Today’s conference is known for gridlock, bragging and gerrymandering, and endless bickering, posturing and fundraising. but was it always like this? Could you summarize for us the story told in your canonical account of how the institution, the American Congress, evolved: the construction of democracy?
That book, which brought together some of the best historians and political scientists in the country, showed the ways in which Congress has impacted all the great moments in American history: the end of slavery, industrialization and urbanization, the great depression, the creation of the new deal, and the civil rights revolution of the 1960s. we tend to focus on presidents, but in times of crisis or great social challenge, congress has often been the institution that brought resolutions to the tensions that existed in society.
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“the constitution assigned to congress the most important power of government: the power to declare war”
The president was not destined to be the most important figure in American politics; Congress was created to be the dominant source of political decision making. colonists rebelled against (and continued to fear) centralized power. Therefore, the Constitution gave Congress the power to collect income from American citizens, the power to tax it, and the power to make decisions about how the money should be allocated. and the constitution assigned to congress the most important power of government: the power to declare war. Though it ceded some power over time, congressional primacy was a key feature of American democracy.
In American Congress, the history of the institution is broken down into four periods.
Part of the challenge in writing about the conference is thinking about how the timeline is done. When writing about the American presidency, it’s very clear: Presidents serve one or two terms (or in FDR’s case, four), but with Congress, it’s tricky. you have two cameras; people are chosen at different times.
So, I decided to define different eras based on how the congress works. I started with the “formative era,” from the 1780s to the 1820s; this was the period when members of congress were figuring out how the institution was going to function. they begin to establish basic procedures, processes and standards. then came what I called the “partisan era” of the 1830s to 1900s; During this period, I argued, the political parties organized the life of the congress. political parties at the time were different from today, in that there were incredibly strong connections between party leaders and organizations with average Americans. it was not simply that Congress was partisan, but that parties were the organizing institutions of American public life.
“It was not simply that Congress was partisan, but that parties were the organizing institutions of American public life”
The “committee era,” which runs from 1910 to 1960, saw the rise of committees, often led by southern Democrats in alliance with Republicans, that became centers of power. committee chairs were able to resist their own party and shape the tenor of the era. Finally, I termed the time from the 1970s to today the “contemporary era,” which has come to be defined by new forms of partisan warfare. a new form of partisanship took hold that shaped legislative behavior, even as ties between citizens and government weakened.
This periodization is not perfect, but it does give a rough idea of how congress has evolved and provides a framework for the messy history of this institution.
Let’s start with the United States Congress: Actions in the Public Sphere, from James Madison to Newt Gingrich.
david mayhew is one of the great political scientists of america; he teaches at yale and has written a number of very important books on congress. the united states congress is always one of my favorites. Mayhew believes that Congress has had a much more active and influential history than is commonly believed. Accessible to laymen and experts alike, the book does a very good job of categorizing the different kinds of “actions” that members of Congress have taken since the country’s inception.
captured some of the big names in congress, like robert wagner, a member of congress during the 1930s. mayhew methodically shows that many of the ideas that become the new deal came from wagner, rather than from president roosevelt ; He astutely points out that Roosevelt could be seen as the person who signed Senator Wagner’s bills. More importantly, it shows that there are many different ways to be a “member” of Congress, and throughout history, lawmakers have taken a wide variety of approaches to employing the power of Congress.
mayhew is often regarded as the doyen of congressional political science, as you say. Can you tell us about other key ideas that his work has contributed to our understanding of the institution?
Congress: The electoral connection ingrained a fundamental fact about Congress: Much of what members do is react to what’s happening in their districts to ensure they’ll get re-elected. it is a fundamental fact, but we must remember it as we try to figure out why different members are doing what they are doing on our big issues. Using rational choice, Mayhew opened up the basic dynamics that guided legislative behavior (although it has greatly expanded its scope over time).
Divided We Rule is also a fantastic book; It went against the conventional wisdom that when the government has been divided, when the congress is controlled by one party and the presidency is in the hands of the other party, it becomes paralyzed. mayhew shows that historically this is not true. it’s classic mayhew: take something we all think is true and destroy the myth. in periods of divided government, such as the early 1970s, for example, many important laws often come from the institution.
Mayhew also wrote an excellent book on party realignment. conventional wisdom held that when elections brought new coalitions to power, politics and congressional policies changed; The classic example cited was the 1932 election. It showed that this theory was exaggerated. In most of his books, he embraces conventional wisdom and undermines what we thought we knew about Congress. his most basic contribution was to show that while we think of congress as a dysfunctional institution that does nothing, it is actually quite the opposite.
a eric schickler, disjointed pluralism: institutional innovation and the development of the united states. congress.
schickler is a historical political scientist; use archives, as a historian does. he pioneered a way of writing about congressional history from a political scientist’s point of view. he offers some of the best analytical work we have on the institution.
