power, and consequently, legislation often reflects the wishes of these members. Congressional leaders must focus on these members (rather than party unity, for example), if they wish to pass legislation. While proponents of these models are often at odds, NCLB and ACA exhibit characteristics consistent with both models. For this reason, this paper will consider both models to assess the success/failure of party leaders to encourage cooperation in Congress.22
In Congress and Its Members, Davidson, Oleszek, and Lee also discuss two basic types of congressional leaders: floor and committee leaders. The former of these, floor leaders, includes the Speaker of the House, party whips, the Majority Leader of the Senate, the President
Pro Tempore of the Senate, and other leaders of an entire chamber. According to Davidson, et al., experts cite two major factors that determine the effectiveness of, in particular, a Speaker of the House or Senate Majority Leader. First, personal style plays a role for floor leaders: successful leaders will utilize all available tools of persuasion (logrolling, leadership PACs, chairmanships, etc.) to pass legislation—even against the will of many members of Congress.
22 Roger H. Davidson, Walter J. Oleszek, and Frances E. Lee., Congress and its members, 12th ed. Washington, D.C.: CQ Press, 2010: 166. 13
Newt Gingrich and Nancy Pelosi were two such leaders.23 These successes notwithstanding, however, Davidson et al. also cite the writings of numerous political scientists to downplay the importance of personal style. Rather, context, they say, greatly influences a floor leader’s effectiveness: he/she will become more or less influential depending on preference homogeneity within the parties, contrast between the parties, formal powers granted to floor leaders (such as committee assignments), the power of the leadership PACs, etc.24
Not all prominent political scientists focus on context, however. Notably, Thomas Mann and Norman Ornstein, in The Broken Branch (2006), stress the importance of individual personalities in the historical development of congressional leadership. According to
Mann/Ornstein, particularly aggressive floor leaders have, in the past, created favorable contexts by lobbying for the right to assign committees, passing omnibus bills (so as to bypass committees altogether), and excluding the minority from conference committees (thus unifying the parties and creating centralization of power with floor leaders). The result, according to
Mann/Ornstein, has been a decline in deliberation and a sort of parliamentarian tribalism in
Washington.25 Still, these conclusions notwithstanding, Davidson/Oleszek/Lee downplay the ability of individual leaders to create their own contexts. That is, just as Edwards cautions against an over-approximation of the president’s influence on Congress, Davidson, Oleszek and
Lee note that much of congressional leaders’ influence depends on their surroundings.
As is typical, several leadership differences exist between the two chambers of Congress.
In the House, a bevy of formal powers (such as control over committee assignments and, consequently, debate rules) empower floor leaders (particularly the Speaker) a great deal. In the
Senate, however, floor leaders must contend with the fact that every Senator holds the power to
23 Ibid, 167. 24 Ibid. 25 Thomas E. Mann, and Norman J. Ornstein. The broken branch: how Congress is failing America and how to get it back on track. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2006. 14 halt all progress, via holds and filibusters.26 Moreover, the Senate has traditionally functioned as a collegial, consensus-based institution. Thus, major forms of influence typically revolve around appeasement, often in the form of favorable amendments for a Senator’s state. Today’s trends of increased partisanship and individualism in the Senate have rendered this job even more difficult.27
A Decentralizing Force: Committee Leadership in Congress
While floor leaders act as a centralizing force in Congress, committees and their leaders often fragment power. Shrewd committee leaders may influence legislative outcomes in a number of ways: they often determine which bills are considered, preside over much of the actual construction of bills, and can sometimes kill bills simply by holding them in committee for long periods of time.28 In addition, committee leaders are often responsible for much of the culture of a chamber: if a preponderance of committee leaders treat minority committee members poorly, the result is often a very partisan chamber in general.29
Despite these powers, recent House committee chairs have lost a great amount of influence. Indeed, though John Boehner originally pledged greater autonomy for committee chairs, chairpersons still suffer from the constraints of the Hastert and Pelosi Speakerships.30 In the Senate, committee chairs have not lost power, due to the Senate’s egalitarian structure and the fact that nearly every Senator holds some kind of chairmanship. However, because any senator may offer an amendment for any given bill, Senate committee chairs’ power remains limited.31 These differences play an important role in understanding legislative initiatives, especially for presidents deciding which chamber should introduce a piece of legislation.
All in all, congressional leadership spans a wide range of leaders and arenas of influence.
26 Davidson, et al., Congress and Its Members, 176-177. 27 Ibid. 28 Ibid, 216. 29 Baker, House and Senate, 88-89. 30 Davidson, et al., 232. 31 Ibid, 234-235. 15
Floor leaders, for example, may influence others through committee assignments, leadership
PACs, or coalition-building techniques like omnibus bills. Committee leaders, on the other hand, can choose to sit on legislation or alienate the minority in committee, depending on how much bipartisan cooperation they desire. And of course, floor and committee leaders do not operate in a vacuum. In fact, they often work against each other: empowered floor leaders create centralization that empowered committee leaders would theoretically fragment. Thus, as
Davidson/Oleszek/Lee urge, political scientists and commentators must remain cognizant of the inherent complexity of congressional leadership. Understanding this complex structure allows one to better grasp the context with which congressional leaders must contend.
Outside Forces: Interest Groups
The final lens through which this paper will examine NCLB and ACA is that of interest groups. To be sure, interest groups played a significant role in the development of both bills; and, ultimately, such groups influenced both the passage and content of each piece of legislation.
Thus, this review will consider some major research on interest groups and Congress, tracking groups’ influence throughout the entire development of a bill.
Constant Contact: Interest Groups’ Basic Methods for Influencing Congress
In Interest Groups and Congress, John R. Wright thoroughly examines the influence of interest groups, as a bill passes through Congress. Before doing so, however, Wright first underscores the reasons why interest groups can exercise influence over Congress. In a word, interest groups possess a commodity that busy, insecure members of Congress desperately crave: information. Thus, says Wright, “Interest groups achieve influence in the legislative process by strategically providing information to change or reinforce legislators’ beliefs about legislative outcomes, the operational effects of policies, and the electoral ramifications of their actions.”32
32 John R. Wright, Interest groups and Congress: lobbying, contributions, and influence, Boston: Allyn and Bacon, 1996: 75. 16
Such strategic provision of information takes different forms throughout the legislative process. First, even before policy proposals or ideas reach committee (or even Congress), an interest group may choose run preliminary ads or send lobbyists to the Hill, in order to establish a stake in a given policy debate. Doing so may transmit a number of importance pieces of information to Congress: members may sense an interest group’s willingness for an ugly fight down the road, understand the importance of a specific idea to a particular constituency, or perceive one interest group as a larger player than others on a given issue.33
Once a bill reaches committee, interest groups begin transmitting strategic information in the greatest volumes of any portion of the legislative process. Indeed, committees are a particularly hospitable environment for interest groups, because the narrow focus of committees allows interest groups to more closely track and (potentially) manipulate the progress of a bill.34
According to Wright, hearings serve two major functions: information and accountability. With regard information/education, interest-group testimonies influence members by communicating new innovations in a given policy area, signaling a shift in the political winds of an issue, and reintroduce old arguments (often for emphasis). In the case of accountability, hearings offer interest groups an opportunity to force members into public stances on an issue. This allows for more stable negotiations with members as a bill progresses.35
As a bill reaches mark-up, interest groups continue to follow the bill, mostly through the few members of Congress with whom the group has closest contact. With these members, interest groups may suggest specific provisions for the bill, warn of potential objections during floor deliberation, and make sense of the most obscure or most complicated aspects of a bill. The latter of these services is especially beneficial for members of Congress: because of members’ desperate need for information, a bill’s obscurities may never make sense to members without
33 Ibid, 39-40. 34 Ibid, 48. 35 Ibid, 40-42. 17 the aid of interest groups.36 Thus, as with the other steps of the legislative process, interest groups influence Congress by providing information strategically during mark-up. Finally, by the time a bill comes up for a vote, interest groups will then band together in coalitions, in order to persuade large groups of members to vote in their desired direction.37 These coalitions vary greatly from bill to bill, based on each bill’s specifics. But, as a general rule, natural allegiances take a back seat during coalition-building: strange bedfellows will not hesitate to band together, in order to advance their groups’ interests.
Strategic Differences in House versus Senate Lobbying
Lobbyists may adopt different strategies during the legislative process, depending on the chamber of Congress with which they are working. In House and Senate, Ross Baker identifies a number of key differences. First and foremost, lobbyists claim that lofty arguments about the broader implications of a measure work well when dealing with Senators, while more narrowly defined, obscure tactics are more effective in the House. Indeed, because Senators serve a larger constituency (and because they lack the detailed knowledge on a particular topic like a House member might have), lobbyists must talk in terms of principles and the greater good in dealing with Senators. Conversely, the specialization inherent in the House leaves such members open to more particular, even parochial concerns.38
The other major difference in lobbyists’ approach between the chambers deals with the type of lobbying campaign interest groups wage in each house. That is, while lobbyists adopt a
“mass-marketing” technique for the House, they often choose a “designer” technique for the
Senate. In the House, members can often be wooed in groups, due to similar interests of certain members (similar geography, constituency concerns) and the close friendships encouraged by
House members’ few committee assignments. In the Senate, however, lobbyists must tailor-make
36 Ibid, 43. 37 Ibid, 45. 38 Baker, House and Senate, 155. 18 their appeals for each Senator. Senators often are either not close enough to woo in groups, or their constituency interests are broad enough that no one lobby can mass-market them. Lobbyists may try the House lobby tactic in the Senate, or vice versa, but in general, lobbyists employ different tactics, based on their targeted chamber.39
Taken together, Wright and Baker highlight numerous methods for influencing
Congress—and reasons that such strategies may or may not prove successful. Yet despite the many openings interest groups may exploit, Wright does caution his readers from attributing too much power to interest groups. According to his and other research, interest groups should be understood as one factor among many with which a member of Congress must contend.
Members have their own preferences, unique constituencies, commitments to party, and other factors to consider.40 Thus, while interest groups do shape legislation in America today, their influence is indirect rather than direct: interest groups affect the factors that influence legislators, but are not factors themselves.41
A Note on Negotiation42
While this literature review has focused on the entities most influential in the shaping/passage of NCLB and ACA (and their potential strategies for influence), it has not explicitly focused on the central question of this thesis: what conditions allowed NCLB to pass with such bipartisanship, while PPACA passed with none? To address this question, this paper will consider two vital principles of bipartisan cooperation—mutual trust and leadership by experienced, “principled compromisers”—as articulated by Amy Gutmann and Dennis
Thompson in The Spirit of Compromise.
This study, of course, does not recognize Gutmann/Thompson’s findings as particularly
39 Ibid, 160. 40 Ibid, 66. 41 Ibid, 67. 42 Amy Gutmann and Dennis F. Thompson, The spirit of compromise: why governing demands it and campaigning undermines it, Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2012. 19 new or groundbreaking. In fact, a mere twenty years ago, institutional studies of Congress would likely have taken the central thesis of The Spirit of Compromise as a “given.” Still, this study will focus on these Gutmann/Thompson’s principles of compromise because, as noted at the outset of this thesis, the importance of bipartisan cooperation (and the principles that allow it to occur) has been short-shrifted by policymakers and pundits in recent years. More specifically, Gutmann and
Thompson’s principles will help to explain why the strategies chosen by the president, congressional leadership, and interest groups either encouraged or discouraged bipartisan cooperation on NCLB and PPACA. In other words, while this paper’s three major sections
(presidential leadership, congressional leadership, interest groups) offer three contexts for comparison, Gutmann/Thompson’s principles of compromise will help explain why strategic differences in each context led to either more or less bipartisan cooperation on NCLB/PPACA.
The first and most important principle of compromise/bipartisan cooperation is mutual trust. This condition rises largely out of the nature of a compromise. As noted before, members of opposing parties are inherently mistrustful of one another’s motives: all things equal, members from one party ultimately wish that members from the other party lose an election. Thus, in a compromise, legislators naturally worry that they “gave too much up” or “got the worse end of the deal.” Already worried about reelection, members may shy away from compromise for fear of defeat by some “principled” outsider. To overcome this vulnerability, leaders and proponents of a compromise must remain cognizant of their appearance to opponents: the least sign of disrespect, electoral opportunism, or general insincerity could render opponent’s mistrust too significant to overcome.
Members may build up trust by employing number of tactics. First, they may focus on smaller, less controversial aspects of a bill first. In many cases, bills include small provisions, on which there is significant agreement between parties. If this is the case, opposing sides can build up trust by coming to a successful agreement on these smaller issues. Second, leadership should 20 avoid allowing “poison pills” into legislation. Of late, some bills have included provisions that prevent a member of the opposition from voting for a measure, despite the fact that he/she mostly agree with it. If a poison pill successfully prevents a member from voting his/her interests, he/she then becomes more vulnerable electorally. Though a shrewd political tool, such tactics ruin any chance for bipartisan cooperation. Finally, leaders and proponents of a compromise should restrain their rhetoric. As noted above, inflammatory comments can cause a sense of disrespect between legislators, exacerbating their already-existent mistrust. To build up that trust, proponents must exercise restraint if/when criticizing opponents.
The second principle for successsful compromise is the prevalence of experienced
“principled compromisers.” Though this term may seem like a contradiction, such agents are often vital to the success of a compromise. Such members and officials combine a reputation as ideologically pure with the experience and rapport necessary to broker a deal in Congress.
Indeed, while their ideological reputation may offer political “cover” for wavering members, their experience allows them to balance the “campaigning” and “compromise” mindsets. In other words, experienced politicians understand when to highlight differences between political ideas and visions (in order to signal one’s bargaining position, before negotiations) and when to emphasize similarities (during the negotiation process, allowing for increased trust and easier negotiation). This understanding of the negotiation process often determines the ultimate success or failure of a negotiation. When combined with the mutual trust often held between such experienced negotiators, the presence of “principled compromisers” vastly increases the success of negotiations.
Taken together, this literature review has striven to highlight both the major arenas of influence for NCLB/PPACA (presidential leadership, congressional leadership, and interest- group influence) and the conditions under which these entities either encourage or discourage bipartisan cooperation. Thus, as this paper proceeds, it will utilize this literature to first identify 21 each actor’s chosen strategy/tactic, then determine whether that tactic (knowingly or unknowingly) had an effect on bipartisan cooperation.
CONTEXT 1: PRESIDENTIAL LEADERSHIP OF CONGRESS43
George Bush and NCLB
Whether through speeches at schools or personal meetings with members of Congress,
President George W. Bush communicated early and often that federal education reform was in fact a presidential initiative. True to his word, Bush provided indispensible leadership in the passage of the No Child Left Behind Act in 2001/2002, often choosing strategies that greatly promoted bipartisanship on education reform. This section will examine each of these strategic choices, explaining why such choices promoted bipartisan cooperation on education reform.
