Julian Zelizer: Bipartisanship is not always good
[Julian E. Zelizer is a professor of history and public affairs at Prince ton University’s Woodrow Wilson School.]
This week, some politicians and pundits will boast of the bipartisan coalition that — under the leadership of Sens. Ben Nelson (D-Neb.), Susan Collins (R-Maine) and Arlen Specter (R-Pa.) — cut the economic recovery legislation by more than $100 billion and moved the bill through the chamber. The legislation might be the first concrete evidence that an influential bipartisan coalition has emerged.
While partisanship has not disappeared (“Saturday Night Live’s” Kristen Wiig, playing House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, quipped that this bill had bipartisan support “if by both parties you mean three Republicans”), the existence of an effective voting bloc would constitute a significant change.
Before we shower praise on this coalition, it is worth remembering that bipartisan coalitions are not inherently good and that some have pushed Congress in the wrong direction.
To be sure, there are positive examples. The alliance between President Harry Truman, congressional Democrats and a handful of Senate Republicans produced some of the most enduring programs of the Cold War in the 1940s.
But bipartisanship has also had noxious effects. The most famous coalition of the 20th century formed between Southern Democrats and Republicans who dominated Congress from 1938 to 1975. This conservative coalition emerged in response to FDR’s court-packing and executive reorganization plans. The coalition depended on a legislative process that granted inordinate power to committee chairmen, a large number of whom were Southern Democrats. And if liberals were able to free legislation from a hostile committee by using procedural tricks, Southern Democrats and Republicans joined hands to kill bills on the floor.
The record of the conservative coalition was impressive in terms of effectiveness, but it is not one that many legislators look back on proudly. Most important, the coalition stifled progress on civil rights. Former Sen. James Eastland (D-Miss.), who chaired the Senate Subcommittee on Civil Rights, joked that “for [the] three years I was chairman, that committee didn’t hold a meeting. I had special pockets in my pants, and for years I carried those bills around in my pockets everywhere I went, and every one of them was defeated.”
The Civil Rights Act of 1957 was so watered down that it had a negligible impact. It took a grass-roots movement, the influx of maverick liberals such as former Rep. Richard Bolling (D-Mo.), and a president with the change of heart and the skill of Lyndon Johnson to break the coalition’s hold on this issue.
This was not all that the conservative coalition accomplished. While most Americans were ready to hunt communists during the Cold War, the conservative coalition pushed the investigations to the extreme, causing irreparable damage to civil liberties and bringing down many innocent Americans through smear campaigns. Even staunch Cold Warriors such as Dwight Eisenhower believed the coalition undermined the anti-communist cause by associating it with irresponsible tactics.
After LBJ escalated the war in Vietnam in 1965, he depended on the bipartisan coalition to support his policies. Southern Democrats such as Sen. Richard Russell (D-Ga.), many of whom had privately opposed the war, insisted on supporting the operations once troops were on the battlefield. Senate Republicans under Minority Leader Everett Dirksen (Ill.) complained the president was not willing to use enough force to bring the war to an end but staunchly defended his policies from attacks by anti-war Democrats.
In the 1970s, the conservative coalition lost its power. Younger liberal Democrats and Republicans obtained a series of reforms that weakened committee leaders and strengthened the party caucus. They deposed several powerful chairmen. Demographic changes decreased the number of centrists. ...
Read entire article at Politico.com
This week, some politicians and pundits will boast of the bipartisan coalition that — under the leadership of Sens. Ben Nelson (D-Neb.), Susan Collins (R-Maine) and Arlen Specter (R-Pa.) — cut the economic recovery legislation by more than $100 billion and moved the bill through the chamber. The legislation might be the first concrete evidence that an influential bipartisan coalition has emerged.
While partisanship has not disappeared (“Saturday Night Live’s” Kristen Wiig, playing House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, quipped that this bill had bipartisan support “if by both parties you mean three Republicans”), the existence of an effective voting bloc would constitute a significant change.
Before we shower praise on this coalition, it is worth remembering that bipartisan coalitions are not inherently good and that some have pushed Congress in the wrong direction.
To be sure, there are positive examples. The alliance between President Harry Truman, congressional Democrats and a handful of Senate Republicans produced some of the most enduring programs of the Cold War in the 1940s.
But bipartisanship has also had noxious effects. The most famous coalition of the 20th century formed between Southern Democrats and Republicans who dominated Congress from 1938 to 1975. This conservative coalition emerged in response to FDR’s court-packing and executive reorganization plans. The coalition depended on a legislative process that granted inordinate power to committee chairmen, a large number of whom were Southern Democrats. And if liberals were able to free legislation from a hostile committee by using procedural tricks, Southern Democrats and Republicans joined hands to kill bills on the floor.
The record of the conservative coalition was impressive in terms of effectiveness, but it is not one that many legislators look back on proudly. Most important, the coalition stifled progress on civil rights. Former Sen. James Eastland (D-Miss.), who chaired the Senate Subcommittee on Civil Rights, joked that “for [the] three years I was chairman, that committee didn’t hold a meeting. I had special pockets in my pants, and for years I carried those bills around in my pockets everywhere I went, and every one of them was defeated.”
The Civil Rights Act of 1957 was so watered down that it had a negligible impact. It took a grass-roots movement, the influx of maverick liberals such as former Rep. Richard Bolling (D-Mo.), and a president with the change of heart and the skill of Lyndon Johnson to break the coalition’s hold on this issue.
This was not all that the conservative coalition accomplished. While most Americans were ready to hunt communists during the Cold War, the conservative coalition pushed the investigations to the extreme, causing irreparable damage to civil liberties and bringing down many innocent Americans through smear campaigns. Even staunch Cold Warriors such as Dwight Eisenhower believed the coalition undermined the anti-communist cause by associating it with irresponsible tactics.
After LBJ escalated the war in Vietnam in 1965, he depended on the bipartisan coalition to support his policies. Southern Democrats such as Sen. Richard Russell (D-Ga.), many of whom had privately opposed the war, insisted on supporting the operations once troops were on the battlefield. Senate Republicans under Minority Leader Everett Dirksen (Ill.) complained the president was not willing to use enough force to bring the war to an end but staunchly defended his policies from attacks by anti-war Democrats.
In the 1970s, the conservative coalition lost its power. Younger liberal Democrats and Republicans obtained a series of reforms that weakened committee leaders and strengthened the party caucus. They deposed several powerful chairmen. Demographic changes decreased the number of centrists. ...