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He shows that to understand the congress, you cannot simply look at the political moment. disjointed pluralism looks at different periods of congressional reform, such as the early 20th century and the 1970s, and shows that during reform periods, we generally don’t get rid of the old system. reforms overlap other reforms. we continue to build and sell the system.
“reforms overlap other reforms. we continue to build and sell the system.”
is a great story of congressional reform, and it has this compelling explanation for why we have the system we built. Whereas many political scientists tried to find single causal arguments to explain what motivates reformers in a given period, Schickler takes a more historical approach by presenting the multiplicity of goals at a given time, which explains why the different outcomes of reform reform often have contradictory effects. . his is an understanding of the different motivations built into any reform period, and the essential messiness of what is left behind.
schickler seems to see congress as a dynamic institution rather than a static one. what makes it so?
The way Congress works is not set in stone. the constitution does not establish the organization of the congress beyond the basic requirements for election and the bicameral system of a senate (with two members per state) and a chamber (with representation distributed according to population). furthermore, congressional committees are not in the constitution, but they are crucial to the way congress does its job. You won’t find filibuster in the constitution: it was created as a way to deal with issues in the Senate while allowing the voice of the minority to be heard.
Because many of the practical aspects of the congress procedure are left to the parties and the institution, the congress changes at different times. can an average member propose amendments to the legislation or just party leaders? the answers to questions like that are subject to changing rules. This is why Schickler is so right: you have to go back decades, if not centuries, to understand the institution. at any given time, you can see many layers that were placed in earlier times.
He then recommends a new title, Yale historian Joanne Freeman’s Field of Blood.
It’s a great, great, great book. it’s one of those one-point contributions that is nonetheless really important and really revealing. the point of the book is that in the 19th century, congress was an incredibly contentious place.
Nowadays, we think parties can’t get along, but in the 19th century, tensions were so bad that members physically fought on the floor of Congress. they had guns. American schoolchildren learn the famous story of southerner Preston Brooks flogging abolitionist Charles Sumner on American soil. Senate on slavery, but we are taught that it was an anomaly. freeman shows that the level of brutality was common in congress during the time surrounding the civil war. tensions over slavery brought Congress to the point of total dysfunction in the mid-19th century.
The book is well written and brings the conference to life through these stories. it opens up an understanding of the violent nature of life on the floor in these decades that has generally been left out of the history books. freeman conveys the flavor of the flat in a way that very few people can, which is why I put the book on the list.
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Are tensions in Congress a product of larger problems or the cause of them? you can’t really untangle the two. that’s something that’s been true throughout American history.
When there are fights in Congress, whether it’s physical fights or just partisan fights, it often reflects the tension that exists outside the capitol. therefore, it is important to always put the congress in the context of the moment you are studying. In the period Freeman writes about in the Field of Blood, the tension on the ground reflects broader sectional tensions that were tearing the union apart.
Robert Caro’s exhaustively detailed, Pulitzer-winning Senate Master is next on his list. why did you choose this?
I always tell people that this is one of the first books to read if you’re really interested in the history of Congress. It’s a wonderful book, the third part of Caro’s multi-volume biography of President Lyndon Johnson that focuses on his time as Senate Majority Leader.
It’s also a splendid history of the Senate itself. he has a section that takes you through the organization of the senate, showing the power that individual senators always had in that institution, and some of the weaknesses that the parties had because of their design. explains all the arcana, like where the filibuster came from and why it’s so essential to understanding how the upper house works.
“Congress is not an institution that naturally lends itself to a clear narrative”
lays out that history so the reader can see how lyndon johnson reorganizes the democratic party to overcome fragmentation. Johnson amassed his own power as he began to control the Senate more. then, as he reads a fascinating account of the individual, he comes to understand the congress.
caro uses her tools as a journalist and general non-fiction writer, like joanne freeman, to bring the institution to life. It’s not just about roll call votes; it’s real people, real conflicts and real drama. this is incredibly difficult to do. As I said, Congress is not an institution that naturally lends itself to a neat narrative. this is what makes his achievement so remarkable.
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history remembers johnson as a “teacher of the senate”. how does current senate majority leader mitch mcconnell deserve to be remembered? how important is he?
You can argue that Mitch McConnell is just as important, if not more so, than President Trump. Borrowing Mayhew’s joke about Sen. Wagner and FDR, McConnell finally found a president who would send him his judges and tax cut legislation.
