Christopher Bates: For Presidents, Losing Midterm Vote is the Norm
[Christopher Bates is a lecturer in the history department at Cal Poly Pomona and a writer for the History News Service.]
In a matter of weeks, Americans will head to the polls, and they are likely to send many congressional Democrats into retirement. Politicians and pundits across the country will loudly declare this to be a repudiation of Democratic leadership in general and of Barack Obama's presidency in particular. Some may even assert that he's a "lame duck," rendered impotent until his inevitable defeat in 2012.
Actually, though, "losing" a midterm election is the rule, rather than the exception, for the party that controls the White House. Only five times in American history has the president's party avoided losing seats in Congress during a midterm election. And each of these instances involved extraordinary circumstances, among them the turmoil over Reconstruction in 1866, the Depression in 1934 and the 9/11 attacks and the early months of the war on terror in 2002.
The fact that the president's party loses seats in Congress in 90% of midterm elections suggests that not even the most brilliant service in the White House can change the outcome....
Read entire article at LA Times
In a matter of weeks, Americans will head to the polls, and they are likely to send many congressional Democrats into retirement. Politicians and pundits across the country will loudly declare this to be a repudiation of Democratic leadership in general and of Barack Obama's presidency in particular. Some may even assert that he's a "lame duck," rendered impotent until his inevitable defeat in 2012.
Actually, though, "losing" a midterm election is the rule, rather than the exception, for the party that controls the White House. Only five times in American history has the president's party avoided losing seats in Congress during a midterm election. And each of these instances involved extraordinary circumstances, among them the turmoil over Reconstruction in 1866, the Depression in 1934 and the 9/11 attacks and the early months of the war on terror in 2002.
The fact that the president's party loses seats in Congress in 90% of midterm elections suggests that not even the most brilliant service in the White House can change the outcome....