Moving Fast—Without Surprises
As George Edwards III notes in At the Margins (cited above), presidents must spend political capital quickly at the beginning of their term, if they hope to capitalize on their
“honeymoon period and pass major legislation.” Without a doubt, President Bush heeded the
“move quickly” advice quite efficaciously, with regard to education reform. First, within the legislature, President Bush hosted several banquets and dinners for key members of Congress, even before he officially took office.44 Doing so communicated both his commitment to campaign promises on education, as well as his willingness to negotiate closely with key legislators on both sides of the aisle. The events were largely well-received45 and began federal education reform on a strong, positive note. President Bush also pursued strategies outside of the legislature to help reform “move fast,” of course. That is, while legislators hashed out President
Bush’s early recommendations and principles for reform through hearings and informal meetings, Bush visited schools and delivered speeches designed to focus the country’s attention
43 Figure 1 on page 80 provides a brief summary of this section’s findings. 44 George W. Bush, Decision Points (New York: Crown Publishers, 2010), 275-76. 45 See, for example, George Miller, "Bush's Early Bipartisan Effort on Education a Wise Move," Contra Costa Times (CA), January 7, 2001. 22 on education reform—preserving valuable time and political capital for education reform.46
By itself, however, “moving fast” does not guarantee an initiative’s success. Indeed, as
James Pfiffner and George Edwards III note, a president must move quickly without subjecting the legislature to surprises. President Bush earnestly strove to avoid all such surprises. First and foremost, Bush had campaigned hard on the issue of education. In fact, according to GOP pollster David Winston, “[A public shift from 16% to 44% support for the GOP on education] was why Bush [became] President. Education was THE deciding issue in 2000.”47 Consequently,
Bush’s promotion of education reform came as no surprise to legislators. Equally important, however, was the substance of Bush’s proposals, which he built from previous educational initiatives and well-vetted ideas. By one account, the Bush blueprint practically “plagiarize[d]” the 1999 House plan for education reform, as well as portions of a 2000 Senate proposal called
“Straight A’s.” While not all actors agreed with these ideas, they did not come as a surprise—nor did they require much vetting in committee.48 From the beginning, then, President Bush created an initiative with which both Democrats and Republicans could feel comfortable.
Accountability: The One-Size-Fits-All Frame
As reform efforts ramped up in early 2001, Bush continued his use of effective (and often bipartisan) legislative strategies. In particular, as preliminary hearings began, President Bush adopted the issue-frame that would color nearly all conversations on education for the next year:
“accountability.” As political scientist Andrew Rudalevige notes in “The Politics of NCLB,” the accountability issue-frame proved advantageous for a number of reasons. First, much like the substance of Bush’s education proposals, his accountability issue-frame built upon a growing consensus in Washington that schools should somehow demonstrate that they are converting
46 Bush, Decision Points, 275. 47 Patrick McGuinn, No Child Left Behind and the Transformation of Federal Education Policy, 1965-2005 (Lawrence, KS: University Press of Kansas, 2006), 163. 48 Martin R. West and Paul E. Peterson, No Child Left Behind?:The Politics and Practice of School Accountability (Washington, DC: Brookings Institution Press, 2003), 36. 23 federal funds into real educational results.49 By adopting this frame, Bush promoted an outlook for education reform with which legislators could feel comfortable and had grown familiar.50
The accountability frame also benefitted reform in another importance sense: it was sufficiently ambiguous so as to keep nearly all interested parties involved in negotiations. In fact, as Rudalevige indicates, the frame of “accountability” proved so vague that it eventually evolved into two separate interpretations. For most Democrats, “accountability” meant standards accountability: education reform would make schools more accountable to accepted standards at the national level. Conversely, for many Republicans, “accountability” meant free-market accountability: finally, they said, schools would be forced to perform, lest they lose students to charter schools.51 Regardless of these differences in interpretation, the effectiveness of the frame remained unchanged: “accountability” provided a point of “agreement” between the parties and a way for each party to speak on the issue to their constituency.
In sum, whether by relying on a familiar theme or offering a broad point of agreement,
President Bush used the strategy of issue-framing to the advantage of both bipartisan cooperation and the progress of his initiative through the legislature. While the frame often lacked unitary or substantive meaning, Bush’s frame protected bipartisanship throughout the legislative process.
Delegating Authority to Congress
In addition to Bush’s “accountability” frame, the Administration adopted another strategy to avoid needless contention with Congress: delegation of authority to congressional leaders.
According to George Edwards III, delegating authority to such leaders—particularly to hash out the details of broad policy agreements—carries at least two benefits for presidents leading
Congress. First, granting real authority to congressional leaders communicates a certain amount of respect for Congress as an institution. Members of Congress revel in their policy specialties,
49 McGuinn, No Child Left Behind and the Transformation of Federal Education Policy, 208-210. 50 Ibid., 165. 51 Peterson and West, No Child Left Behind?, 27. 24 and granting authority to congressional leaders demonstrates respect for that expertise. In addition, working with congressional leaders allows a president to channel the actual expertise of individual members of Congress. Committee chairs and floor leaders have often obtained their positions through years of hard work in Congress, so working with these leaders provides a gateway to a wealth of information about policies and other members of Congress.
In the case of the No Child Left Behind, the Bush Administration worked closely with congressional leaders in a number of ways. As noted above, Bush began meetings with education experts in the House and Senate, including Democrats George Miller and Ted Kennedy and
Republicans John Boehner and Judd Gregg, even before he officially became president. As reform efforts wore on, President Bush did not relent in this correspondence. In addition to constant correspondence with members of Congress via Education Secretary Rod Paige and chief negotiator Sandy Kress, Bush met personally with key leaders on numerous occasions throughout the hearings, mark-up, and conference stages of the legislative process.52
In addition to this regular correspondence, however, Bush also adopted a general legislative approach that delegated important responsibility to congressional leaders: the use of a policy “blueprint.”53 That is, rather than sending already-crafted legislation to Capitol Hill,
President Bush drafted and sent a document to Congress on January 23, 2001, that highlighted the major components of reform. The particular reform principles closely reflected those articulated during the Bush’s campaign for the presidency and ranged from school vouchers to required state-wide testing to grades for every public school in America. But regardless of content, Bush’s blueprint allowed Congress significant say and leeway in shaping reform, while simultaneously giving structure to the reform efforts.54 Indeed, while a blueprint granted Bush flexibility for negotiation and indicated his willingness to compromise, it also offered a written,
52 See, for example, "Stakeout Press Conference with Sen. James Jeffords, Sen. Ted Kennedy, Rep. John Boehner, and Rep. George Miller, After Meeting with President Bush," Federal News Service, January 23, 2001. 53 Peterson and West, No Child Left Behind?, 35. 54 Peterson and West, No Child Left Behind?, 36. 25 public record of Bush’s sincerity about meaningful education reform.55
Throughout the legislative process, Bush demonstrated a clear willingness to delegate authority on education reform. And while doing so sometimes cost the Administration much- valued aspects of reform (vouchers for private schools, for example), Bush’s cooperation with
Congress allowed him to obtain large numbers of votes from Democrats and Republicans alike.
Principled-Negotiator-In-Chief: Guiding Debate and Communicating a Clear Position
According to Amy Gutmann and Dennis Thompson in The Spirit of Compromise, a truly skilled negotiator must understand the balance between principle and pragmatism within a given policy debate. That is, he/she must understand that principle plays an important role in finding a compromise just as pragmatism does, for a clear statement of principles communicates the real terms of one’s demands in a negotiation. With regard to education reform, President Bush understood the importance of clear messaging on key principles of reform. Indeed, while flexibility and modest deference to Congress characterized Bush’s general leadership strategy in
Congress, Bush also knew that unclear positions on contentious aspects of reform negotiations could slow reform and eventually undermine it.
The earliest and most important of these positions came with regard to the school voucher aspect of President Bush’s blueprint. Beginning as early as Bush’s preliminary outreach dinner, Rep. George Miller expressed Democrats’ concern with Bush’s voucher plan. According to a column Miller penned in a local paper, Bush’s approach to education reform presented many opportunities for bipartisan cooperation but also included one “poison pill”: vouchers to attend private schools. If the Administration could demonstrate some flexibility on vouchers, Miller said, then Democrats could remain at the negotiating table in earnest.56
In the months following Miller’s (and others’) proclamation, negotiations continued
55 McGuinn, No Child Left Behind and the Transformation of Federal Education Policy, 168.
56 Miller, "Bush's Early Bipartisan Effort on Education a Wise Move.” 26 without a clear picture of the role vouchers would play in the final drafts of No Child Left
Behind. But as negotiations proceeded, members of Congress and the president alike realized that Democrats could no longer continue negotiations in earnest without an understanding of the president’s true position on vouchers. (In fact, according to several news sources, education reform was in serious “trouble” if a deal on vouchers could not be made57). Realizing private school vouchers could ruin relations with Democrats, President Bush announced his flexibility on vouchers in a radio address.58 Democrats were “satisfied, if not exuberant,”59 and House members voted in committee 27-20 to remove vouchers from the bill.60 While Bush’s position hardly seemed “principled,” Bush was able to rescue negotiations by clearly stating what his principles were not. Meanwhile, Democrats articulated an absolute opposition to private-school vouchers and were able to come to an agreement with the White House on the issue.
President Bush did not just communicate his areas of flexibility, however. He also articulated his absolute commitment to another aspect of reform: testing. As No Child Left
Behind reached the floor of the House in 2001, insiders in Washington began to hear rumblings of an odd far-Left/far-Right alliance forming in the House. According to reports, Peter Hoekstra
(R – Mich.) and Bernie Sanders (I – VT) had crafted an amendment that would remove the mandatory-testing element of education reform. In anticipation of this amendment, Bush directed
Education Secretary Rod Paige to publish a column on the Administration’s commitment to testing. In the column, Paige called testing the “centerpiece of the president’s plan,” and clearly demonstrated other negotiators the importance of testing to Bush’s plan. Consequently, as
Sanders and Hoekstra took the floor, a bipartisan majority of members (including some
Democrats who doubted the true effectiveness of testing) voted down the amendment.61
57 David Espo, "Bush's School Voucher Plan Is Nixed," Associated Press Online, May 2, 2001. 58 Mike Allen, "Bush Willing To Consider Alternatives To Vouchers," Washington Post, January 28, 2001 59 Peterson and West, No Child Left Behind?, 35. 60 Espo, “Bush’s School Voucher Plan Is Nixed.” 61 Rod Paige, "Why We Must Have Testing," Washington Post, May 13, 2001. 27
Clearly, then, while President Bush allowed Congress to negotiate the details of reform, he also understood that without clear leadership on potentially poisonous sub-issues, negotiations could drag on and potentially break down. Whether by expressing some flexibility on vouchers or underscoring the importance of testing, President Bush provided the communication required to keep education negotiations on track.
Finding a Winning Coalition: Building from the Center, Outward
Notwithstanding Bush’s successes in promoting an inclusive issue frame, maintaining the nation’s focus on reform, communicating clear issue positions, etc., the Bush Administration ultimately had to develop a coalition within Congress that could pass No Child Left Behind. To do so, Bush, Kress, and Paige decided that, instead of energizing the conservative base to pass reforms, they would build their coalition on an alliance between the moderate New Democrats and moderate Republicans. In other words, the Administration would negotiate the substance of education reform at the center of the political spectrum and then convince enough conservatives to join the cause and pass the legislation.62 Bush had numerous reasons for adopting this approach: he lack the votes to invoke cloture on a Democratic filibuster, had pledged to be a
“uniter” during his campaign, and may have even been closer to New Democrats on the issue of education. But whatever his reasons, President Bush decided that, as a former Gore strategist put it, “patient bipartisan centrism” would deliver the most popular, feasible reform.63
This strategy became manifest in both the specifics of reform and the tactics used to sway more liberal and conservative members of Congress. With regard to reform specifics, no aspect of NCLB better illustrates the Bush coalition strategy better than negations over AYP (“annual yearly progress”) for schools across the country. As part of President Bush’s “accountability” initiative, NCLB held that schools ought to meet certain standards of progress (“AYP”) on
62McGuinn, No Child Left Behind and the Transformation of Federal Education Policy, 169. 63 Ibid., 167. 28 standardized tests each year. Yet despite lawmakers’ general agreement on this idea, the specific formula for adequate progress remained quite contentious. Eventually, after intense debate, the
Senate finally agreed on (albeit intensely convoluted and complicated) AYP language. Though the agreement was less-than-perfect, it had guaranteed the sort of centrist support for which Bush had sought and would allow the Senate to successfully confer with the House. The compromise was a piece of quintessential Washington sausage-making, but Bush understood the delicate balance required to maintain his centrist coalition.64
Aside from the substance of NCLB, the Bush centrist strategy also became evident in the president’s efforts to woo conservatives and liberals after negotiations on reform specifics.
Regarding liberal supporters, President Bush purposely kept Sen. Kennedy out of his original outreach dinner because of Kennedy’s reluctance to support various accountability measures, including testing. Apparently, Bush’s early treatment of Kennedy forced him to reconsider his position. In the words of a former Kennedy aide, “he realized he would be denied a seat at the table for drafting the most important education bill in 40 years, unless he was willing to compromise…”65 Thus, rather than changing his position to placate Kennedy, Bush simply used his alliance with centrist Democrats to gain the Liberal Lion’s support. Aside from Kennedy, of course, the Bush team also used non-policy methods to woo conservatives. Perhaps most prevalently, White House officials challenged Republicans to oppose their president’s first major domestic initiative.66 Most eventually caved to this pressure and, as with Kennedy, the Bush team added non-centrist members to their coalition without changing much policy substance.
Conclusion
Because education reform came to Washington in 2001 as a presidential initiative,
64 Peterson and West, No Child Left Behind, 38. 65 Vasil Jaiani and Andrew B. Whitford, "Policy Windows, Public Opinion, and Policy Ideas: The Evolution of No Child Left Behind," Quality Assurance in Education 19, no. 1 (2011): 16. 66 Jesse H. Rhodes, An Education in Politics: The Origins and Evolution of No Child Left Behind (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 2012), 152 29
President Bush’s leadership on the issue proved indispensible for not only the passage of NCLB but for the development of a bipartisan coalition as well. By relying on already-vetted policy ideas, promoting an inclusive issue-frame, delegating authority to congressional leadership, clearly communicating the Administration’s positions on difficult issues, avoiding polarizing public rhetoric, and building a coalition from the center, President Bush played a vital role in the bipartisan support and passage of the No Child Left Behind Act.
President Obama and the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act
In many ways, as President Obama embarked on the elusive task of major health-care reform, he faced greater challenges in navigating Congress than did President Bush with No
Child Left Behind. Perhaps most importantly, while President Bush, a Republican president, pushed a traditionally “Democratic” issue in education, President Obama found few natural supporters in the Republican Party for his vision of health-care reform—another traditionally
Democratic issue. Indeed, if President Obama were to pass reform, many thought from the outset that he ought to simply work within the Democratic caucus and forsake all prolonged attempts at bipartisanship. However, for a number of reasons, President Obama declined this advice. To begin with, he had campaigned as a candidate who would reach across the aisle and transcend typical partisan politics. A party-line vote on his signature domestic policy achievement would hardly little to fulfill that campaign promise. In addition to this promise, however, bipartisanship could also protect Democrats from “glitches” in policy implementation: Democrats would do well to have Republicans share political liability on such glitches.67
Whatever the reasons for Obama to pursue bipartisan cooperation on health reform, this section will examine President Obama’s leadership strategies during the deliberation and passage of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act of 2010. Like the previous section on Bush
67 Bob Roehr, "Obama's Top Priority," British Medical Journal, Overseas and Retired Doctors Edition ser., 338, no. 7706 (2009): 1357. 30 and NCLB, this section will evaluate the effectiveness of President Obama’s strategic choices, both with regard to general legislative success and bipartisan cooperation on the measure. After examining President Obama’s leadership of Congress on health reform, this section will reveal that President Obama’s lack of an inclusive issue-frame and clearly communicated positions on key issues, along with his “outside-in” coalition-building approach, rendered bipartisan far less likely to occur than it had on education during the Bush years.
