Changes in Congress

The Reagan years were marked by Presidential power over-shadowing the power of Congress, particularly in terms of issues related to the economy. While it is true that seniority and other forces of entrenchment protect incumbents and keep the power of Congress in certain hands, it is also true that the Congress is comprised of individuals who must be re-elected regularly. This means that, however arrogant they might become, they still smell the political winds and popular issues. When Reagan was elected by a landslide in 1980 over Jimmy Carter, the nation and Congress perceived that landslide as a mandate for Reagan's economic program.

Accordingly, for the most part, especially in the first term of Reagan's reign, the Congress buckled under and quickly passed whatever bills the President sent, knowing that if they did not pass them, they would have to answer to the people at the next Congressional election.

The weakness of Congressional leadership, under Democratic patriarch Thomas "Tip" O'Neill, helped Reagan push through whatever bills he desired in his radical makeover of the structure of American economics and society.

As we read in Power in Congress, published by Congressional Quarterly: "Given Reagan's popularity and the Republican gain of thirty-three House

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issued by Congress in an effort to avoid the horrors of the Vietnam era in which Presidents Johnson and Nixon ran roughshod over Congress in their efforts to wage any sort of war they wanted in Vietnam. The public debate over the Gulf War in Congress --- before the war actually began --- was certainly a good thing for democracy in the United States in general, and a good thing for Congress specifically, because it at least brought into the public spotlight the question of the power-sharing between Congress and the President on vital issues, and especially the issue of war. The War Powers Act which was passed in the wake of Nixon's term was designed to make sure that the President would not wage war on his own, or lie to the Congress (a la Johnson's Gulf of Tonkin Resolution) in order to gain its support about war. As it is, in fact, some of the most horrific accounts committed by Saddam Hussein's troops in Kuwait, given by a young girl in open testimony before Congress, were specifically manufactured to persuade the people and the Congress to support Bush's war policies. The girl turned out to be the daughter of the Kuwaiti ambassador to the United States, and she never witnessed the atrocities she weepingly claimed to have w
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Approximate Word count = 2084
Approximate Pages = 8 (250 words per page)

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