Julian Zelizer: Don't Blame Congress for Leaders' Faults
When Sen. Evan Bayh announced that he would step down from the Senate, he said that Congress had become a dysfunctional institution. "I love helping our citizens make the most of their lives, but I do not love Congress," Bayh lamented.
Bayh is not the only politician or pundit to issue this warning in recent months. There have been an abundance of proclamations that Congress no longer works....
But we must not blame it all on the institution and downplay the human failures of leadership either. At this point, Democrats must start to question two aspects of their performance in 2009. The first has been the White House strategy of allowing Congress to dictate the timing and substance of legislation. The second has to do with Sen. Harry Reid and his inability to keep his caucus united and to move major bills despite leading a sizable majority....
The reality is that passing legislation through Congress has never been easy. The nostalgia for better times is a constant refrain. During much of the 19th century, Congress was legendary for looking more like a boxing ring than a site of distinguished debate.
During the progressive era, a series of powerful House speakers caused grief for presidents as they obstructed legislation. President Teddy Roosevelt complained about the tyrannical powers of Speaker Joe Cannon, known as the "Czar" of the House, who controlled committee assignments and manipulated procedures that gave him the power to block proposals for government expansion. One observer said: "There is room for saying Cannon is even more powerful than the president of the United States."
Between the 1930s and 1970s, Southern Democrats dominated Congress by relying on the power of committee chairmanships. Mississippi Sen. James Eastland, chairman of the Senate Subcommittee on Civil Rights, proudly boasted that he had special pockets "put into my pants" in which he carried "those bills around in my pockets everywhere I went and every one of them was defeated."...
The complaints about heightened party polarization and a supermajority Senate have been standard since the 1970s. The trends that resulted in the current process were not invented in 2008. Rather they were the result of long-term changes such as the movement of moderates, Southern Democrats and liberal Northeastern Republicans, out of their respective parties as well as the impact of the 24-hour news cycle with cable television....
Congress also created a national security state during the early Cold War. Even since the 1970s there have been big breakthroughs, such as the Americans with Disabilities Act (1990) and the reorganization of homeland security under President George W. Bush....
Sen. Chuck Schumer announced his support for using the budget reconciliation process, which prohibits a filibuster, to pass specific sections of health care reform. While Republicans have been comfortable using all Senate procedures this year, including the threat of a filibuster and holds on presidential appointments, Democrats have been much more hesitant to use this equally legitimate procedure.
But this announcement is just a start. There is a need for much more introspection about why Reid has had so much trouble reaching the kind of intra-party deals between moderates and liberals that Speaker Nancy Pelosi has achieved in the House, and whether President Obama is willing to undertake a different approach to dealing with the legislature.
If Democrats ignore these tough questions, focusing only on the flaws in procedures, they will find themselves in bad shape going into 2010.