Off to a Solid Start: Moving Quickly with Few Surprises
Like President Bush, President Obama understood that, if he hoped to pass any major health-care reform during his first term, he had to capitalize quickly on his early popularity. He had won a decisive victory over his opponent, John McCain, and had spent a significant amount of time promoting his health reform during the campaign. So, like Bush, Obama entered office with the expectation that he may in fact pursue significant health-care reform. And pursue he did.
Much as Bush invited 150 members of Congress to an outreach dinner before his inauguration,
Obama invited dozens of interest-group and congressional leaders to the White House for an outreach event. The event featured a poignant speech by an ailing Ted Kennedy, and when it had concluded, few wondered what the president’s early legislative priority would be. It was clear:
President Obama was moving as quickly as he could to promote major health reform.68
Yet despite President Obama’s focus on health care during the election, his early focus on health reform did in fact surprise some top officials within the Democratic Party. In fact, a number of top White House aides, including Rahm Emanuel and Robert Gibbs (along with a number of leaders within the Republican Party), urged President Obama to focus on the economy before pursuing health reform. Many past presidents had floundered in their pursuit of health reform, and the public had made very clear during the election that the economy/jobs concerned
68 The Staff of the Washington Post, Landmark: The Inside Story of America's New Health Care Law and What It Means For Us All (New York: Public Affairs, 2010), 16. 31 them the most. Undaunted, however, President Obama urged his team forward on health reform: after all, health care accounted for one-sixth of the American economy and rising costs threatened both the job market and families’ balance sheets in the future.69
Ultimately, President Obama’s “surprise” pursuit of health reform probably did not have a significant impact on the fate of PPACA. Especially considering the Obama Administration’s early commitment to “no surprises” in the bill’s content (minimizing changes to the private insurance system, allowing satisfied customers to keep their current plan, etc.)70, Obama displayed a more-than-ample understanding of surprise-avoidance when moving quickly with an initiative. Yet unlike Bush’s near-plagiarism of old ideas and the unanimous agreement among top officials to pursue education reform, President Obama had already encountered some push- back to his health-reform plan. Like many of his leadership strategies on health reform, Obama demonstrated an understanding of the tactics necessary for leading Congress, yet his execution of those strategies fell somewhat short—introducing some dissent into the policy formation process.
Cost v. Coverage: Missing the Mark with Health-Reform Issue-Fram
As President Obama and his health-reform team began promoting reform in early 2009, they closely studied the mistakes of another recent Democratic president who had attempted health reform: Bill Clinton. Indeed, fifteen years earlier, Clinton had pushed major health reform on Congress, only to have the bill flounder in committee and fail to reach any sort of vote. Eager to avoid these mistakes, Obama knew that he had to find the right frame for health reform.
According to polls (and given the state of the economy), the best frame seemed rather clear: Americans worried most about health-care costs.71 Consequently, Emanuel and Obama determined they would sell health reform to the American people as a bill designed to lower
69 Ibid., 13. 70 David L. Eckles and Brian F. Schaffner, "Loss Aversion and the Framing of the Health Care Reform Debate," Forum 8, no. 1 (2010): 1-11. 71 Roehr, "Obama's Top Priority," 1358. 32 costs for everyone.72 Yet despite these intentions, remaining true to this issue frame proved more difficult than expected. First, at the most fundamental level, most Democrats believed coverage to be the most vital aspect of health reform. Thus, of all of President Obama’s many campaign promises and recommendations for health reform, congressional leaders tended to fixate on elements that promoted access: expansions of Medicaid, eliminations of “abusive” insurance, tax credits for uninsured families, etc. Not only did this force Obama to publically defend /promote these provisions, but as debate wore on, they forced his into a de facto “coverage” (rather than
“cost”) issue frame.73 This frame continued into the summer, when Republicans attacked these provisions. To the extent that Obama tried to promote the cost-cutting components of PPACA
Republicans viciously attacked these provisions as intrusions into patients’ personal lives.74
Unfortunately enough for President Obama, the coverage frame prevented bipartisan support for health reform. Whether Obama could have better promoted the “cost” frame remains to be seen: besides Democrats’ focus on coverage aspects, Obama could not speak much about the best cost-cutting measure in the bill—the “Cadillac Tax”—because of labor unions’ distaste for the provision.75 Without a doubt, Republicans viewed skyrocketing costs as the greatest impediment to universal coverage in America, but as Democrats assailed GOP cost-cutting measures one-by-one—first malpractice reform, then interstate insurance competition, then the elimination of the health-care tax benefit—76the deleterious effects of the coverage issue-frame for bipartisanship became increasingly apparent. Unlike President Bush, who had found an issue- frame that pleased Democrats and Republicans alike, President Obama had missed an opportunity to capitalize on the preferences of the GOP and public alike.
72 The Staff of the Washington Post, Landmark, 16. 73 Stuart Altman, Power, Politics and Universal Health Care (Amherst, NY: Prometheus Books, 2011). 74Lawrence R. Jacobs and Theda Skocpol, Health Care Reform and American Politics: What Everyone Needs To Know (New York: Oxford University Press, 2010), 52. 75 Theda Skocpol and Vanessa Williamson, "Obama and the Transformation of US Public Policy: The Struggle to Reform Health Care," Arizona State Law Journal 2010, no. 42 (2010): 1216. 76See, for example, Committee on Finance, Senate, “Roundtable Discussion on Comprehensive Health Care Reform,” Hearing on May 12, 2009. 33
Working with Congressional Leaders: Ensuring a Congressional “Buy-In”
As committee chairs in the House and Senate began holding hearings on health reform, the Obama team made another important strategic decision on the basis of Clinton’s health-care experience: delegate more authority to congressional leaders. Fifteen years before, the Clintons chose to submit an already-crafted, 1000+ page bill to Congress, in their effort to promote major health reform. The bill alienated many veterans within the legislative branch: drafting such a detailed bill behind closed doors, they thought, not only insulted their own experience and expertise on the issue, but displayed little respect for Congress as an institution as well. Thus, like Bush had with education reform, the Obama team determined it would allow congressional leaders in the House and Senate to develop the details of the health reform bill.77
To delegate authority on health reform, Obama chose a tactic for reform similar to
Bush’s: he would highlight principles or goals for reform, and Congress would develop the policy mechanisms to meet the goals. These goals included provisions such as universal coverage for all Americans, insurance regulations on pre-existing conditions and other practices, and “cost reduction,” but unlike Bush’s plan, were not actually written and did not suggest many methods for attaining policy goals (such as testing and vouchers, which provided
“accountability” within the Bush plan). Thus, as deliberations began to intensify before summer recess, legislators found President Obama’s blueprint increasingly unhelpful: while his goals/principles may have offered some structure for reform, his lack of formal advocacy for more specific measures (such as the public option) left negotiators uncertain of the White
House’s position.78
Beyond the difficulties created by Obama’s outline, however, Obama’s method of delegation also suffered in another regard: lack of involvement from the Department of Health
77 The Staff of the Washington Post, Landmark, 16. 78 Roehr, "Obama's Top Priority," 1356. 34 and Human Services. Originally, the Obama Administration intended for the Secretary of HHS to become the Administration’s chief negotiator on health reform. Tom Daschle, a seasoned veteran in the Senate, had copious experience with both health policy and coalition-building in the Senate and had emerged as the presumptive nominee for Secretary. However, after becoming embroiled in difficulties with the IRS, he removed his name from consideration.79 Scrambling to fill the all-important position, the White House ultimately settled on Kathleen Sibelius. The former governor of Kansas, many saw Sibelius as a capable, moderate choice for the position.
However, as a Washington outsider, the Sebelius choice also signaled an important strategic choice by the White House: HHS would no longer play a key role in health reform negotiations.80 As Andrew Rudalevige demonstrates in the Managing the President’s Program, negotiating complex policies like health reform requires heavy involvement from the executive departments that mirror relevant congressional committees. Indeed, disrupting the “iron triangles” (congressional committees, executive departments, and interest groups) that members of Congress rely upon can significantly slow the progress of a bill. In the case of health reform, not only could Sibelius not match Daschle’s expertise, but her lack of involvement in negotiations ensured the centralization of negotiation within the White House.81 Thus, while
President Obama’s “blueprint” sought to empower Congress, the removal of HHS from negotiations may have worked counter to that goal. Rather than decentralizing negotiations to match the complexity of health care, centralization robbed Congress of its authority on “details.”
Taken together, President Obama’s strategy to delegate authority to Congress produced mixed results. While his blueprint, like Bush’s, sought to empower Congress, the lack of HHS involvement closed a channel of executive-legislative communication and likely slowed
79 Altman, Power, Politics and Universal Health Care, 9157 (ebook). 80 Matt Kelley, "Gov. Sebelius sized up for health post; Bipartisan reform of care industry would be key task," USA Today, March 2, 2009. 81 James P. Pfiffner, "Organizing the Obama White House," in Obama in Office, ed. James A. Thurber (Boulder, CO: Paradigm Publishers, 2011), 78-80. 35
Congress’s consideration of health reform. Unlike President Bush who, despite some criticisms, involved Education Secretary Rod Paige in important congressional negotiations,82 President
Obama chose a negotiation strategy that may have failed to appreciate the complexity of health policy. And as the next major section of this paper (congressional leadership) will explore, a lack of congressional autonomy on health reform may have endangered bipartisan negotiations.
The Passive Negotiator: Obama Leaves Congress Guessing
While President Obama may have relied heavily on advisers to negotiate the specifics of health reform with congressional and interest-group leaders, he certainly did not remain aloof to negotiations on health reform. By all accounts, in fact, President Obama closely followed the popular debate that began to develop in Congress and the media, taking account of the concerns articulated against reform83. Yet as President Obama listened, deliberations in Congress began to intensify—leaving many Democrats worried about the potential consequences for their re- election. For weeks, they said, Obama had refused to weigh in on important disputes, such as the existence of a public option in the health-reform bill. Much like private-school vouchers for
Bush, lawmakers understood that the White House supported a public option in the abstract; but, many wished to know whether the public option was a non-negotiable point for Obama.84
Rather than engaging legislators on the public option, however, the Obama team grew nervous about the slowness of the deliberative process. Emanuel in particular, who had urged
Obama to adopt a quick-striking, piecemeal approach, began drafting a White House bill in secret, in case Congress stalled for too long.85The plan ultimately did not become public until after PPACA had passed, but as Obama officials drafted it, many Democrats began to grow anxious about the growing popular distaste for the bill. In town hall meetings across the country,
82 NPR News, Morning Edition, National Public Radio, August 3, 2001, hosted by Cheryl Corley, narrated by Claudio Sanchez. 83 Evan Thomas et al., "Learning from LBJ," Newsweek, April 5, 2010. 84 The Staff of the Washington Post, Landmark, 25-26. 85 The Staff of the Washington Post, Landmark, 25-26. 36 angry voters shouted down their representatives and senators, and legislators who supported the bill grew angry at the Administration’s apparent aloofness. How were they supposed to defend a major presidential initiative when they were still unsure about the president’s true positions?86
Finally, in September of 2009, President Obama offered legislators something of an answer on the public option. In a special session of Congress, President Obama announced that while he supported the public option, it was only a “means to an end” and “just one component” of reform. 87 The speech signaled some flexibility on the public option, but lawmakers remained uncertain about the fundamental question at hand: how committed was Obama to the public option? While this apparent flexibility may have attracted some moderate Republicans earlier in the year, after a summer of “death panels” and “socialized medicine,” such a possibility seemed unlikely (particularly when Obama still seemed somewhat committed to the public option).88
In addition to this lack of effect on Republicans (who wondered why the president neglected to put the public option on the table earlier), the speech also fractured Democrats. On the Left, commentators like Paul Krugman already felt betrayed by Obama’s apparent reluctance on a public option.89 In the center, however, Obama’s continued support for a public option threatened support by moderates, such as Senator Joseph Liebermann (I – Conn.). Ultimately,
President Obama’s speech would prove the beginning of stronger and more consistent leadership by Obama on health reform; but, in the short-term, President Obama’s inability to communicate his true convictions about health reform stymied progress on the bill. While counterfactuals typically prove untestable, one must wonder how clear White House stances would have affected negotiations. Just as Bush’s clear position on vouchers made way for bipartisan cooperation on education reform, a clearer position on the public option may have encouraged more productive
86 Ibid, 54. 87 Ceci Connolly Shear, "Obama Implores Congress to Act; In Arguing for a Public Option, He Emphasizes It's 'Only One Part of My Plan,'" Washington Post, September 10, 2009. 88 Jacobs and Skocpol, Health Care Reform and American Politics, 81 89 Paul Krugman, "Obama's Trust Problem," New York Times, August 21, 2009. 37 bipartisan negotiations. Regardless, this much was certain for most of 2009: “[Obama’s] fear of small conflict made a big conflict inevitable.”90
Building Support from the Outside, Inward: The Obama Coalition-Building Strategy
Like Bush in 2001, Obama understood the importance of vote-counting and coalition- building before a vote on a major bill. Indeed, a surprising loss or poor showing on the floor could project weakness on the party and Administration. Thus, as health reform exited mark-up,
Emanuel, DeParle, and congressional leaders had to ensure that reform would receive the votes necessary to pass through both chambers of Congress. Yet unlike Bush in 2001, the Obama team adopted a very different approach to coalition-building: they would build support among their base and make only as many concessions as necessary to centrist, in order to pass the legislation.
Throughout the legislative process, several factors evidenced Obama’s choice of this coalition-building strategy. First, unlike Bush (who met regularly with leaders from both parties),
Obama did not officially meet with Republican leaders from his originally outreach event until a bipartisan summit in March of 2010. Once President Obama did meet with Republicans in 2010, however, participants quickly recognized the event as little more than a publicity stunt: at one point, President Obama went so far as to scold John McCain during the summit, reminding him that “the election’s over.”91 According to Scokpol and Jacobs, President Obama did hear out some ideas during the summit, including an “undercover Medicare fraud agents” idea by Tom
Coburn of Oklahoma.92 However, President Obama’s overall lack of correspondence with even moderate Republicans evidenced his left-to-center approach to coalition-building.
In addition to Obama’s limited contact with Republicans, the various “concessions” made in exchange for centrist votes also evidenced the Obama coalition-building strategy. Unlike
Bush, who encouraged leaders to strike down amendments that pulled too far left or right,
90 Evan Thomas et al., "Learning from LBJ.” 91 Brian Monotopoli, "Obama to McCain: 'The Election's Over,'" CBSNews.com, last modified February 5, 2010, accessed March 9, 2013, http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-503544_162-6242715-503544.html. 92 Jacobs and Skocpol, Health Care Reform and American Politics, 55. 38
Obama watched as congressional leaders granted specific concessions to centrists (the
“Cornhusker Kickback” for Sen. Ben Nelson, the “Louisiana Purchase” for Sen. Mary Landrieu, etc.),93 in order to preserve the heart of the bill. In other words, while Bush used non-policy means to add liberals and conservatives to his coalition, Obama kept liberals mollified with substance and added centrists only as needed. While such a strategy would make sense for a party-line approach presidential leadership of Congress, President Obama’s coalition-building strategy made little sense considering his professed commitment to bipartisanship. Like many of his other strategies and tactics, Obama’s approach to coalition-building ran counter to his hopes for bipartisanship and rendered such cooperation more difficult.
Presidential Leadership of Congress: Final Analysis and Conclusions
Without a doubt, both President Bush and President Obama espoused a hope for bipartisan support for their respective policy initiatives. Yet as they pursued reform, they amassed wildly different records on bipartisanship. While differences in context may account for some of the presidents’ differences in experience, the two also pursued strategies that affected their level of bipartisan success.
