Achieving Bipartisanship

The Center on Congress and the Close-Up Foundation joined together to produce the third in a series of programs, airing on the C-SPAN television network.

The program, "Achieving Bipartisanship" aired on C-SPAN on February 16, 2001.

Featured guests were former Representative Lee Hamilton, now Director, Center on Congress, who represented Indiana in the House for 34 years and former Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan, who represented New York for 24 years. The Moderator was John Milewski, of the Close-Up Foundation.

They spoke to the Close-Up student audience about the role of bipartisanship in passing successful laws, and answered their many questions. Excerpts from the program follow.

Moderator: We have two former Members of Congress with us today to discuss the concept of bipartisanship. And it would be good to first define the term. What is bipartisanship?

Moynihan: One definition would be two parties opposed to each other's positions, but working together in the national interest. Bipartisanship is good only in certain circumstances. For the most part, I think you want the clash of ideas - you get the best from both that way. It's good for certain issues that rise above the usual parties. For example, there is an effort underway now for a national commission on election process reform, headed by former Senator Howard Baker, a Republican and former President Jimmy Carter, a Democrat. That would be a good idea for a topic that requires bipartisanship.

Hamilton: There will be episodes of both partisanship and bipartisanship cooperation. Partisan clashes will stop some enactments. But given the narrow margins in the 107th Congress, the measures that get enacted will be enacted only because there is a level of bipartisan cooperation. But in the end, the bipartisan agreements that work are those where no one can say they won and no one can say they lost - everyone got at least something.

Moynihan: If you want to accomplish something big, you need to compromise big. In our system, both the President and the Congress are needed to get a law. Here is story of a failed bill due to a failure to cooperate between the President and the Congress. The Clinton Administration's health-care program was all over the minute the President declined to work on the issue across party lines - in the face of an offer by Senator Bob Dole to have a bipartisan bill. He said he would not compromise on his bill - according to David Gergen's book, "Eyewitness to Power" - and the health care bill died at that moment.

Hamilton: In a very recent study by the Brookings Institution, they listed the 50 greatest enactments of Congress: laws that directly relate to the daily lives of people, all of them were as a result of bipartisanship cooperation - the Marshall Plan after World War II, Medicare, Civil Rights legislation.

Moynihan: My example would be the effort to rescue Social Security in the 1980's. The system was going to go bust. The Majority Leader, Bob Dole, a Republican, had written an opinion piece for the New York Times that morning. I walked over to him and said if you really believe what you wrote, I think we can work something out on Social Security. Five days of negotiation later, we had a bill and we saved the social security system. It was that chance encounter that led to cooperation to save social security - never underestimate the power of chance to get things done.

Audience: Do you think bipartisanship restricts your freedom of speech?

Hamilton: I don't think bipartisanship restricts your freedom of expression. I think what a legislator confronts is the conflict between pragmatism and pure principle. Your view of policy may not attract 218 votes in the House nor 51 in the Senate. That means you may have to change some things in your bill you would rather not give up in order to get the votes you need. You may have to decide whether or not to be practical and accepting adjustments in the bill achieved through compromise or whether to hold out for policy perfection. That's not giving up my freedom of speech, it's deciding whether or not a bill that has changed significantly from where it started should still be supported.

Audience: Do you think that bipartisanship will shortchange the different points of view among the American people?

Hamilton: We had 130 million people in America about 50 years ago, and now we have 280 million people. With the doubling of population of our nation has come enormous diversity. House of Representatives does reflect the American people in all their disagreement and diversity better than any other institution today. We have learned that different caucuses, like the women's, Hispanic, or Black caucuses, have to be contacted. We have to listen to the different voices and reflect their diversity in drafting legislation.

Moderator: Don't the electorate want conflicting things? They want to see strong advocacy on behalf of their issues but they don't like to see the confrontations that develop as a result, which they view as partisan bickering.

