©2015 Benjamin A. Dworkin ALL RIGHTS RESERVED COLLECTIVE COMMUNICATION IN CONGRESS: UNDERSTANDING AND ASSESSING HOUSE CAUCUS LEADERSHIP EFFORTS TO WIN PRESS COVERAGE, 1981 – 2010 by BENJAMIN A. DWORKIN A Dissertation submitted to the Graduate School-New Brunswick Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey In partial fulfillment of the requirements For the degree of Doctor of Philosophy Graduate Program in Political Science Written under the direction of Beth L. Leech and approved by __________________________________ __________________________________ __________________________________ __________________________________ New Brunswick, New Jersey OCTOBER 2015 ABSTRACT OF THE DISSERTATION Collective Communication in Congress: Understanding and Assessing House Caucus Leadership Efforts to Win Press Coverage, 1981 - 2010 By BENJAMIN A. DWORKIN Dissertation Director: Beth L. Leech Caucus leaders in the House of Representatives are distinguished from other leaders by their roles as agents for the entire caucus. Therefore, they seek to cater to the needs of their members, especially the prospects for individual reelection and collectively maintaining or attaining majority status. The electoral priority relies, in large part, on building a strong party brand and that requires active leadership engagement as national messengers speaking on behalf of the entire congressional party. Between 1981 and 2010, top leaders in the House dramatically expanded the time, resources, and personnel dedicated to promoting their collective partisan narratives in the national media. Simultaneously, they navigated dramatic internal and exogenous change, including the aftereffects of 1970s reforms, the emergence of unique, ambitious leadership personalities, increasing sophistication in messaging technology, the changing media landscape, and a sharp rise in partisanship. We know very little about how this transpired and under what conditions leaders were more or less successful in their quest ii to generate coverage. This dissertation examines those questions while taking into account the current literature’s tendency to ignore differences between majority and minority leaders, Democrats and Republicans, and caucus leaders and anyone else with a leadership title. By employing qualitative data from nineteen interviews with former communications staff members for top House leaders, and content analysis generated from 3,096 articles in the Washington Post and the New York Times, randomly selected from the thirty-year period, this dissertation finds that coverage of congressional leadership is largely driven by the power bias: reporters write about those who have the greatest ability to affect the final outcome in the House. The majority party, therefore, consistently retains this advantage. Further, quantitative analysis that operationalizes “media coverage” in five different ways produced very mixed results, indicating that past scholarship that relied on just one measure of coverage (e.g., mentions of leaders) may obscure a more complicated story. iii ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS The genesis of this research began in 2005 with a letter that was shared with me by David Greenberg, a neighbor of mine in suburban New Jersey. The letter was addressed to the Democratic National Committee in response to its constant appeal for donations. A strong, partisan Democrat, Greenberg was upset with what he perceived to be the lack of a forceful Democratic response to the actions of the George W. Bush presidency. “If you are trying to get the message out, I, at least, am not getting it – and I am looking for it,” he wrote to nameless national Democratic Party leadership. “I can imagine what people are seeing who don’t even know how to look for it: approval conveyed by your silence.” From this simple missive, I began a journey of inquiry involving when Congress gets covered and under what conditions that takes place. I became fascinated by the electoral implications of coverage, and especially the distinctions between the majority and the minority parties in the House. The result is the dissertation before you. And so, I begin these acknowledgements by thanking David Greenberg for being the initial spark. Another spark came from Patricia Dash, my Spanish teacher in Bergenfield (NJ) High School and the toughest instructor I’ve ever had. She taught me to value academic rigor and to never forget the personal touch that a teacher can have with a student. I would not be where I am today had I not pushed myself as hard as I did in three years of classes with her. At Rutgers, I am indebted to several other scholars and mentors for helping me along the way including Jane Junn, Lisa Miller, Milt Heumann, and my committee, Kira iv Sanbonmatsu, Ross Baker, and Dan Tichenor. Two