For President Bush, education reform began with a fast start and few surprises. His plan closely mirrored past policies and campaign promises. While President Obama largely did likewise, his choice to pursue health reform over job-creation did surprise some. In addition,
Presidents Bush and Obama also chose issue-frames that significantly affected their potential for cooperation with the opposing party. For Bush, “accountability” built upon a growing consensus in Washington and carried enough flexibility to accommodate the various goals of Republicans and Democrats alike. Unlike Bush, President Obama ultimately settled on a “coverage” issue- frame that did accommodate the major health-care concern of Republicans in Congress—cost.
93 Ibid, 58-59. 39
Beyond quick action and framing, Bush and Obama also differed in their delegation of authority to Congress. That is, while Obama tried to emulate Bush’s “blueprint” approach, his plan’s lack of specifics (and his neglect of HHS as a major negotiator) undermined his efforts to empower Congress. Compounding President Obama’s difficulties, he and his team also failed to clearly articulate White House positions on key controversies, such as the public option. Unlike
Bush, who had prodded negotiations along by offer clear flexibility on vouchers, President
Obama floundered on the public option until he eventually announced his flexibility. Finally,
Presidents Bush and Obama each espoused very different approaches in coalition-building. That is, whereas Bush built his coalition from the center, outward, President Obama built his coalition with liberals and reached out to centrists only when necessary.
Taken together, these differences in strategy and tactics contributed significantly to the great differences in bipartisanship between NCLB and PPACA. Though far from providing a complete explanation of this discrepancy, they offer a solid starting point for understanding bipartisanship (or the lack thereof) within the two bills. And while the following sections of this study will further explain the aforementioned discrepancies in bipartisanship, this section plays an especially important role in the overall explanation. After all: NCLB and PPACA both came to Washington as major presidential initiative.
CONTEXT 2: CONGRESSIONAL LEADERSHIP94
The “Big Four” and NCLB
Throughout each stage of No Child Left Behind’s passage, congressional leadership was integral to the initiative’s success. Whether by piecing together a bipartisan coalition, protecting the delicate balance of committee deliberations, or simply pressuring wayward members to support reform, a core of important congressional leaders contributed greatly to the success of education reform. Still, in the course of examining congressional leaders’ contributions to
94 Figure 2 on page 81 provides a brief summary of this section’s findings. 40
NCLB’s bipartisanship, it is also important to not oversell the significance of leaders’ contributions. Indeed, while leaders’ strategies and approaches may have contributed positively to bipartisan success, the legislative atmosphere around education reform also likely contributed to education reform’s bipartisanship. Perhaps most crucially, both major presidential candidates in 2000 had campaigned heavily on education, rendering it a highly salient issue to both parties.95 Moreover, because Democrats had traditionally “owned” education, many leaders decided early on that they would cooperate on education reform, lest they lose ownership/leverage to Republicans.96
Nevertheless, despite these helpful factors, congressional leaders played an integral role in the bipartisan success of NCLB. This section will highlight Congress’s many challenges to bipartisanship throughout NCLB negotiations and analyze the strategies congressional leaders employed to address these challenges.
Building Upon Consensus
As George W. Bush took office in 2001, he entered into a conversation on education that had, at some level, converged on the idea of educational “accountability.” According to education experts Hess and Petrilli, many years of failure on education—failure to close the achievement gap, failure to slow America’s descent in educational world-rankings, etc.—had forced conservatives and liberals alike to rethink their positions on education. Indeed, officials on both sides of the aisle had grown weary of state/local officials consistently asking for more money to “improve” education, even though such investments rarely increased educational outputs. For these reasons, a consensus developed in Washington around education: if the federal government would continue to pour money into education, it should somehow hold schools
95 Adam McLaughlin and Dante Chinni, "In Democratic Party, Stirrings on the Left," Christian Science Monitor, January 5, 2001 96 Ibid. 41 accountable for the funds they received.97
Yet despite this bipartisan template from which congressional leaders could build reform,
Democrats and Republicans agreed considerably less about the actual meaning of accountability.
As highlighted in the previous section on presidential leadership, while conservatives believed
“accountability” meant accountability to parents and community, liberals believed it meant accountability to national standards and educational experts. Thus, as congressional leaders mulled the various aspects of President Bush’s blueprint for reform, they were faced with a fundamental question of strategy: would they focus on the more controversial aspects of Bush’s proposal (i.e. – vouchers), or would they begin negotiations by underscoring areas of consensus?
Beginning as early as January, their decision became quite evident: negotiations would build upon points of agreement. One important manifestation of this choice came in leaders’ discussions of the achievement gap. To be sure, both parties agreed that reform should focus on the achievement gap. But, they agreed far less on the causes of the gap. Of all the explanations for the achievement gap, however, funding levels created the most friction between the parties.
Indeed, while Democrats argued that a lack a funds prohibited poor schools from achieving at a high level, Republicans pointed to years of funding increases as evidence that funding could not explain the achievement gap. Still, rather than focusing on this disagreement first, congressional leaders simply built upon points of agreement: while funding caused friction, all agreed that two popular explanations for the achievement gap, poverty and “school culture,” were no longer valid explanations for gaps in achievement between white and non-white students.98 In accordance with this agreement, congressional leaders began negotiations by focusing standards and testing reforms on the poorest of states and school districts. Rather than adopting lesser goals for students in poor areas, negotiators determined that impoverished school districts would
97 Frederick M. Hess and Michael J. Petrilli, "The Politics of No Child Left Behind: Will the Coalition Hold?," Journal of Education 185, no. 3 (2004). 98 Frederick M. Hess and Michael J. Petrilli, "The Politics of No Child Left Behind: Will the Coalition Hold?," Journal of Education 185, no. 3 (2004). 42 receive the most attention and highest scrutiny on benchmarks, such as yearly testing increases.99
While a seemingly small point of agreement, this early decision by congressional leaders constituted an excellent example of the sort of “trust-building” that Amy Gutmann and Dennis
Thompson discuss in The Spirit of Compromise. According to Gutmann and Thompson, if members of opposing parties wish to build the trust necessary to reach a compromise, they must
“economize disagreement.” In order to do so, one prominent strategy involves what they call
“separating the issues”: focusing first on areas of agreement within a negotiation, and dealing with thornier issues later. On education reform, congressional leaders deftly applied this strategy.
Without a doubt, they could not put off funding questions indefinitely: after all, NCLB was a reauthorization of a previous bill, and both sides would have to eventually agree upon new funding levels for education. Yet, rather than posturing on this contentious issue, congressional leaders focused on a simple point of agreement: that poverty would no longer excuse educational mediocrity, but would provide a context for some of the largest accountability reforms.
While measuring the exact effect of this negotiating tactic would undoubtedly prove difficult (if not impossible), a generally cooperative atmosphere did in fact develop as negotiations began in Congress. Owing at least partially to the non-combativeness of
Republicans, several prominent Democrats announced early on that they would in fact cooperate as much as possible with Republicans, in order to avoid being perceiving as “obstructionist.”100
Thus, at least in part by avoiding contentious issues such as vouchers and funding during early negotiations, congressional leaders were able to further encourage a civil, cooperative atmosphere around education reform. Later on, this atmosphere insulated lawmakers from the most harmful effects of major disagreements.
The Ascension of Principled Compromiser
99 Frederick M. Hess and Michael J. Petrilli, "The Politics of No Child Left Behind: Will the Coalition Hold?," Journal of Education 185, no. 3 (2004). 100 Adam McLaughlin and Dante Chinni, "In Democratic Party, Stirrings on the Left," Christian Science Monitor, January 5, 2001 43
While avoiding contentious issues early on certainly began NCLB negotiations on a positive note, such issues were certainly bound to reappear as deliberations wore on. Thus, to navigate such issues, President Bush needed strong congressional leaders with which to work.
According to Gutmann and Thompson, if President Bush truly wished for bipartisan cooperation, he would need leaders who understood “principled prudence”: leaders with a reputation for both standing on principle and adapting principles when necessary. While a reputation of principle could provide political cover for those who might otherwise be accused of “selling out,” an ability to adapt principles allows a negotiator to determine whether a given compromise is in fact an improvement on the status quo.
In the case of education reform, a brief examination of NCLB’s “Big Four” reveals the clear presence of “principled compromisers” among major congressional leaders. In the House,
Rep. John Boehner fit the description of “principled compromiser” particularly nicely. Since assuming office in 1991, Boehner had solidified his reputation as a rather conservative congressman throughout his years in the House. Most notably, as recent as the late-1990s,
Boehner had openly advocated for the elimination of the Department of Education.101 Yet despite his reputation for principled conservatism, Boehner had also grown accustomed to the political realities of Congress. As he ascended to his chairmanship of the House Committee on Education and the Workforce, Boehner realized that the success of Bush’s education plan depended largely on Republicans’ ability to appease moderate Democrats. Consequently, as his first act as Bush’s main point-person in the House, Boehner urged Bush to reach out to Education Committee
Ranking Member George Miller.102 With years of experience in the House and a strong reputation for civil-rights advocacy, Rep. Miller could both confer real bipartisan legitimacy on
101 Patrick J. McGuinn, No Child Left Behind and the Transformation of Federal Education Policy: 1965-2005 (Lawrence, KS: University Press of Kansas, 2006), 170 102 Martin R. West and Paul E. Peterson, No Child Left Behind?: The Politics and Practice of School Accountability (Washington, DC: Brookings Institution Press, 2003), 39. 44 education reform and offer important advice on coalition-building .103
Miller and Boehner’s principled prudence played out in a number of important ways as education negotiations heated up, perhaps most notably on the issue of block grants for education. According to conservatives in the House, states could not be expected to deliver increased achievement unless they were granted flexibility in the funds they received from
Washington. This position, however, frightened congressional Democrats a great deal: without strict regulations funneling money to the poorest districts in each state, how could Congress be certain that states were earnestly striving to alleviate the achievement gap among impoverished schools? As debate over block grants grew more and more contentious, Boehner quickly offered a compromise position. According to Boehner’s compromise, states and school districts would enjoy “transferability” of federal funds: that is, while most Title I regulations would remain in place for impoverished schools, states and school districts could now transfer funds from one
Title I program to aid in the implementation of another Title I program. Naturally, this compromise felt less-than-satisfying to states-rights conservatives. However, largely because of his conservative credentials on education, Boehner successfully mollified conservatives in private on the compromise, allowing the bill to successfully reach the floor.104
As Boehner crafted compromises on issues such as block grants, however, Miller also played an important role in securing bipartisanship—particularly in convincing Democrats to cooperate with Bush on education in the first place. As a life-long civil-rights advocate, Miller understood the importance of the minority vote to the Democratic Party. Since the 1960s, blacks and Latinos especially had become an important segment of the Democratic voting coalition. Yet on the issue of education, however, many Black and Latino had grown increasingly restless. If
President Bush began to encroach on Democrats’ ownership of education, would Republicans
103 Jesse H. Rhodes, An Education in Politics: The Origins and Evolution of No Child Left Behind (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 2012), 150. 104 Martin R. West and Paul E. Peterson, No Child Left Behind?: The Politics and Practice of School Accountability (Washington, DC: Brookings Institution Press, 2003), 39. 45 begin to capture a larger share of the minority vote?105 For his part, Rep. Miller did not want to wait to find out: as soon as President Bush reached out to him, he penned a very positive column highlighting his many agreements with Bush—and tacitly admonishing other Democrats to join reform efforts. Thus, in addition to his constant collaboration with Boehner and Bush, Miller proved to be an asset to education by signaling to other Democrats that compromise was both
“safe” (they could compromise without fear of attacks from the left) and necessary for the future success of the Democratic Party.
Education reform did not just benefit from principled compromisers in the House, however. Indeed, two congressional leaders in the Senate —Ted Kennedy and Judd Gregg— would prove incredibly valuable in Congress’ upper house. On the Republican side, Judd Gregg offered Bush a trusted ally on the Senate Health, Education, and Labor Committee. The former governor of New Hampshire, Gregg possessed solid credibility with conservatives who valued states’ autonomy on the issue of education. Likewise, on the Democratic side, Ted Kennedy, the long-time Senator from Massachusetts, offered Bush both a legacy of principled liberalism on education, as well as a set of well-polished deal-making skills.106 Together, Gregg and Kennedy helped navigate education reform through the twists and turns of Senate deliberations.
No other episode better illustrates the value of Gregg and Kennedy’s principled prudence than the Senate’s negotiations on AYP or “annual yearly progress.” As part of Bush’s push for school accountability, schools across America would have to pass certain criteria, to be labeled a
“passing” school. If schools failed to meet these criteria—“AYP”—they faced a number of punishments, including a state takeover of the school. Naturally, negotiations over the AYP formula proved quite contentious in the Senate. On one hand, educational liberals worried that hopelessly high standards would doom many of America’s schools to “failure” and place undue
105 Patrick J. McGuinn, No Child Left Behind and the Transformation of Federal Education Policy: 1965-2005 (Lawrence, KS: University Press of Kansas, 2006), 170-171. 106 Jesse H. Rhodes, An Education in Politics: The Origins and Evolution of No Child Left Behind (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 2012), 150. 46 pressure on teachers. On the other hand, however, Republicans argued that lax standards would undermine the president’s entire accountability initiative.
How could the Senate possibly negotiate this contentious issue? The answer: rather messily. After weeks of intense deliberation, the Senate finally agreed on an extremely convoluted AYP formula that pleased neither side completely. Almost immediately, pundits and education experts derided the language as entirely unworkable and argued that such complex language completely undermined the entire goal of accountability. However, understanding the delicacy of Senate deliberations (according to some reports, the coalition had nearly broken up during the AYP debate),107 Gregg and Kennedy vigorously defended the Senate’s compromise.
Indeed, while the language did not satisfy either side’s preferences particularly well, Gregg,
Bush, and Kennedy convinced Senators to hold their noses and support the language—at least until House-Senate conferees could untangle some of the most egregious inconsistencies.108 In the end, the Senate successfully passed the AYP formula, keeping education reform on schedule.
Gregg and Kennedy had not merely kept education reform on schedule, however; they had ensured that Congress would not quit on reform, simply because of a language hang-up.
In both the case of Boehner’s “transferability” compromise and the Senate AYP compromise, the “Big Four” displayed a vital understanding of the true meaning of principled prudence. To be certain, neither compromise matched the principles of either side particularly well, yet according to Gutmann and Thompson, the best “principled compromisers” recognize this fact as an essential element of a successful compromise. Indeed, no matter how messy a particular agreement becomes, principled compromisers can best determine whether a given compromise improves upon the status quo. Thus, no matter how convoluted education negotiations became, congressional leaders were able to convince vacillating partisans to remain
107 Frederick M. Hess and Michael J. Petrilli, "The Politics of No Child Left Behind: Will the Coalition Hold?," Journal of Education 185, no. 3 (2004). 108 Martin R. West and Paul E. Peterson, No Child Left Behind?: The Politics and Practice of School Accountability (Washington, DC: Brookings Institution Press, 2003), 276. 47 steadfast in their support of the bipartisan initiative.
A Winning Organizational Strategy: Utilizing an “Informal” Committee System
As NCLB negotiations continued into the summer of 2001, the Bush Administration and congressional leaders encountered a problem that threatened to stymie the entire education reform effort: the traditional committee system within the Senate. For years, Senators had earned chairmanships through seniority—a practice that often benefited reform (through the chair’s experience, knowledge, etc.) in the past. In the case of education reform, however, the seniority rule had placed a leader atop the Senate HELP Committee—Sen. James Jeffords (R – Vt.)—with whom the Bush Administration worried it could not craft a satisfactory bill. For months, Sen.