Hamilton: They may not appreciate fully enough the role of vigorous debate. We do have sharp exchanges but then we get down to the business of seeking an agreement. Members of Congress are supposed to give voice to the conflicts in the nation about issues. But debate is not nearly as confrontational as in the Congress of the 19th century when it was not at all unusual for Members to bring guns and weapons on the floor and sometimes they used them against each other.

Audience: What areas do you think will produce bipartisan progress?

Hamilton: I think there is a good chance we'll get an education bill, an election reform bill, and maybe even a tax cut and a patients' bill of rights, some foreign policy issues like funding for the Middle East peace process may come out of this Congress. In the presidential debates, Gore and Bush were mainly in disagreement on the margins of the issues rather on the core of the issues themselves. Although the recent election showed the electorate was closely divided, that is not the same as being deeply divided. I think the differences are manageable.

Moderator: Do you think any group of Members more than any other might be prone to compromise: any key players?

Hamilton: Members of Congress know that their business is to get bills passed and enacted into law. It's not a question of one Member being more bipartisan than any other. On different issues, different Members will step forward to propose bipartisan compromises.

Moynihan: There are about 30 Senators who have formed an informal centrist coalition who try to get their colleagues to see things from their moderate point of view, and they meet regularly.

Moderator: Are the mechanisms for achieving bipartisanship in Congress institutional or informal?

Moynihan: Institutional, in the committees. They work things out in committee.

Hamilton: There are structures in the Congress, I agree, but also informal ones like the conversations in the cloakrooms and elsewhere between individuals who are willing to work together.

Moderator: Any issues which will be especially partisan, avoiding bipartisan cooperation?

Moynihan: My answer lies in Dean Swift's Gullivers Travels. The Low-Heelers vs. the High-Heelers or the Big-enders vs. the Little-enders. If there wasn't an issue for disagreement, they found one! So those issues will always be there or human nature will create them. The best solution would be to keep moral issues that can't be compromised out of politics alltogether.

Hamilton: Abortion, gay rights - even in issues like that you can see some progress toward cooperation. Even though there is no agreement, you can get a better understanding over time of the other guy's point of view so there is more conversation, and you can maybe compromise around the margins of the issue: like parental notification in abortion or a ban on one type of abortion, like partial-birth abortions. They are also controversial but not as controversial as the core of the issue.

Audience: Do you think Democrats or Republicans are better at compromise? Don't you think President Clinton and the Democrats won more than they lost?

Hamilton: I don't think you can say either party is better at it. It depends on the issue and the how the players on that issue work things out.

Moynihan: Oh sure, the Republicans caved into the Democrats and President Clinton! When he came in Democrats controlled the House, the Senate, and the White House. Now look at it! Republicans control the House, the Senate, and the White House! Who gave into who here??

Audience: Where is the line between holding to principle and compromising on policy?

Hamilton: That's the tough call for everyone. I don't think any Member feels he can compromise on fundamental principle but they do recognize that you may have to compromise on lesser matters in a bill. There are some instances where you feel you just can't compromise on a bill and you have to give up your support for it. Other times you accept adjustments that in an ideal world you would not accept, but you do it to get a product.

Audience: What about standing for something and being passionate about your views? Don't voters prefer that in candidates?

Moynihan: Passion is how you get nominated and how you get elected. But look what passionate unyielding leaders have cost us in lives in the last century: Stalin, Hitler, Mao - the bloodiest century because it was total victory or nothing for those passionate leaders.

Hamilton: There is a place for passion in political views. But if you can't compromise you may be passionate and yet get nothing done. You may have to modify your passion and accept a half-loaf because there are not the votes to get a whole loaf. James Madison was asked, as the key author of the Constitution, what made it a great document. And he answered there were 3 things: compromise, compromise, and compromise.

Audience: Is the recent contested presidential election going to help or harm efforts at compromise?

Hamilton: Both. Because of the even election, there will be pleas for bipartisanship and cooperation and a determination to have that attitude govern but the same narrow election will also fuel some passions, depending on the issue. It will cut both ways.