others deserve special praise: the late Alan Rosenthal, who imbued so much fun into the study of politics, and my dissertation chair and advisor, Beth Leech, whose class in “Mass Media and Politics” changed the trajectory of my academic career and guided me at every step of this lengthy dissertation process. I could not have asked for anyone better. Two of my colleagues in the Rutgers graduate program – Marika Dunn and Anna Mitchell-Mahoney – have been the kind of friends anyone would treasure. They have shared every bump in the road and made it all seem bearable. At Rider University, where I have been working for the last eight years, thanks goes the former Provost Donald Steven, who plucked me from relative obscurity and offered me a wonderful position, and to all my colleagues who have encouraged me along the way. Those who agreed to be interviewed for this dissertation offered fascinating insights into the dynamics of House congressional leadership communications. They are all busy people and were supremely generous with their time. Those who agreed to be listed here include: Tom Blank, Brendan Daly, John Feehery, Mike Franc, Cindy Jimenez, Mike Johnson, Eric London, Lauren Maddox, John Murray, David Ransom, Johanna Schneider, Missi Tessier, and Jim Wilkinson. I cannot thank my family enough for their support. My late father, Moshe Dworkin, has missed this and several other family milestones, but he always encouraged me to “be in my element” and do what makes me happy. I know he is smiling today. My siblings, Jenny and Aaron, are devoted, loyal, and brilliant leaders, each in their own way. They have always been there for me. My mother, Susan, encouraged me to pursue v my Ph.D. long before I considered it seriously. She is the finest storyteller I’ve ever known and a matriarch in the truest sense of the word. My understanding wife, partner, and best friend, Amy, has been a constant rock of stability for me and our three daughters. She has patiently withstood the pressures of my research schedule and remains my guiding light. I would never have made it this far without returning to her loving smile and warm embrace every day. vi TABLE OF CONTENTS ABSTRACT ……………………………………………………………………………...ii ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ……………………………………………………………...iv LIST OF TABLES ……………………………………………………………………..viii CHAPTERS 1 Beginnings ………………………………………………...…...................1 2 Theory and Literature Review …………………………………............34 3 Hypotheses and Research Design ………………………………...........86 4 The Process of Leadership Communications: Five Contextual Elements ……………………………………………..118 5 The Process of Leadership Communications: Developing the Message ………………………………………………178 6 The Process of Leadership Communications: Disseminating the Message ……………………………………………227 7 The Process of Leadership Communications: Assessment of Communications Efforts by House Leaders …………..262 8 House Leadership Obligations and Distinctions ………………………301 9 Power and the Competition for Coverage ……………………………..316 10 Measuring the Effectiveness of House Caucus Leaders’ Media Outreach …………………………………………………...348 11 Conclusions and Areas for Future Research …………………………436 APPENDIX A – House Caucus Leaders, 1981 – 2010 .…….………………………..465 APPENDIX B – Script for Informed Consent Interviews .....…………….………… 467 APPENDIX B1 – Dates of Interviews .....................................………...…………….. 471 APPENDIX C – Codebook ........................................…………………………….…... 472 BIBLIOGRAPHY …………………………………………………………………...... 496 vii LIST OF TABLES Table 2a House Leadership Objectives …………………………………………. 54 Table 3a Breakdown of Priority Targets Among House Communicators ……….. 93 Table 3b Breakdown of House Communicators Interviewed ……………………. 94 Table 3c Isolation of House Majority and Minority with Media Coverage Expectations ………………………………………………………….. 102 Table 7a House Caucus Leadership Media Objectives and Measures of Success………………………………………………….. 266 Table 10a Mentions and Messages in Coverage of Majority and Minority House Leadership ………………………………………………………….… 354 Table 10b Average Quantity of Message Paragraphs for House Leadership (Majority and Minority) ………………………………………………………… 355 Table 10c Location of First Message Paragraph for Majority / Minority House Leadership ……………………………………………………...…… . 356 Table 10d Tone of Coverage Towards Majority / Minority Party …………...…. .356 Table 10e Summary of Assessment of Correlations: Types of Media Coverage of House Majority/Minority Leaders and Various Conditions ………..... 359 Table 10f Percentage of Mentions for Majority and Minority House Leadership Over Time (1981 – 2010) ………………………………………..… .. 366 Table 10g Majority and Minority House Leadership Mentions Over Time (1981 – 2010) Including Articles that Mention Both ……………………….. .. 367 Table 10h