Jeffords had advocated for special education reauthorization (the so-called “IDEA Bill”) to become part of Bush’s education reform efforts. But despite Jeffords’ passionate advocacy for special education reform, President Bush remained just as steadfastly opposed: education reform would focus on global competitiveness and closing the achievement gap—special education reform constituted another issue entirely. For this and other reasons, Bush’s legislative team began searching for ways to avoid a standstill with the moderate from Vermont.109
After some discussion, Bush and some leaders in the Senate devised a clever organizational strategy: they would bypass the HELP Committee entirely by devising an informal “ESEA Reauthorization Committee” of roughly 10 Senators to negotiate legislation.
This approach ultimately benefited reform in a variety of ways, but the most prominent effect was that the Bush team (and their allies in Congress) could handpick members to the committee.
Rather than dealing with Jeffords, then, Bush and his team elevated Senator Judd Gregg as the main Republican leader in the Senate. Besides his skills as a principled compromiser (noted in the previous section), Gregg also agreed more with the Bush Administration’s positions on
109 Christopher R. Cross, Political Education: National Policy Comes of Age (New York, NY: Teachers College Press, 2004), 131. 48 education than did Jeffords, allowing him to devote more time to lobbying fellow members in committee. In the end, when the HELP Committee and the informal ESEA committee passed separate bills, Gregg’s unique position as a “committee leader” and well-respected conservative allowed him to deliver key support for Bush’s language from Republicans such as Susan Collins,
Bill Frist, and Tim Hutchinson.110 Moreover, as Jeffords eventually switched parties in the midst of education negotiations in 2001 (tipping the Senate majority to Democrats), Gregg’s leadership within the informal committee system also successfully insulated negotiations from this rather abrupt change in the Senate.111
Besides moving Gregg to a greater leadership role in the Senate, however, the informal committee system also promoted bipartisanship by enabling Bush and Gregg to better appeal to
New Democrats. To be sure, Bush’s coalition-building strategy hinged largely on his ability to appeal to New Democrats, and the president clearly demonstrated his commitment to that outreach by hiring Sandy Kress—a New Democrat himself—as his lead legislative negotiator.112
Still, within the traditional committee system, Bush and Kress encountered significant obstacles in their outreach to New Democrats. In specific, while Bush, Kress, and Gregg hoped to focus on particularly influential New Democrats in their negotiations, the traditional committee system often complicated their ability to do so. The informal committee system, however, alleviated such issues. Not only could Gregg and Kress focus on members most likely to create a winning coalition, but they were able to better highlight the contributions of two particularly crucial senators: Evan Bayh and Joe Lieberman.113 As two of the most respected New Democrats in the
Senate, Bayh and Lieberman were seen as critical to not only a winning coalition ,but to additional Democratic outreach as well. The informal committee system allowed Bush and
110 Siobhan Gorman, "Education's Bipartisan Bargaining," The National Journal, March 3, 2001. 111 Christopher T. Cross, Political Eduation: National Policy Comes of Age (New York: Teachers College Press, 2004), 138. 112 Cross, Political Eduation: National Policy, 128. 113 Siobhan Gorman, "Education's Bipartisan Bargaining," The National Journal, March 3, 2001. 49
Gregg to negotiate directly with Bayh and Lieberman, and the final legislation ultimately incorporated many aspects of the Senators’ “3 R’s” proposal for education.114 Moreover, as Ted
Kennedy witnessed the informal committee steaming forward with reform, he too determined he would join negotiations. Thus, largely because of the informal-committee approach by Bush,
Kress, and Gregg, the reform effort had successfully drawn New Democrats into negotiations and broadened the NCLB coalition at the same time.115 When combined with the leadership of principled compromisers in Congress, this organizational strategy likely helped reformers achieve bipartisanship on NCLB.
Congressional Leadership and PPACA
Much like NCLB, congressional leadership played a vital role in the passage of PPACA.
Indeed, by many accounts, health reform would have never passed without Nancy Pelosi’s remarkable vote-counting abilities or Max Baucus’s negotiating successes with special interests, for instance. Yet despite the importance of congressional leadership to PPACA’s passage, the strategic choices of congressional leaders also contributed to the polarization of health reform.
This section will examine these strategic choices and their consequences. And while it will not claim that changes in such strategies would have necessarily resulted in widespread bipartisan cooperation, this section will strive to identify missed opportunities for promoting bipartisanship throughout PPACA’s path through Congress.
Bypassing Consensus: Congress’s Fixation on the Public Option
In many ways, health reform faced a much steeper path to bipartisanship than did Bush’s education reform ten years earlier. Indeed, unlike education, no real consensus had developed around health reform as Obama took office in 2009. However, while health reform lacked an obvious starting point like, for example, “accountability,” a few points of agreement had arisen
114 Ibid. 115 Christopher T. Cross, Political Eduation: National Policy Comes of Age (New York: Teachers College Press, 2004), 132. 50 between the two parties—particularly among moderates.
Most prominently, moderates in both parties seemed to agree that reformers should not view comprehensive health reform as the only path to success. Indeed, because of the complex nature of reform, moderates both within and outside of Congress advocated for a piecemeal approach to reform.116 Such an approach could benefit reform in a number of ways, they argued.
First, from the perspective of potential bipartisan negotiators like Chuck Grassley and Joe
Lieberman, a piecemeal approach would allow interested members to highlight points of agreement early on. Rather than fixating on contentious issues such as the public option, lawmakers could build trust by passing less contentious provisions first.117118 Beyond attracting moderates to the table, however, other officials also argued that a piecemeal approach made for better politics. Rather than stake the Administration’s reputation on a long, drawn-out, and increasingly unpopular comprehensive initiative, Democrats should (in the words of Rahm
Emanuel) strive to “get some points on the board.” In other words, if Democrats could deliver on some of his campaign promises quickly at first, then they would not suffer as greatly for not delivering on other aspects of reform later.119 Still, despite calls by officials and politicians like
Grassley and Emanuel, Obama insisted that he must deliver comprehensive health reform.
Whether a piecemeal approach would have indeed delivered bipartisanship remains to be seen, of course. However, by choosing against such an approach, Obama and congressional leaders in the House and Senate missed an opportunity to build on a sort of agreement between the parties (or, at least, parts of the parties).
PPACA and Principled Prudence: A Dearth of “Principled Compromisers”
116 Theda Skocpol and Lawrence Jacobs, American Politics and Health Care Reform: What Everyone Needs To Know (New York: Oxford University Press, 2010), 14, 63. 117 Stuart Altman and David Shactman, Power, Politics, and Universal Health Care: The Inside Story of a Century- Long Battle (Amherst, NY: Prometheus Books, 2011). 118 Skocpol and Jacobs, American Politics and Health Care Reform, 13. 119 The Staff of the Washington Post, Landmark: The Inside Story of America's New Health Care Law and What It Means for Us All (New York: PublicAffairs, 2010), 22. 51
Just as health reform lacked the sort of pre-existing consensus that education reform had enjoyed, health reform also suffered from a lack of cooperative leadership from some in the
Republican Party. Indeed, far from the supportive op-eds and press conferences held by
Democratic leaders in the early stages of education reform, several Republican leaders in 2009 openly advocated against cooperation with Obama on health reform. Perhaps most prominently,
Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell and conservative Senator Jim DeMint argued that
Obama would automatically receive credit for any bipartisan cooperation on health reform, and that Republicans should instead turn the issue into Obama’s “Waterloo.”120 Clearly then, from the outset, health reform faced greater difficulties in finding principled compromisers than had education reform—there simply were few members of Congress willing to contradict the strategic choices of others in their party.
Nevertheless, top Democrats did miss several opportunities to locate such principled compromisers—both within their own party, and in the GOP. Perhaps most interestingly, beginning in early 2009, a coalition of about 12 Republicans and Democrats had begun to form in the Senate. The group received little press, though they had convened in 2009 because of previous cooperation in 2007. Rather than simply advocating for bipartisanship, however, this group of Senators demonstrated very quickly their serious commitment to passing truly bipartisan health legislation: as Baucus’ “gang of six” talks broke down in the summer of 2009, this bipartisan group introduced complete legislation, cosponsored by Senators Bob Bennett (R –
Utah) and Ron Wyden (D – Ore.). Among the bill’s supporters were progressives such as Debbie
Stabenow (D – Mich.), moderates such as Joe Lieberman (I – Conn.) and Ben Nelson (D – Neb.), and conservatives such as Mike Crapo (R – Idaho) and Judd Gregg (R – N. H.).121
Yet despite this large, very serious coalition of Senators, few reports to date indicate that
120 Theda Skocpol and Lawrence Jacobs, American Politics and Health Care Reform: What Everyone Needs To Know (New York: Oxford University Press, 2010), 86. 121 Jeffrey Young, "Grassley Plots Backup Healthcare Plan," The Hill, May 6, 2009. 52 anyone within the Democratic leadership reached out to this coalition. Indeed, instead of contacting and working with this group, neither Obama nor Harry Reid nor Max Baucus brought a single member into negotiations in the Senate’s HELP committee or “gang of six.” To be sure, one cannot possibly determine whether working with this group would have actually increased bipartisanship in the Senate. However, given the contentiousness of health- reform politics in
2009, one could reasonably conclude that at least some outreach to these senators may have benefited reform and Obama’s espoused goal of bipartisanship.
Still, if health reform missed such opportunities to drawn in principled compromisers, what kinds of leaders did eventually arise to guide health reform through Congress? Unlike with education reform, floor leaders like Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid played an integral role in PPACA’s passage. And though both leaders displayed enough flexibility to make major concessions (such as abortion restrictions and removal of the public option), they were lacking in the sort of principled prudence illustrated by John Boehner and Ted Kennedy on NCLB.
Consider first Nancy Pelosi. Speaker Pelosi has widely been credited for her incredible vote-counting abilities—and rightly so. Despite major divisions in the Democratic caucus over abortion rights and the public option, Speaker Pelosi delivered a comprehensive health reform bill in a relatively short amount of time. Yet, when it came to Republican outreach, Speaker
Pelosi fell woefully short. Indeed, throughout the hearing and bill-writing process, few
Republicans arose as major contributors to reform. Of course, this could have resulted from pure intransigence from Republicans—perhaps none were interested in contributing. However, in the many books, articles, and journals published on the politics of ACA, little evidence suggests that
Pelosi ever considered the “bottom line” of Republicans on healthcare in the way that Boehner did with Democrats on education. Instead, Pelosi openly contradicted her own majority leader,
Steny Hoyer, when he suggested that liberals should consider removing the public option, in order to broaden their coalition. Pelosi stridently opposed such a removal, claiming that she 53 could not sell progressives on the idea.122 Yet while PPACA ultimately did not include a public option, several health-policy experts have agreed that progressives’ unwavering dedication to a public option almost assuredly contributed to the health-reform polarization.123 Perhaps if Pelosi would have stood with Hoyer on the public option, some polarization could have been avoided.
Pelosi understood well the “principled” half of “principled prudence,” but she may have lacked the kind of “prudence” required to woo already-suspicious House Republicans.
In the Senate, Democrats suffered from a similar lack of principled prudence. Consider the leadership of Max Baucus in the all-important Senate Finance Committee. Given Harry
Reid’s preference for delegating power to committee chairs, Baucus’s leadership in the Senate became increasingly important as health reform reached the Senate. For years, Baucus had become known for his radically moderate political ideology. Oftentimes, his willingness to work with Republicans (particularly his friend Chuck Grassley) even angered leaders with his own party. Nevertheless, Democrats in the White House and Congress counted on Baucus to build a winning coalition within the Senate Finance Committee.
Baucus proceeded in this task by assembling the “gang of six,” a bipartisan group of
Senators (to be discussed at greater length in the following subsection), to craft a compromise on health reform. The “gang” would strive to develop some bipartisan consensus on health reform, in hopes of parlaying that consensus into broader support of health reform. However, as the group’s negotiations wore on into the summer, members of both parties grew increasingly restless. On the Left, White House officials and members of Congress alike doubted Baucus’s ability to draft a satisfactory bill in a reasonable amount of time, particularly given his extremely moderate record. Likewise, on the Right, Republicans worried that Grassley would capitulate too much to his close friend Baucus, and Obama would receive credit for any bipartisan cooperation
122 Staff of Lincoln Star Journal, "Now Do Health Reform the Right Way," Lincoln Star Journal (Nebraska), January 21, 2010. 123 Stuart Altman and David Shactman, Power, Politics, and Universal Health Care: The Inside Story of a Century- Long Battle (Amherst, NY: Prometheus Books, 2011). 54 on health reform.124 For these reasons, people like Rahm Emanuel, Mitch McConnell, and Jim
DeMint pressured the gang of six to cease their meetings. Ultimately, the pressure grew too strong and talks broke down. While Baucus may have possessed experience in coalition building and health policy in the past, he nonetheless lacked one essential element of “principled prudence”: clear ideological principles. Had Baucus been recognized on the Left as a real leader of progressive reform, more Democrats may have supported his quest for bipartisanship. Unlike
Pelosi, Baucus excelled in compromise and “prudence;” but, without a reputation of “principle,” he offered little credibility and political cover for liberals interested in bipartisanship.
In many ways, health reform’s lack of principled compromisers was not the fault of congressional and executive-branch leaders and strategists. Indeed, perhaps the two best principled compromisers around on health reform, Tom Daschle and Ted Kennedy, were unable to promote PPACA as major players. Still, because of a lack of “principled prudence” from health-reform’s leadership, PPACA struggled to gain bipartisan support. Whether through their lack of deal-making skill or credibility with ideologues in both parties, PPACA leaders failed to reach Gutmann and Thompson’s ideal of principled prudence.
The Informal Committee System and the “Gang of Six
Like education reform, the final important factor that influenced bipartisanship on health reform involved congressional organization. To be sure, PPACA relied more upon the traditional committee system than NCLB had in 2001: in the House, Nancy Pelosi pieced together legislation from three committees, and in the Senate, two committees drafted versions of a health-reform bill.125 However, like Judd Gregg’s informal ESEA committee in 2001, Max
Baucus also convened a “gang of six” senators in early 2009, in order to negotiate a bipartisan compromise on health reform. Composed of Senate Finance committee members, the committee
124 Theda Skocpol and Lawrence Jacobs, American Politics and Health Care Reform: What Everyone Needs To Know (New York: Oxford University Press, 2010), 87. 125 Jonathan Oberlander, "Long Time Coming: Why Health Reform Finally Passed," Health Affairs 29, no. 6 (June 2010): 1115. 55 included mostly moderates, such as Olympia Snowe (R – Maine). Of the members, however,
Baucus and his close friend Chuck Grassley were seen as most crucial to reaching a bipartisan agreement. True to this expectation, the two met one-on-one over three-dozen times in the spring and summer of 2009, trying desperately to reach an agreement.126
Ultimately, however, the “gang of six” failed to produce a bipartisan agreement. Why did this informal committee approach fail to promote bipartisanship as it had for NCLB? Several factors offer a potential explanation for the “gang of six’s” failure to reach an agreement. First, as noted above, the group lacked truly conservative and liberal voices. On the Republican side,
Mike Enzi (R – Wyo.) offered the most conservative voice, yet he made clear that would not support reform without the support of at least 70-80 senators—a nearly impossible task.127
Likewise, on the Democratic side, Senator Bingaman (D – N. M.) brought the most liberal voice to negotiations—not a Senator known for his deal-making abilities, much less on health care.128
When combined with consistent pressure from Republican leaders to avoid cooperation with
Baucus, this lack of conservative and liberal involvement stymied the group’s progress.
