Abraham Lincoln may be President Barack Obama’s favorite predecessor, but in his early White House days his recipe has been two parts Franklin D. Roosevelt with a dash of Ronald Reagan. As time goes on, it appears he’s even more likely to follow the FDR model.
That’s only partially because Messrs. Obama and Roosevelt share the Democratic label and its accompanying philosophy, even though the dominant party mindset is very different today than it was in the 1930s and 1940s.
Mr. Obama’s path is the product of two more important factors: Like FDR, he has a Congress strongly controlled by his own party, and the nature of the economic challenge is more like what America faced in the 1930s than at the start of the Reagan era in the early 1980s.
Although Mr. Obama talks bipartisanship, his Capitol Hill allies see the large Democratic majorities as the public’s proxy to enact their agenda and are under no illusion that meaningful compromise with their Republican colleagues is necessary, achievable or desirable.
By necessity, Mr. Reagan needed and received Democratic votes in Congress to pass his programs because Republicans never controlled both houses of Congress during his terms.
Presidents Roosevelt, Reagan and Obama each inherited horrific economies.
Fundamental Differences
FDR and Mr. Reagan guided the U.S. through those especially difficult years and were the two best presidents of the 20th century, most historians agree, even though they were philosophical opposites. But the economic crises they faced were fundamentally different, as were their responses.
FDR inherited a deflationary environment that reduced the cost of goods and services while massive unemployment left consumers unable to spend the nation back to prosperity. He changed the nature of the federal government’s relationship to the American people and its economy, giving it new and sweeping powers.
Mr. Roosevelt’s response included public works programs on a scale never before contemplated in the U.S., a greater and in some cases revolutionary regulation of business, and the expansion of government’s role in everyday life.
Whether FDR’s “New Deal” led to the economic revival that did not really occur until World War II, 10 years later, is the subject of much debate these days. But history has long given him credit for the eventual recovery.
When Mr. Reagan took office in 1981, the nation’s economic problem was the opposite of what it had been under Mr. Roosevelt. Double-digit inflation had forced up interest rates and caused businesses to lay off workers. Mr. Reagan’s solution was also the opposite of FDR’s – tax cuts and reductions in domestic spending, which forced down interest rates and got the economy back on track within three years. He did, however, increase military spending.
The part of the Obama stimulus package consisting of tax cuts was the part he borrowed from Mr. Reagan. But, because the economic morass these days is more like 1932 than 1980, the initial Obama response – the stimulus package – is tilted toward FDR-type solutions.
Reversing Spending Trends
Although it does contain some tax cuts, the legislation signed Tuesday by Mr. Obama represents a reversal of the trend of recent decades by beefing up money for food stamps, child care, help for the homeless and education funding for low-income students. It also makes some of its tax cuts refundable – which means that many people who don’t pay taxes will get a check back anyway. Many conservatives see that as back-door welfare. In addition, the Obama White House’s rhetoric, which has been sharply critical of Wall Street, is reminiscent of FDR’s railing against the “economic royalists.”
One of the larger questions of the 2008 presidential campaign had been whether as president, Mr. Obama would be able to govern in a bipartisan manner, as he claimed he would. After all, the nonpartisan National Journal rated his voting record as the most liberal in the Senate.
Mr. Obama’s call for bipartisanship — something popular with the American people but largely nonexistent on Capitol Hill — has benefited him politically. Even on the eve of the stimulus votes when he knew more Democrats (seven) would vote against it than Republicans (three) for it, he maintained: “I hope they act in a bipartisan fashion.”
Sen. John McCain, who angered many fellow Republicans after the election by calling for the GOP to work with the new Democratic president, said that was now impossible because Mr. Obama’s stimulus plan “doesn’t meet any test of bipartisanship.”
Less than a month into the Obama presidency it has become clear bipartisanship will be as much a pipedream for Mr. Obama as it was for George W. Bush and Bill Clinton before him — and for FDR more than 70 years ago.
Like FDR, Mr. Obama plans to use his congressional majorities – and public support in the polls – to enact his agenda.
Rep. Steny Hoyer of Maryland, No. 2 in the House Democratic leadership, states the obvious: “The conventional wisdom is that bipartisanship is not dead, but on life support.”
http://blogs.wsj.com/capitaljournal/2009/02/17/obama-follows-fdrs-path-to-economic-recovery/?mod=googlenews_wsj">source
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