“mitch mcconnell is as important, if not more so, than president trump.”
The Republican Party’s protection of President Trump is thanks to McConnell. McConnell has tight control over the Senate. he has led the majority in a very disciplined and very ruthless way. he has made sure, at least so far, that members don’t defect because of their happiness with the president. And because of McConnell’s control, we’ve seen consequential changes under him, most dramatically with the federal courts. So, McConnell is someone we’ll be focusing on in congressional history and someone who will be remembered as incredibly important.
Ending on a less than optimistic note, you recommend that it’s worse than it seems: how the US constitutional system collided with the new politics of extremism by think tank scholars norman ornstein and thomas e mann.
norm ornstein and thomas mann are a great team. they have been writing and commenting on Congress for decades. they are really easy to listen to and fun to read. they know how to explain what is happening to a lay audience. most importantly, they are always very balanced in their coverage. they give you a long-term perspective of what is happening. they are very believers in bipartisanship and good government.
“The changes in Congress are not, as is often heard in the news, symmetrical between parties. in the last two decades, the Republican party has moved much more to the right than the Democrats have moved to the left”
wrote this book arguing that not only is Congress pretty broken right now, which is conventional wisdom, but also that changes in Congress are not, as is often heard in the news, symmetric across parties. in the last two decades, the Republican party has moved much further to the right than the Democrats have moved to the left. Looking at roll calls, speeches, history, and interviews, they conclude that extremism is much more pronounced in the Republican Party than it is in the Democratic Party. this is what social scientists call asymmetric polarization.
This is an important book whose publication was a remarkable event. Many journalists portray the problems in Congress as the product of both sides. For these two prominent and unbiased political pundits to come out and say that extremism is much more pronounced on one side had a huge impact, including on how Congress is covered. since it came out, there has been much more space in the public sphere, though not enough, to point to the ways in which the modern republican party advances the current tenor in washington.
The central thesis seems to be that Republicans, under the leadership of McConnell and House Speaker Paul Ryan, were “more loyal to the party than to the country.” But this thesis seems outdated under the leadership of President Donald Trump. Some argue that the leaders of the 115th Congress were loyal to the President at the expense of both the country and the Republican Party. Would you agree that the 115th Congress was exceptionally sycophantic?
I don’t think it’s outdated. Like you said, Mann and Orenstein show that partisan pull on how Republicans behave in Congress grew stronger, starting with Newt Gingrich in the 1980s and during the Tea Party era.
So the question is: is your allegiance to President Trump, or is President Trump simply a reflection of where the party is today? I think true loyalty is to the party, in the end. the modern republican party produced triumph instead of vice versa. they created a massive opening for Trumpian politics. What keeps Republicans at bay is not their love for Trump, but their belief that it benefits the party. the fact that they are often not as far apart as some claim is also essential.
The Republican Party has moved to the right on many issues. Trump is not an outlier. though it broke with the GOP on trade, it actually reflects where the party has moved in the past decade on immigration, gun control, climate change, and more. the party has become much more extreme. Since Gingrich, which is the subject of my next book, they have also been willing to break basic procedures and rules in pursuit of partisan power. so your thesis holds up well.
Fault Lines, his most recent book with Kevin Kruse, alerts readers to the cracks that undermine American government.
is a narrative history of American politics beginning in the 1970s and continuing to the present day. Kevin Kruse and I focused on four big areas of division. First, partisan division: the movement of parties away from each other. second, the economic divide: the divide between rich and poor, which became more acute during this period. the insecurity of the middle class is also part of that story.
third, division over race. the civil rights movement shifts more of its attention from the 1970s to institutional racism, such as how race works in the criminal justice system, creating a new era of bitter divisions. The return in recent decades of white nationalism in American politics has also brought to the surface overt expressions of racism that many citizens hoped were a thing of the past.
Finally, the fault lines around gender and sexuality raised by the conservative movement, the feminist movement, and the gay rights movement have become major forces in conflict. Those are the four areas of division that we focus on in telling the country’s story, from the time President Nixon resigned in 1974, to today.
what will we learn about the congress by reading the fallas?
changes in the republican party are a big part of our history. Regarding Republicans, we take the ideas of Ornstein and Mann and provide the full story of how the party has moved so far with procedural warfare and congressional politics. we finished a draft before trump was the candidate, then added a chapter on his presidency. but we clarify that his success rests on a previous turn in the Republican party. To understand the changes in the direction of American politics, even more than the presidency, you have to look at Congress.
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