In addition to these factors, however, another factor—the complexity of health reform, in relation to education reform—seemed to cause problems for the gang of six. As negotiations proceeded, Chuck Grassley articulated one point on which he would not compromise: the language he agreed to in the gang-of-six meetings would have to remain in the final Senate health-reform language, in order for him to support the bill. On a complex issue like health reform, such a demand seemed impossible. Aside from the gang of six, five other committees in the House and Senate would submit health legislation as well. Given the electoral gains by
Democrats in 2008, few on the Left wanted to cede so much influence to a Republican from
126 Theda Skocpol and Lawrence Jacobs, American Politics and Health Care Reform: What Everyone Needs To Know (New York: Oxford University Press, 2010), 84. 127 Stuart Altman and David Shactman, Power, Politics, and Universal Health Care: The Inside Story of a Century- Long Battle (Amherst, NY: Prometheus Books, 2011). 128 Ibid. 56
Iowa. Grassley’s requests, then, rendered compromise even more difficult for the gang of six.
When combined with Grassley’s already-present disaffection with Democrats (after they used reconciliation to pass the stimulus package earlier in the year),129 this request likely contributed to the gang of six’s failure to secure bipartisanship.
Congressional Leadership: Summary and Conclusions
Much like presidential leadership of Congress, congressional leadership played an important role in the passage of both NCLB and PPACA. However, while strong congressional leadership may have allowed both bills to pass through Congress, congressional leaders encountered considerably more difficulty securing bipartisan support for PPACA than NCLB.
To begin, NCLB congressional leaders made a clear decision to build upon points of consensus on education. Rather than focusing on contentious issues such as vouchers and funding first, congressional leaders keyed in on less controversial aspects of reform. With regard to PPACA, however, congressional leaders chose not to pursue what little consensus had developed around health reform. Instead, by choosing against a more incremental approach,
Democrats in Congress limited their ability to build any trust and rapport with congressional
Republicans. When combined with Republican floor leaders’ efforts to undermine bipartisanship, this inability to capitalize on consensus harmed PPACA’s chances for bipartisan support.
In addition to building on consensus, another congressional-leadership factor—the leadership of principled-compromisers—also affect the partisanship and bipartisanship of
PPACA and NCLB. As NCLB negotiations proceeded in 2001, leaders with a clear sense of
“principled prudence” rose up as leaders of NCLB negotiations. Throughout the negotiation process, they kept reform efforts moving forward, despite the less-than-perfect compromises that resulted in the House and Senate. Conversely, during PPACA negotiations, principled compromisers did not arise as the major leaders of reform. Of the leaders who did arise, they
129 Jeffrey Young, "Grassley Plots Backup Healthcare Plan," The Hill, May 6, 2009. 57 lacked essential qualities of principled prudence and were not able to promote bipartisanship.
Finally, while both NCLB and PPACA negotiators attempted to utilize an informal organization structure to promote bipartisanship, NCLB negotiators encountered far more bipartisan success. In the case of NCLB, allowing key negotiators like Judd Gregg to appeal to
Republicans and New Democrats alike kept Bush’s education initiative on schedule. Baucus and the “gang of six” experienced far less success with health reform, however. Indeed, for reasons ranging from a lack of conservatives/liberals to the complexity of health reform itself, the gang of six failed to reach a bipartisan agreement.
To be sure, one cannot not honestly attribute the bipartisanship of NCLB (or the partisanship of PPACA) to leadership choices by members of Congress alone. In addition to the contributions of the president and interest groups (both addressed in this study), the political and historical atmosphere surrounding the two initiatives determined a great deal for each bill’s fate.
Still, while the legislative atmosphere may have partially contributed to the bipartisan success of
NCLB (and partisanship of PPACA), the strategic choices and approaches of congressional leaders would seem to have played a definite role in ensuring the bipartisan passage of education reform. One may never know whether changes in such strategies could have encouraged more bipartisanship on PPACA, of course; but, such strategic changes may have at least helped to increases the chances for bipartisanship.
CONTEXT 3: SPECIAL INTERESTS130
NCLB and Interest Group Influence
Thus far, this study has attempted to explain the disparity in bipartisan cooperation between NCLB and ACA through two pertinent lenses: presidential and congressional leadership. Without a doubt, these perspectives highlight important strategic steps and missteps
130 Figure 3 on page 82 provides a brief summary of this section’s findings. 58 taken by various leaders, as well as conditions (both created and pre-existing) that encouraged and discouraged bipartisan cooperation. Still, despite these findings, this study has yet to address a final, vital aspect of both NCLB’s and PPACA’s passage: the influence of interest groups.
Indeed, from informal summits and preliminary hearings to coalition-building, interest groups greatly affected both the passage and bipartisanship of NCLB and PPACA.
In the case of NCLB, interest groups proved incredibly influential long before education reform ever became the top issue of the 2000 presidential election. That is, since the passage of
ESEA during the Johnson Administration, education garnered a reputation as a policy field full of land mines and swarming with interests. For years, a “strange bedfellows” alliance between states’ rights advocates and teachers’ unions fought to preserve the status quo in education—a nearly impenetrable left-right coalition that engulfed any policymaker interested in rocking the education boat.131 However, beginning with the publication of A Nation at Risk in the 1980s, a new interest-group dynamic began to develop around education reform. In particular, a new educational interest, the business community, grew more interested in education policy. Worried about America’s global competitiveness in future decades, the business community echoed popular concerns in America about the educational status quo.132 Eventually, this concern culminated in a growing consensus within the business community: America needed some sort of national standards and accountability in education.133
Perhaps most crucially for NCLB, this business-community consensus gradually softened
Republicans’ opposition to federal involvement in education and provided members political cover to support national accountability measures.134 President Bush, largely a product of this
131 Patrick McGuinn, "Breaking Open the Iron Triangle— Interest Groups, Public Opinion, and Federal Education Policy" (paper presented at Northeastern Political Science Association Meeting, Philadelphia, PA, November 7, 2003), 5. 132 McGuinn, "Breaking Open the Iron," 12-15. 133 Jesse H. Rhodes, An Education in Politics: The Origins and Evolution of No Child Left Behind (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 2012), 134. 134 Ibid, 135. 59 business-community movement, served as the embodiment of the new education-politics dynamic: he was a businessman who earnestly believed in the social and economic importance of a fully accountable education system. But besides altering the left-right divide on education, interest groups vastly affected the bipartisan success of NCLB. This section will examine that influence: given education’s new interest-group dynamics, how did leaders (in the White House,
Congress, and interest groups) parlay changes in interest-group politics into bipartisan success on education reform?
Business Savvy and Civil Rights: NCLB’s Unorthodox Interest-Group Coalition
Clearly, the gradual emergence of the business community in education politics greatly shaped education reform and NCLB. But how exactly did this change encourage bipartisanship?
Simply put, the involvement of the business community encouraged Republicans to adapt their principles and pursue a traditionally Democratic issue: education. As noted above, states’ rights advocates had long succeeded in limiting the federal government’s role in education. And, given such advocates’ strong identification with the Republican Party, few perceived education as
“Republican” issue—after all, many Republicans advocated the abolition of the Department of
Education altogether. This perception changed, however, with the election of President Bush.
Even before President Bush took office in 2001, his transition team began meetings with leaders of the business community on education. Fresh off a somewhat pyrrhic victory on the
Improving America’s Schools Act, business leaders were especially anxious to achieve a more substantive victory on education, and Bush seemed the perfect political actor for doing so.135
With views that closely reflected those of the business community,136 Bush provided business leaders with an educational vision they could trust. More importantly, however, with such considerable agreement between a long-time conservative interest and a demonstrably
135 Rhodes, An Education in Politics, 146. 136 Ibid, 148. 60 conservative political leader, the business-White House alliance offered reform a battle-ready political force with impeccable conservative credentials. Could Republicans—states’ rights advocates or otherwise—really resist such a confluence of conservative powerhouses?
In short, most Republicans could not resist this alliance. First and foremost, as
House/Senate committees released drafts of their education bills, Sandy Kress coordinated a specially tailored legislative blitz with BCEE and the Business Round Table, in order to garner congressional support for the bills.137 Utilizing appeals centered on “economic competitiveness,”
BCEE and GOP leaders sought to convince the party’s many fiscal conservatives. And convince they did. According to Margaret Spellings, “the business community [was] huge ally in the development, implementation, and support for NCLB.”138
The Bush-business alliance proved so effective, in fact, that it even convinced stubborn conservatives to vote for provisions with which they disagreed. Perhaps most crucially, the
BCEE pre-empted a poisonous House amendment that would have removed mandatory testing from NCLB. Even before the amendment reached the floor, BCEE lobbied members to vote against the amendment, which could have irreparably damaged negotiations.139 Ultimately, the amendment failed, due in part to crucial votes by Republican legislators. In a now-famous quote,
Republican congressman Mark Souder (Indiana) deftly summarized the power and persuasion of the Bush-business alliance: “The president wanted a bipartisan bill on both sides. While I respect that, […] that doesn’t mean we like it.”140
Clearly, with its over 200+ correspondences with members of Congress, the business community helped to keep Republicans united around Bush’s reform efforts. However, it was not the only “principled” interest that contributed to NCLB’s bipartisan success. Most vitally, the
137 Ibid, 153. 138 Rhodes, An Education in Politics, 153. 139 Patrick McGuinn, No Child Left Behind and the Transformation of Federal Education Policy, 1965-2005 (Lawrence, KS: University Press of Kansas, 2006), 174. 140 Ibid, 175. 61 business community joined with a somewhat unorthodox ally to lobby for reform: civil-rights advocates. Like the business community, civil-rights advocates had grown weary of the educational status quo in America. For decades, achievement gaps persisted between white and non-white students, and state and local officials had done little to substantially address the problem. Thus, as evidence mounted that the status quo was not benefitting the minority community, civil rights groups began to agitate for federal reform.141
Perceiving this sentiment among civil rights leaders, Bush had tailored much of his education message to civil-rights minded voters and activists during the 2000 election. Vowing to combat the “soft bigotry” of low standards, Bush pointed to the shrinking achievement gap in
Texas as one of the pole stars of his federal reform efforts. Naturally, civil-rights advocates were drawn to this sort of language—should it really matter which party supported reform, so long as it promoted greater social justice? As a result of Bush’s language on education reform, civil- rights groups such as the Education Trust and Citizens’ Commission on Civil Rights came out in support of reform efforts early on.142
Why did the support of civil rights groups matter so greatly? Much like the business community had done for Republicans in Congress, the civil rights community kept nearly all interested Democrats at the negotiating table throughout reform.143 As noted earlier, one pertinent Democratic leader—George Miller—may have never joined the reform effort, had it not been for the demonstrable shift in minority opinion on education reform. Due in large part to pressure by civil rights groups Democrats chose to support education reform, despite the strident opposition of traditional Democratic supporters like teachers unions. Civil-rights groups had provided reason for Democrats to join the effort—and the political cover necessary to do so.144
In conclusion, the advocacy of “credible” interest groups on both sides of the political
141 Rhodes, An Education in Politics, 142. 142 McGuinn, No Child Left Behind and the Transformation, 171. 143 Rhodes, An Education in Politics, 150-151. 144 McGuinn, No child Left Behind and the Transformation, 172. 62 spectrum enabled reform leaders to assemble a reliable bipartisan coalition on education. On the
Right, the business community aided conservatives in their acceptance of a federal role for education and protected reform from the most radical reform proposals. Similarly, on the Left, civil rights groups encouraged consistent participation by Democrats, while providing political cover against angry teachers’ unions. Taken together, the cooperation of these credibly
“conservative” and “liberal” interests allowed reform to proceed in the most inclusive fashion, avoiding various “poison pills” along the way. Much as Congress’s “principled compromisers” had done throughout the negotiating process, business and civil-rights groups gave members of both parties yet another reason to join bipartisan negotiations.
Navigating Congress’s Relations with Interest Groups
Clearly, Bush and his closest allies were able to capitalize on the support of both conservative and liberal interest groups. However, in doing so, they also ran an important risk.
That is, as will be discussed in the following section on interest groups and PPACA, by centralizing interest-group negotiations in private White House meetings, Bush could have easily alienated congressional leaders. Not only would such a lack of consultation with Congress communicate a little respect for Congress and individual members, but it could have called into doubt (at least the from members’ perspective) the sincerity of the congressional consultations that had already occurred. Consequently, as Bush and Kress planned strategy with special- interest leaders, they had to delicately avoid such alienation.
How did Bush avoid this sort of alienation? Most fundamentally, unlike the Obama
Administration, Bush and Kress did not make binding, substantive agreements with special interests behind closed doors. Rather, largely because of his already-existing agreements with the business community especially, Bush focused on legislative strategy in his private dealings with interest groups. Quite contrary to disrespecting Congress’s usual relations with interest groups, this strategy allowed Congress to communicate with usual interests on education, even allowing 63 them to strike deals with interests who would eventually oppose reform. On one occasion, congressional Democrats even turned to teachers’ unions to aid in their opposition to the school- vouchers portion of Bush’s plan.145 At the same time, however, this approach allowed Bush ample control in interest-group negotiations on education reform. Indeed, not only did Bush’s team negotiate strategy with interest groups in the White House, but they also authorized concessions to interest groups in congressional meetings. Short of reaching such deals in private
White House meetings, the Bush team largely avoided alienating members of Congress—while at the same time maintaining some control over interest-group negotiations.146
In addition to respecting Congress’s interactions with interest groups, however, Bush’s approach may have actually allowed the reform effort to reach a wider range of interests. Indeed, as George Miller and Ted Kennedy entered the education-reform conversation, they provided
Bush with deep connections to civil-rights activists. While such groups’ support may have proven inevitable given the substance of Bush’s message, the initiative’s connection to civil- rights activists was undoubtedly strengthened by the negotiating authority granted to long-time civil rights champions Miller and Kennedy. Thus, by avoiding an over-centralization of special- interest outreach in the White House, Bush and his team avoided alienating Congress and reinforced relations with an important portion of the reform coalition.
The “Silent” Strategy: Avoiding Explosive Controversy
Besides co-opting the support of interest groups sympathetic to reform, reform leaders in both the White House and Congress also adopted a very specific, effective tactic to address interests hostile reform: secrecy. That is, as negotiations entered particularly delicate stages, negotiators took extreme care to shield such talks from interests who had expressed even modest doubts about the reform effort.
145 Rhodes, An Education in Politics, 146. 146 Christopher T. Cross, Political Eduation: National Policy Comes of Age (New York: Teachers College Press, 2004), 127. 64
Perhaps no set of negotiations better exemplified the importance of the “silent” strategy than those surrounding the issue of Adequate Yearly Progress. As House and Senate leaders conferred on education reform, they realized that AYP would prove a particularly sticky issue (as discussed in the congressional leadership section). Thus, to address AYP, congressional leaders deliberately adopted a negotiations strategy that would protect deliberations from further polarization by opposing interests. First and foremost, leaders chose to postpone AYP discussions to the very end of conference discussions. Indeed, with a bevy of issues lined up ahead of AYP, interests could perhaps become distracted from their strong feelings on AYP.147
In addition to this delay, however, negotiators also took a vow of silence on AYP-related discussions. Rather than arm opponents with ammunition against reform, negotiators would agree to a compromise first—before interest groups could polarize negotiations. Throughout the process, negotiators were remarkably disciplined in their pledge to secrecy. And, while negotiators shielded deliberations from the most obvious of opponents (such as teachers’ unions, for example),148 they also chose not to involve interests whose support had wavered during the legislative process. Perhaps most notably, congressional leaders shut state-government organizations such as the National Governors Association out of conference deliberations on
AYP.149 With such disciplined secrecy, negotiators maintained a civil, moderate discussion on
AYP, free of polarizing interests and their public-opinion campaigning.
