Abstract
In the last frantic days of the 105th Congress, President Bill Clinton used the negotiations over the Omnibus Appropriations bill–the $520 billion catch-all bill that encompassed numerous unpassed appropriations bills–to press for funding of key domestic social programs. In particular, he stubbornly bargained for additional funds to hire new teachers and rebuild crumbling schools.
Education proved to be a central issue for the president and Democrats in the 1998 mid-term elections. In his first six years in office, Bill Clinton has argued that the federal government should continue to play a critical role in addressing the country's needs, although a less important one than in the past. Most Republicans, on the other hand, campaigned on an anti-government message.
The public rendered its verdict on November 3. The president had successfully turned the budget debate toward Democratic issues and away from the Republicans' focus on Clinton's personal scandals and their opposition to government programs.
But to win extra funding for his priorities, the president had to give ground on military spending. After an overwhelming campaign by Republicans, defense contractors, and the Joint Chiefs of Staff, in September the president agreed to add about $1 billion to deal with what was portrayed as a military readiness crisis. The deal-making proceeded from that starting point. Former Speaker Newt Gingrich vowed that for every billion added for social programs, he would seek a billion for defense. By the time the bargaining was completed and the president signed the Omnibus Appropriations bill on October 21, Republicans had succeeded in hiking the military budget by $8.3 billion, including a billion dollars for missile defense and $1.5 billion for intelligence programs.
The tug-of-war between military and non-military programs will accelerate in 1999. The first struggle will be for the heart and soul of Bill Clinton. He has spoken of his desire to leave the country a better place by funding social priorities–while balancing the budget–but he also has a history of giving in to the demands of the military. In September 1998, the president agreed not only to add Pentagon funds in the last bill to be passed by Congress, but also to hike military spending in the budget to be submitted to Congress in February 1999.
Most key executive branch decisions for the fiscal 2000 budget had to be made in December. In the defense budget, the president had to decide whether to add as much as $25 billion to the previously slated total of $276 billion–as demanded by the Joint Chiefs–or whether to fund health, mass transit, housing, job training, education, and other programs. The results will not be known until February.
Sensitive to this timetable, budget priority groups mobilized after the election to pressure the president to come up with funds for “the tens of millions of people in this nation whose basic needs for education, health care, food, shelter, child care, clean air and water, and other essentials still are going unmet.” More than 100 national organizations–unions, educational groups, childrens' advocates, environmental, religious, and budget priority organizations–stressed that the “fiscal year 2000 budget is, symbolically and practically, the place to start” responding to long-deferred needs.
This year, the president and Congress will be operating under an overall budget cap of $574 billion. An important new factor is that the so-called “firewall” between domestic and defense programs will disappear in the fiscal 2000 budget–so funds could be moved from the Pentagon to social programs. But the pressure will be on for a flow in the opposite direction.
Politicians will also begin factoring in the new political dynamics after the 1998 election. In fact, the 106th Congress will look surprisingly like the 105th. Republicans expected to make major gains in both the Senate and House, but they wound up with a wash in the Senate and a five-seat loss in the House. They ended the campaign dispirited and determined to oust much of their leadership.
Bill Clinton had picked himself off the floor once again, and proved he was not yet ready to be labeled a lame duck–and Democrats were emboldened to push their key issues in the new Congress.
Writing appropriations bills and any other successful legislation will require extensive negotiations between Republicans and Democrats. Both the elevation of former House Appropriations Committee Chairman Bob Livingston of Louisiana to speaker, and the Republicans' bitter experience of leaving many key money bills to the last days of the 105th Congress, make it likely that those negotiations will take place earlier in 1999 than in 1998.
Another new ingredient is the success of the Pentagon hawks' campaign to shift the mood in Congress toward increased Pentagon spending. While few members of Congress were advocating military budget hikes at the beginning of 1998, by the end of the year many members of both parties were alleging serious military deficiencies that could only be made up by an infusion of money. At the end of 1998, there were few liberals or conservative budget hawks willing to oppose this tidal wave.
Another new factor is the willingness of both parties to disregard budget ceilings to fund their pet programs, especially after the government produced its first budget surplus in 30 years. To the dismay of budget hawks, the discipline of the 1997 balanced budget deal lasted about a year. Both parties agreed to exceed the budget ceiling by $20.8 billion, hiding behind the label “emergency spending” in the frenzied closing negotiations of the 105th Congress.
In light of these new elements, it is possible to make an educated guess about the outcome of the tug-of-war–a guess, not a prediction. Democratic liberals inside and out of the administration will push for more spending for their favored programs; Pentagon hawks will continue to decry the trend toward armed forces that are no longer in top fighting form. Meanwhile, Republican budget hawks will oppose increased spending on either side of the ledger, pressing instead for major tax cuts and reducing the long-term federal budget deficit. The president will try to split the difference. Familiar scenario? You bet.
When the end-game negotiations begin between the president and Congress, between Republicans and Democrats, both sides will see that the only way out of the impasse will be to junk the budget cap and add funds–perhaps on the order of several billions of dollars–for both military and social programs. Everyone will grouse about the absence of principle, but they will all get something out of the deal. Pragmatism rather than principle will rule–to the chagrin of many but the opposition of few.