We Are Experiencing Institutional Difficulties
Here at the League, Mark Thompson has written a great post detailing both a serious problem with our institutional arrangement and its potential solution. I’m not going to do much block-quoting (though I recommend reading the whole thing), but it suffices to say that Mark wants to make the presidency and Congress more accountable for their failures. That is, as it stands, even though legislation originates in and is written by Congress, the outsized role of the presidency means that in the public eye, it’s the president who is to blame for failed or ineffective legislation, even if the prerogative lies with the legislature. Mark’s solution then, is to nationalize elections for the Speaker of the House, in hopes that having a nationally recognized leader of the House would focus criticism where it rightly belongs. Here’s Mark in his own words:
The most obvious reason why this proposal would greatly reduce regulatory capture and the growth of Executive Power is that it would give voters someone to hold accountable specifically for the passage of legislation. Under our current system, narrow local interests are able to turn national legislation into little more than a giant rent-seeking operation, while the scope of the legislation becomes severely watered down. There is no one to hold accountable for this – if your district gets none of the rent-seeking, you have to be content with “well, it’s better than nothing,” or “well, at least my Congresslizard voted against it.”
Mark’s diagnosis focuses on the problem of accountability and I understand why: as long as its virtually impossible to hold Congress responsible for its failures, we will continue to play this silly game where we pretend that electing a new president will have some measurable effect on Congress’ ability to pass actual legislation, rather than the thinly veiled-giveaways to corporate or parochial interests that passes for legislation. That said, I’m not sure if increased accountability – through Mark’s solution or any other – should be our first concern. Before we try to steer Congress towards greater accountability, I think we should first attempt to steer Congress towards greater responsiveness. That potentially far-reaching legislation is nearly always tamed and de-fanged is partially (or even mostly) a product of the huge number of veto points that exist within our system, including extra-constitutional requirements like the filibuster.
November 2, 2009 14 Comments
I ain’t got time for this jibba jabba
No, I don’t think this is a failure of leadership so much as a feature of democratic politics — and a reminder of how unpleasant and unsatisfying to nearly everyone the business of politics can be.Democratic politics is a messy business. It’s disorganized and frantic and unpredictable and frustrating. Politics is a matter of shouting, and dissent, and deal-making, and strategy, and slippery rhetoric, and compromise. It is not a matter of deciding on the “right” policy and then making it so — even when your party controls the White House, the House, and the Senate.
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It’s not that people enjoy this; in fact, it seems to turn a lot of people off. As Robert Putnam wrote, “Most men are not political animals. The world of public affairs is not their world. It is alien to them — possibly benevolent, more probably threatening, but nearly always alien.” But to a large extent, the spasms and outbursts and irritations that come with the political process are inevitable — no matter who’s in charge, no matter what the polls and pundits and politicians say.
I am completely on board with the observation that democratic politics is a messy, unpleasant affair. But I’m not so sold on the implication Suderman’s post, which is that the current legislative gridlock is an unfortunate, but fundamentally acceptable, part of the democratic process. It isn’t acceptable, and more importantly, it isn’t inevitable. At its heart, the problem facing health care reform – and really, the problem facing any substantive change in domestic policy – is institutional. Congress is simply ill-equipped to deal with large, complex problems, a rule that goes double for anything requiring substantive changes to the status quo. That’s not to say that a few tweaks will suddenly turn Congress into a paragon of effective legislating – of course it won’t – but it is entirely within our power to make Congress a more effective vehicle for pursuing and implementing good public policy. And we need to begin by abandoning this absurd notion that there is something noble about having a deeply unresponsive and counter-majoritarian legislative branch.
August 19, 2009 46 Comments