Leaders’ silent strategy extended beyond AYP-related negotiations, of course. On the issue of vouchers, for example, Bush and his congressional allies called the bluff of religious conservatives at organizations like the Family Research Council when the White House
147 Martin R. West and Paul E. Peterson, No Child Left Behind?:The Politics and Practice of School Accountability (Washington, DC: Brookings Institution Press, 2003), 68. 148 Cross, Political Education, 131. 149 Rhodes, An Education in Politics, 153. 65 announced it would allow the removal of vouchers from reform.150 Yet regardless of the issue, reformers’ interest-group strategy recognized both the positive and negative power of special interests in Washington. While lobbyists may prove useful in promoting one’s ideas and stances
(embodied in the White House’s cooperation with the business community and civil-rights groups on education reform), special interests can also polarize negotiations on an issue, rendering bipartisan cooperation impossible. Thus, reformers adopted selective secrecy as part of their bipartisan negotiating strategy.151
Summary and Conclusion
Clearly, interest groups played a vital role in the passage and bipartisan success of
NCLB. Indeed, before President Bush ever took office, interest groups had cleared at least a partial path for bipartisan education reform. When combined with reformers’ efforts to encourage participation by “principled” interests of all types, involvement of Congress in negotiations with interest groups, and protection of negotiations from hostile interests, special interests aided NCLB’s bipartisan success in significant ways. Unfortunately for health reformers
(as the following section will illuminate), however, special interests would not contribute so positively to bipartisanship in 2009.
Interest Groups and PPACA
Much like educational interests had prior to the 2000 election, health interests agreed in the run-up to the 2008 elections that the federal government must address the nation’s health system. Businesses complained that rising health costs vastly harmed profits, labor unions worried that health costs encouraged wage stagnation, hospitals decried the burden of caring for uninsured patients, etc. Consequently, in the lead-up to the 2008 presidential elections, lifelong
150 Vasil Jaiani and Andrew B. Whitford, "Policy Windows, Public Opinion, and Policy Ideas: The Evolution of No Child Left Behind," Quality Assurance in Education 19, no. 1 (2011): 18; FRC had vowed not to support reform without vouchers. 151 One may, of course, debate the desirability of such secrecy in an ostensibly transparent democratic government. However, this subsection intends only to highlight the strategic effectiveness of selective silence, with regard to special interests. 66 health-reform champion Sen. Ted Kennedy had already assembled an informal group of special interests—the “Workhorse Group”—to discuss potential health reform in America. The coalition was surprisingly broad—membership included conservative groups like the Chamber of
Commerce and Business Roundtable, as well as liberal groups such as labor unions and Families
USA—and came to a surprising amount of agreement during their meetings.152 Yet despite this solid foundation of interests in the early stages of reform—and despite President Obama’s sincere efforts to co-opt interests—interests groups failed to encourage bipartisanship on health reform. Why was this the case? This section will strive to answer that question.
Maintaining a Broad Coalition: Close, But No Cigar
As noted above, health-reform negotiations began on a strong note, as reform leaders had encouraged broad interest-group support in the months (and even years) prior to Obama’s reform effort. Within months of entering office, President Obama attempted to capitalize on this progress by inviting interests of all types to a health reform summit at the White House.153
However, as negotiations pressed on in early- and mid- 2009, this coalition did not remain as strong. That is, while natural supporters of Democratic health reform (such as the AFL-CIO,
Families USA, and other traditionally liberal groups) provided steadfast support for reform, crucial conservative and moderate interests fell out of the reform coalition.154
Perhaps the most crucial of these interests was the insurance industry. Under the leadership of former AFL-CIO official Karen Ignagni, the American Association of Insurance
Providers (AHIP) initially appeared more ready and willing than ever to support health reform.
For years, Ignagni had met with political leaders inside and outside Washington, in order to discuss potential reforms to America’s expensive and inefficient health-care system. Thus, in
152 Stuart Altman and David Shactman, "Ted Kennedy and Strange Bedfellows," in Power, Politics, and Universal Health Care: The Inside Story of a Century-Long Battle (Amherst, NY: Prometheus Books, 2011). 153 The Staff of the Washington Post, Landmark: The Inside Story of America's New Health Care Law and What It Means For Us All (New York: Public Affairs, 2010), 16. 154 Lawrence R. Jacobs and Theda Skocpol, Health Care Reform and American Politics: What Everyone Needs To Know (New York: Oxford University Press, 2010), 79. 67 many ways, Ignagni’s early cooperation with the White House came as no great surprise. In another way, however, the potential cooperation of the insurance industry marked one of the most momentous and crucial ideological swings on health reform in the past two decades.
During Bill Clinton’s reform efforts in the 1990s, insurance companies vehemently opposed federal health reform entirely. Indeed, in one the most infamous ad blitzes in non-election advertising history (the Harry and Louise campaign), the insurance industry had dealt a nearly single-handed death blow to health reform only few years back. Thus, support by the insurance industry would have added considerable depth and breadth to the 2009 reform coalition.
Such support, however, did not come to pass. Due in large part to President Obama’s early commitment to a public option, Ignagni and other top health-insurance lobbyists withdrew from talks in late July.155 Practically speaking, this breakdown proved significantly detrimental to bipartisanship on health reform. Simply put, the breakdown encouraged the rapid polarization of dialogue surrounding health reform. With insurance companies no longer at the negotiating table, Congress veered away from many of the industry’s requests. In a matter of weeks, in fact,
Congress had weakened the individual mandate, decreased the legal premium ratio between old and young people, and adopted a number of anti-insurance positions that angered Ignagni and her allies. As a result, the insurance industry quickly joined forces with the business community to coordinate a sharply critical ad blitz against reform, exacerbating an already tense national conversation on health reform.156
The effects of the insurance industry’s withdrawal from negotiations reached further than ad blitzes and direct opposition, however. It also sharpened the rhetoric of many supporters of reform. In particular, when Sen. Joe Lieberman first opposed a public option in the Senate bill, critics inside and outside the Senate charged that Lieberman was a mere tool his home state’s
155 Stuart Altman and David Shactman, "Karen Ignagni and America’s Health Plans," in Power, Politics, and Universal Health Care: The Inside Story of a Century-Long Battle (Amherst, NY: Prometheus Books, 2011). 156 Ibid. 68 insurance industry.157 Eventually these attacks devolved into more personal attacks against both
Lieberman and his wife.158 Had reformers reached an agreement with the insurance industry weeks earlier, such attacks may have never started (Lieberman would have no longer been the only obstacle to the public option) or escalated in the way they did.
The health-reform interest-group coalition was lacking in breadth in other regards, of course. Despite early involvement in Ted Kennedy’s Workhorse Group, the business community, for example, was never earnestly pursued by reform leaders. Similarly, because of Democrats’ reluctance to adopt malpractice reform (a major tenet of health reform for many Republicans), the reform effort lacked a stalwart commitment from doctors (American Medical Association).159
Taken together, as negotiations wore on through the summer, health reform suffered from a significant lack in support by a broad range of interests. Unlike education negotiations, which interest groups on the left and right had carefully protected, health negotiations lacked political cover on the right, and dialogue polarized quickly.
From the White House with Love: PPACA’s Overly Centralized Negotiation Scheme
From the beginning of President Obama’s health reform efforts, top Democrats indicated that the placation of interests would play a vital role in the development of health reform. Indeed, while Clinton’s reform efforts faltered because of vehement interest-group opposition, Obama and his team were determined to “neutralize” interest-group opposition to reform.160 Thus, to achieve this goal, reformers would adopt a rather simple tactic: with the help of Sen. Max
Baucus, President Obama would invite special interests to the White House and negotiate reform specifics in exchange for support. In other words, unlike Bush, who held substantive interest- group negotiations in meetings that involved top members of Congress (and discussed only
157 Staff of the Washington Post, Landmark, 45. 158 Ibid, 47. 159 Stuart Altman and David Shactman, "The AMA Changes Sides," in Power, Politics, and Universal Health Care: The Inside Story of a Century-Long Battle (Amherst, NY: Prometheus Books, 2011). 160 The Staff of the Washington Post, Landmark, 16. 69 strategy in private White House meetings), the Obama Administration would attempt to placate interests on its own. Unfortunately, as the president would soon learn, this centralized negotiation tactic carried with it some distinct disadvantages.
These disadvantages were first borne out in Obama’s dealings with PhRMA—the powerful drug-company lobby. Led by the feisty former-Congressman Billy Tauzin, drug companies were seen as crucial to health reform’s success, both because of PhRMA’s strength and because drug companies would provide much of the cost-saving needed to make reform budget-neutral. PhRMA’s support would not come easily, however. That is, to ensure such support, President Obama would have to renege on a campaign promise he had made only month earlier: drug reimportation. Rather than allowing US citizens to freely purchase drugs from
Canada at a discounted price, drug companies insisted they needed protection such
“reimportation.” Sensing that Tauzin would not budge on this aspect of reform, Obama and
Baucus capitulated, disallowing drug reimportation in the health bill.
Despite this victory for the Obama Administration (they had placated one of Clinton’s staunchest opponents in 1994), the disadvantages of Obama’s White-House-centric negotiation plan became evident as news of the PhRMA deal disseminated. In Congress, leaders were incensed at the amount of control and decision-making power the White House had granted itself: many leaders saw Obama and Baucus’ negotiations as disrespectful of their expertise and of Congress as an institution. Most notably, upon hearing of Obama’s PhRMA agreement, Rep.
Henry Waxman (D – Calif.)—Chairman of the House Energy and Commerce committee and primary author of the House’s health bill—announced that he would not be bound by White
House agreements and would extract more savings from drug companies.161 In a particularly illustrative response, Rahm Emanuel reassured Tauzin, stating that “we’re [the White House]
161 The Staff of the Washington Post, Landmark, 23. 70 bound to this agreement and the Senate is bound to it.”162 Yet while Emanuel’s response may have reassured Tauzin and PhRMA, congressional leaders remained as angry and miffed as ever.
Moreover, in addition to Congress’s negative response, many voters (as well as liberals in
Congress) voiced distaste at the PhRMA agreement. In the first place, President Obama had run as a transformative type of politician—someone who would transcend the politics of special interests. Instead, however, he had chosen to invite such interests into the White House itself.
Furthermore, he reneged on a campaign promise—drug reimportation—in the process. This was hardly the transformative leadership many voters had expected, and public opinion on health reform soured as the summer drew to a close.163
To be clear, while President Obama’s approach to interest-group negotiations may have alienated congressional leaders, this study does not mean to suggest that presidents should defer to Congress when dealing with interest groups—far from it, in fact. Rather, in such dealings, they must show Congress respect by involving members (even if only symbolically) in negotiations. The Bush Administration, for instance, remained mostly in control of interest-group negotiations on NCLB while nevertheless avoiding alienating members of Congress—largely by allowing congressional leaders a seat at the table during negotiations. The Obama
Administration, on the other hand, centralized such negotiations in private White House meetings, which proved alienating to many members. Thus, while “accommodations” may have in fact been “necessary” (as one former Kennedy aide argued),164 the Administration’s chosen negotiation strategy did little to encourage wavering members to join the reform coalition.
Silent No More: Obama’s Negotiation Strategy Creates More Tension
In some sense, President Obama’s centralized negotiation system boasted more potential for secrecy than had Bush’s in 2001. Indeed, by confining most meetings to top lobbyists, White
162 Ibid, 24. 163 See, for example, Jesse M. Crosson, "Thus Spake Public Opinion: The Role of the People in Obama's Major Health-Care Reform" (unpublished manuscript, Hofstra University, Hempstead, NY, May 9, 2011), 11. 164 Skocpol and Jacobs, Health Care Reform and American Politics, 69-70. 71
House officials, and Max Baucus, the system theoretically reduced the probability of an injurous leak. Yet, despite this potential to control leakage, health reform suffered from a nearly fatal interest-group leak in late July 2009. Earlier in the year, Obama and Emanuel had reached a crucial agreement with drug companies: in exchange for cost reduction by drug companies,
Medicare would not retain the right to negotiate with companies for lower drug prices.165
However, by mid-summer, reformers faced a new barrier to health reform: a surprisingly high score by the Congressional Budget Office. Indeed, as the scores came in, Democrats were shocked to find that reform would cost roughly $600 billion more than expected—a major blow to their claims of “budget neutrality.”166 In response, House Democrats inserted a new provision into health reform: Medicare would in fact be empowered to negotiate drug prices.167
Billy Tauzin was furious. Already, he had made concessions worth roughly $80 billion to the White House and was feeling heat from nervous pharmaceutical executives—how could explain even more sacrifices to them? Thus, out of desperation, Tauzin chose to go public, breaking the oath of silence that he and White House officials had followed to that point. The response was livid. As noted above, many of Obama’s supporters were shocked to hear that he had engaged in secret negotiations with the very interests he derided during the campaign.168 In
Congress, many Democrats vowed they would not be bound by the White House’s secret deals.
Perhaps most crucially for bipartisanship, however, Republicans were incensed to hear of the secret deals. In a scathing letter to his old friend Tauzin, House Minority Leader John
Boehner called President Obama a “bully” and asked how Tauzin could make a deal in such a
165 Stuart Altman and David Shactman, "Billy Tauzin: The Swamp Fox Makes a Drug Deal," in Power, Politics, and Universal Health Care: The Inside Story of a Century-Long Battle (Amherst, NY: Prometheus Books, 2011). 166 The Staff of the Washington Post, Landmark, 21-22. 167 Altman and Shactman, “Billy Tauzin: The Swamp Fox Makes a Drug Deal,” in Power, Politics, and Universal Health Care. 168 Skocpol and Jacobs, Health Care Reform and American Politics, 68. 72 way.169 Like liberals, Republicans wondered how the president could so blatantly violate his campaign promises: after all, the president had insisted he would pursue bipartisanship on health reform. Instead, it appeared that the president was attempting an end-run around congressional
Republicans, precluding them from negotiations with many important interest groups. While
Obama may have invited both interests and Republicans to his health reform summit back in
March, it seemed that Obama was now more interested in appeasing powerful lobbies than aggressively pursuing bipartisanship.
Whether or not Obama was in fact more interested in lobbyists than Republicans remains to be seen, of course. And indeed, a full answer to that question undoubtedly falls outside the purview of this study. Still, the deleterious effect of Tauzin’s breech of secrecy seems quite demonstrable. That is, by failing to effectively shield negotiations from specific groups, health reformers harmed PPACA’s progress through committee and damaged its chances for bipartisanship. Whether by alienating allies in Congress, intensifying growing popular distaste for reform, or giving Republicans the impression that Obama cared more about interests than bipartisan compromise, health reform’s breech in secrecy harmed its chances for bipartisanship.
Summary and Conclusions
As demonstrated above, interest groups (and reformers’ handling of them) greatly affected the passage and bipartisan success of both NCLB and PPACA. However, due to strategic missteps and other important factors, the influence of interest groups resulted in far less bipartisanship on PPACA than NCLB. First, while Bush and Republicans capitalized on support from a broad range of reliably conservative and liberal interests, Obama and Democrats lacked the support of (and, to some extent, outreach to) traditionally conservative interests. Second, whereas President Bush espoused an interest-group negotiation strategy respectful of Congress,
169 Altman and Shactman, “Billy Tauzin: The Swamp Fox Makes a Drug Deal,” in Power, Politics, and Universal Health Care. 73
President Obama alienated Congress by concentrating major negotiations in the White House.
