Divided We Stand
In his latest Against the Grain commentary, CBSNews.com's Dick Meyer points out the virtues of divided government.
I tend to make lots of wagers in election years, most of them just to be contrary. One I made confidently last year was that the party of the winning presidential candidate would not also seize control of both the House and Senate, regardless of whether Bush or Gore won.
I lost.
But now I've won! Divided government is back. And the federal government has returned to what has become its natural state of being for the past two decades: different parties in control of Congress and the White House.
United government in the 21st century lasted exactly 135 Republican days. Then Jim Jeffords jumped. And politics returned to usual.
The odds were always with me. In the 20 years since Ronald Reagan was inaugurated, one party managed to control both the White House and Congress for just two years, plus the past 135 days.
But in the 20-year period before Reagan, there were 12 years of one-party government. And one party controlled Washington for 28 of the 40 years from 1921 to 1961. Divided government was not rare, but it was definitely the exception. Now it's the rule.
The Washington Insider's view of the Jeffords Jump is simply that George W. Bush and Trent Lott blew it – big time. Case closed. The more common Outsiders' view, I think, is that Jeffords bolted out of principle when he saw his Republican party go too far right.
I take the Adam Smith view that Jeffords was lifted from the GOP by an invisible hand and dropped into the Independent column to restore the equilibrium of the political markets. Consumers, even the political consumers known as voters, ultimately get what they want, collectively and mysteriously. And they don't want one party to control Congress and the Oval Office.
But what specifically accounts for the prevalence of the increased demand for divided power in recent times?
The most toxic explanation is that voters are so soured on politicians, parties and politics that they dare not entrust government to a single clique. Another hypothesis says the lines between the parties are too blurred, that they both scramble for the middle and then exaggerate and bicker over minor disagreements. Sort of like Coke and Pepsi, which taste the same to most people, vying for market share with huge advertising budgets.
The beauty of divided government is certainly in the eye of the beholder. For many, it is a logical and intended result of the Constitution. But the usual portrait of divided government, at least in the media, perpetuates two myths: that it causes evil gridlock and that it creates weak presidents.
It doesn't. Gridlock isn't necessarily evil, or even lousy. No action is generally better than dumb action. Gridlock is automatically bad only to those convinced there is a Righteous Answer on every issue. For the est, gridlock can be a derogatory term for slow and sensible.
Regardless, divided government doesn't necessarily weaken presidents or ensure that they won't accomplish much. Ronald Reagan did fine, but he never had a Republican Congress. Jimmy Carter didn't do so fine, and he always had a Democratic Congress. George Bush the Elder never had a Republican Congress and didn't do well. Now George Bush the Younger gets a chance to do better.
And I still have to pay up on my bet.
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