Finally, while education-reform leaders successfully shielded delicate negotiations from hostile interests, a breech in secrecy resulted in much polarization around health reform. Taken together, these differences likely influenced NCLB and PPACA’s differences in bipartisanship.
FINAL CONCLUSIONS AND SUMMARY
Thus far, this study has detailed a number of conditions and strategic choices that help to
(at least partially) explain NCLB and PPACA’s vast differences in bipartisanship. As noted throughout, some changes in strategy would have proven more difficult than others to achieve: in many ways, key differences in historical consensus and political climate rendered health-reform leaders’ job much more difficult than that of education reformers, at least with regard to bipartisanship. Still, within each of the contexts examined above, the study outlines a variety of choices and conditions that, if somehow changed during PPACA’s passage, may have increased the chances that health reform achieve education-reform-like bipartisanship.
Beyond these specific recommendations, however, this study will now attempt to step back and highlight major themes in each context’s findings. Doing so will not only draw the study’s findings together, but will provide a more concise list of implications for future attempts at bipartisanship in US politics. Furthermore, by viewing these findings in light of this study’s literature review, the summary will also place these findings in the larger context of American politics. With such perspective, the study will conclude with some implications for both
American politics and the future study of the president, Congress, and interest groups.
A Common Core: Coalition-Building from the Center
The first major theme that arises between NCLB and PPACA involves the development of a “common core” for reform among members of both parties. In the context of presidential leadership, this meant building a congressional voting coalition from the center, outward via 74 personal appeals (a la Pfiffer’s model) and working with congressional leaders (as Edwards suggests). On education reform, President Bush chose to meet and discuss reform substance with
New Democrats (such as Lieberman and Bayh) first, before adding more conservative and liberal members to the coalition. Conversely, President Obama did not meet with Republicans after his early-March summit in 2009. And, to the extent that the White House did reach out to moderates, they did so only by authorizing case-by-case deals like the “Louisiana Purchase” and the
“Cornhusker Kickback.” By choosing to build from the base, Obama limited his ability to attract
Republicans to health reform.
In addition to this presidential leadership tactic, congressional leaders also built a common core on education (and neglected to do so on health reform). To develop No Child Left
Behind, leaders built on the “accountability” consensus and focused on points of agreement
(such as mandatory testing—even for poor schools), before addressing more contentious issues
(such as funding). Much as Gutmann/Thompson suggest, this helped to build mutual trust between negotiators. On PPACA, however, Congress fixated on the most contentious aspects of reform (i.e. – the public option and comprehensiveness), instead of building on points of agreement. When combined with the fact that health reform enjoyed far less historical agreement than had education reform, this strategy harmed leaders’ ability to appeal to Republicans.
President and Congress: Achieving a Balance of Power
In addition to the development of a common core, achieving a proper balance of power between the President and Congress also proved integral to attracting bipartisan support. Two presidential leadership tactics helped Bush achieve a proper balance of power on NCLB. First, to respect both Congress as an institution and the expertise of individual members, Bush chose to submit a blueprint for reform—rather than a full bill—to Congress. This tactic gave direction to negotiations, while allowing “experts” in Congress to handle the details of reform. In addition, however, Bush also clearly articulated his principles when negotiations stalled. In particular, 75
Bush crucially announced “flexibility” on vouchers early on, while also noting his fundamental commitment to testing as part of reform. Conversely, President Obama struggled to achieve a proper balance of power between the branches. In some ways, he was too passive: his blueprint for reform was vague, and he neglected to take a clear position on the public option. Yet, in other ways, Obama also alienated Congress (i.e. – by not involving HHS in reform negotiations).
Taken together, these strategic missteps created further challenges for outreach to Republicans.
Like Presidents Bush and Obama, NCLB and PPACA congressional leaders also played a part in achieving a proper executive-legislative balance of power. Most importantly for NCLB, education reform leaders utilized an informal committee system to develop education legislation.
As noted above, this tactic protected negotiations from the most radical ideas/opponents and granted the Bush Administration some control over negotiations. Though health reform leaders attempted the same sort of tactic with the “Gang of Six,” health reform’s complexity and the gang’s unrepresentative membership disallowed this tactic to produce bipartisanship on PPACA.
In addition to presidential and congressional leadership, interest groups (and the strategies leaders employed to deal with them) also contributed to the executive-legislative balance of power on NCLB and PPACA. On NCLB, Bush did use interests to lobby Congress; but, he did not reach large, substantive agreements in private White House meetings with such interests. Rather, interest groups on the right and left protected the core of education reform, effectively holding the bipartisan coalition together. On health reform, however, major White
House deals with interest groups alienated Republicans and Democrats alike. The result was a more polarized popular dialogue and, eventually, a lack of Republican involvement on PPACA.
Building a Credibly Broad Support Group
The final major theme of this study’s findings involves the ideological breadth of each bill’s support group: how did the president, congressional leaders, and interest groups build a broad enough group of supporters to lend bipartisan credibility to reform efforts? In the context 76 of presidential leadership, President Bush’s usage of the flexible “accountability” frame attracted a broad range of support. As noted earlier, liberals and conservatives alike could interpret
“accountability” however they pleased and often disagreed about its true definition; yet, the frame’s broad appeal brought a wide range of supporters to the table. Conversely, as PPACA negotiations progressed, President Obama encountered much difficulty in holding to a “rising costs” frame for health reform—the frame that appealed most to Republicans. Instead, Obama and Democrats focused on “coverage,” which drew far less support across the political spectrum.
Congressional leaders also influenced the breadth of NCLB and PPACA’s supporting coalitions. In the case of education reform, NCLB’s “Big Four” served as principled compromisers who combined liberal/conservative credentials with a talent for deal-making. With their support, education reform gained credibility within both parties. Health reform, on the other hand, lacked such principled compromisers. Its leaders, instead, possessed either liberal/conservative credentials or deal-making prowess—but never both. As a result, members of both parties doubted the feasibility of bipartisanship on health reform.
Finally, in addition to presidential and congressional leadership, interest groups also influenced the ideological breadth of support for both bills. On NCLB, the support of the business community on the right and civil rights groups on the left helped to nudge both
Republicans and Democrats to the negotiating table. Health reform, on the other hand, lacked support from a credibility conservative interest group. Consequently, Republicans did not feel pressured (at least from an interest-group perspective) to participate in negotiations.
Implications for Political Science and Future Research, Final Thoughts
By articulating the above three themes in the politics of NCLB and PPACA, this study has highlighted some clear strategies and approaches that both partially explain NCLB’s and
PPACA’s disparities in bipartisanship and offer future leaders some strategies that may encourage bipartisanship moving forward. However, at a broader level, a final question remains: 77 what implications for political science research arise from the findings of this study?
With regard to presidential leadership, this study has largely reinforced the central thesis of George Edwards III’s At the Margins. Unlike Pfiffner and Neustadt, Edwards argues that presidents may affect legislative outcomes, but only at the margins of coalition-building. With regard to education reform, President Bush certainly undertook numerous strategies that promoted bipartisanship and the passage of NCLB. However, many of these actions built upon already-existing factors that worked to the president’s advantage: Bush’s personal agreement with New Democrats made outreach to the center easier, convergence around the notion of
“accountability” allowed Bush to more easily promote an inclusive issue-frame, and the traditional “Democratic” status of education gave Bush some leverage when wooing liberals like
Ted Kennedy. For the most part, health reform lacked these helpful factors, which rendered presidential leadership more difficult in comparison.
Yet while Edwards’ model for presidential leadership of Congress may generally hold when discussing the effectiveness of such leadership, it would seem slightly less helpful in dissecting the actual process of bargaining that occurs between the president and Congress. In the case of this study, Edwards’ (and many other presidential scholars’) work does little to explain how a president ought to approach bipartisan negotiations. In other words, because
Edwards simply lists “bipartisanship” as a one of many legislative “strategies” from which a president may choose, he does not seem to capture the specific sorts of tactics (like those that
Bush adopted) that help promote bipartisanship. What tactics generally promote the most bipartisanship on a measure? How, if at all, should presidents alter their legislative strategy to best appeal to members of the opposing party (while not alienating members of their own)? This thesis has attempted to suggest some possible answers to these questions. However, much future research is needed, in order to reach broader, more reliable conclusions.
As with presidential leadership of Congress, this study has also revealed a need for 78 further study of congressional leadership. In particular, while scholars such as Ross Baker (as well as to Davidson, Oleszek, and Lee), correctly highlight the tension that arises between committee and floor leadership in Congress (as well as how cultural differences between the houses color leadership styles), they do not address the dynamics of an important “third” type of congressional organization and leadership: the “informal” committee system. On NCLB, for example, the informal committee system allowed leaders to achieve a balance of power with the executive branch, while avoiding harmful conflicts with floor leadership. On PPACA, however, this approach was less successful. Exactly how useful is the informal committee system? Under what circumstances is such a system most effective? Congressional scholars would do well to further explore this tactic of leadership and negotiation.
Finally, with regard to interest groups, this study has underscored a number of areas for further study, including, most notably, the effect of “interest-group centralization.” That is, does the centralization of interest-group negotiations in the White House often alienate members of
Congress and stymie a bill’s progress? Do interest groups prefer working with the executive
(rather than the legislative branch) under certain circumstances? These questions, though addressed tangentially by scholars like Andrew Rudalevige merit further, more careful attention in future research.
In addition, this study has also found current literature on interest groups to be generally deficient in its explanation of how interest groups may encourage bipartisan cooperation. On
NCLB, pressure from groups on the right and left encouraged more legislators to the table and protected negotiations as they progressed. Has this sort of two-way pressure occurred in the past?
How often does such pressure produce bipartisan results? Such information would prove vitally helpful to leaders hoping to advance bipartisanship in the future.
* * *
In the end, of course, no one strategic choice or condition can explain the vast differences 79 in bipartisanship between NCLB and PPACA. Particularly given the differences in pre-election support for health and education reform, any explanation for such disparities is inherently limited. Moreover, as noted at the outset of this study, some may even deny the importance of bipartisanship altogether. After all, PPACA did eventually become law.
Nevertheless, given the rancorous political conversation and serious implementation challenges that have ensued since PPACA’s passage, bipartisanship would still seem desirable, at least at some level. Besides the long-term problems caused by the loss of mutual trust in the legislature, PPACA’s partisanship has distracted America’s political leaders and public from the many other challenges that face the country today. For these reasons, this study has attempted to highlight a number of strategic choices and conditions that, if changed, could have at least increased the likelihood that PPACA achieve NCLB-like bipartisanship. And, among these findings, it has compiled three themes of bipartisanship—building on a common core, obtaining a proper executive-legislative balance of power, and obtaining convincing breadth in support— that, taken together, may offer a few broad goals for future leaders interested in bipartisanship.
Without a doubt, Madisonian democracy requires compromise as much today as in the days of Madison himself. In fact, given today’s polarized polity, even political divide, and daunting list of political challenges, compromise may prove more crucial today than ever before.
Does compromise really form the basis of “all government, indeed every human benefit and enjoyment, every virtue, and every prudent act,” as one noted compromise advocate, Edmund
Burke, once famously argued? Some agree, others do not. Yet while some may disagree with
Burke’s lofty account, one must ultimately come to terms with the practical value of compromise in American politics, as articulated by President Lyndon Baines Johnson: “I'm a compromiser and a maneuverer. I try to get something. That’s the way our system works.”
80
SUMMARY TABLES Figure 1 PRESIDENTIAL LEADERSHIP OF CONGRESS Differences/Similarities & Obama’s Chosen Bush’s Chosen Strategies Effect Strategies
While both Bush and Obama understood the importance of Moves fast, but with a Moving fast, with few moving quickly with few surprises, surprisingly aggressive and surprises in policy choice President Obama’s pursuance of comprehensive approach to and content comprehensive health reform reform surprise some in both parties
While Bush’s flexible frame brought Resorts to a de facto a wide range of leaders to the Adopting the flexible issue- coverage/access frame, negotiating table, PPACA’s coverage frame, “accountability” rather than more inclusive frame appealed to a much narrower cost frame spectrum of leaders.
While Bush balanced congressional Delegates authority to Delegating authority to empowerment with White House Congress with blueprint, Congress through legislative control, Obama’s lack of but ultimately proves too “blueprint” and regular involvement by HHS and lack of vague. Lack of HHS meetings with leadership blueprint detail kept him from involvement slows effectively guiding negotiations negotiations
Bush prodded negotiations by Unclear principles on most Clear signaling of clearly articulating his “bottom line,” controversial aspects of principles, particularly on while President Obama’s ambiguity reform, such as public vouchers and testing on health-reform controversies option stalled reform negotiations
Bush increased chances for Coalition-building bipartisanship by reaching out first Builds coalition from base, beginning in the center, to the center, then galvanizing outward with New Democrats support from his base. Obama adopted an opposite tactic.
81
Figure 2 CONGRESSIONAL LEADERSHIP
Differences/Similarities Congress and NCLB Congress and PPACA & Effect
While NCLB leaders built trust between the parties by Significantly less historical focusing on points of Built upon historical consensus upon which to agreement, eager Democratic consensus; established points build; popular conversation members tended to focus too of agreement first, before focused upon most much (and too early) on the handling controversial aspects controversial aspects, such as most controversial aspects of public option PPACA, polarizing the health- reform conversation.
While NCLB leaders attracted a “Big Four” lend both deal- wide variety of members to the Health reform leaders possess making skill and ideological reform coalition and were able either ideological credibility or credibility to education reform to make a deal, PPACA leaders deal-making experience, but effort were far less able to attract never both such a wide variety of support.
Though “Gang of Six” resembled informal groups of Leaders utilize informal ESEA “Gang of Six” attempts to reach NCLB, the complex, multi- reauthorization committee to a bipartisan agreement, but faceted nature of health effectively protect bipartisan multiple committee referrals reform, along with opposition negotiations and craft a and opposition by party by party leadership and an satisfactory compromise. leadership prevents its success. unrepresentative mix of members, render it ineffective.
82
Figure 3
THE INFLUENCE OF INTEREST GROUPS
Interest Groups and Differences/Similarities & Interest Groups and ACA NCLB Effect
Whereas interest groups on the right and left encouraged Solid group of up interest- Business community and Republicans and Democrats to the group support (such as civil-rights groups provide a NCLB negotiating table (and PhRMA, AMA, etc.), but few (if ideologically broad, diverse protecting bipartisan negotiations any) traditionally conservative body of support throughout), few conservative special interests in support interests encourage GOP involvement on PPACA.
Whereas Bush uses interest Bush heavily involved groups to his advantage without Obama and his team negotiate strategically with interest alienating Congress, Obama’s both strategy and reform groups, but allows Congress extensive agreements with substance with interest groups to interact with interest interest groups proved alienating in closed-door White House groups on substance. to Republicans and Democrats meetings alike.
While silence protected NCLB Bush and NCLB leaders negotiations from the most hostile Obama and PPACA leaders protect the most delicate interests, a breach in silence by keep White House reform negotiations with PhRMA opened Obama up to negotiations silent at first, but complete silence to the press criticisms for “breaking” fights with Congress force and outside interests campaign promises, according to PhRMA to break the silence some.
83
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