Transcripts For CSPAN3 Discussion On The Past Century In Con

That because of our strength, the power of our banks, all we americans have to do if Congress Rejects this plan is return to the bargaining table, puff out our chests and demand a better deal. Ive heard one critic say he would use sanctions to give iran a choice between having an economy or having a nuclear program. Well, folks, thats a very punchy sound bite, but it has no basis in reality. As dick said, i was chair of the Foreign Relations committee when our party came across to enact round after round of economic sanctions against iran. Remember, even the toughest restrictions didnt stop Irans Nuclear program from speeding ahead. From a couple of hundred centrifuges to 5,000 to 19,000. Weve already been there. If this agreement is voted down, those who vote no will not be able to tell you how many centrifuges iran will have next year or the year after. If its approved, we will be able to tell you exactly what the limits of irans program will be. The fact is that it wasnt either sanctions or threats that actually stopped and finally stopped the expansion of Irans Nuclear activities. The sanctions brought people to the table, but it was the start of the negotiating process and the negotiations themselves recently concluded in vienna that actually stopped it. Only with those negotiationiran get rid of its spock pile of 20 enriched uranium. Only with those negotiations did it stop installing more centrifuges and cease advancing the iraq reactor. Only then did it commit to be more forthcoming about iae access and negotiate a special arrangement to break the deadlock. So, just apply your common sense. What do you think will happen . If we say to iran now, hey, forget it, the deal is off, lets go back to square one, how do you think our negotiating partners, all of whom have embraced this deal, will react . All of whom are prepared to go forward with it, how will they react . What do you think will happen to that multilateral sanctions regime that brought iran to the bargaining table in the first place . The answer is pretty simple. The answer is straightforward. Not only will we lose momentum we built up in limiting iran in nuclear activities, well almost surely start moving in the opposite direction. Secretary of state john kerrys speech at national skugs center begins at 8 00 eastern and its part of our Program Related to the iran nuclear agreement. Also a Senate Armed Services Committee Hearing from late july, plus well show you floor speeches by majority leader mitch mcconnell, and dick durbin. Congress has until september 17th to vote on a resolution disapproving the iran agreement. Both the house and the senate will be back on tuesday, september 8th and they plan to debate the iran nuclear deal. And the senate plans to begin debate on a disapproval resolution of the iran agreement on the day they return. The house is not currently scheduled when they would consider a similar resolution. Earlier today maryland democrat barbara mccull ski announced she supports the agreement and that gives president obama at least 34 votes to sustain a president ial veto. Institute Congressional Research Service Recently released a report called the evolving congress over how the legislative branch has changed and the future of the u. S. Congress. The Bipartisan Policy Center hosted this discussion about the report. Good morning. I think were going to get going here. Thank you all for coming. My name is john fortier, director of the Bipartisan Policy Center democrat project. Im here with a great collection of scholars on the u. S. Congress. Were here with a number of hosts. We, the bipartisan poeflt center, are a host. John sides, wholy turn to soon, president of the Political Science center, is also hosting this with us. Were here for a purpose, to celebrate and investigate the release of a series of essays on Congressional Research center and scholars on congress. That is entitled the evolving congress. Now, many of you know the good work that crs does. For some of you, you may not see it as much because, of course, crs works very closely with the congress. Its there to help our senators and representatives, to advise them, to give them background information. This is a document that is publicly available. And while ill wave it up here. It does not have the flashy cover. We will be talking about the movie rights, which youre negotiating soon. But could be found, if you so chose, at the Government Printing office online. With, again, a series of essays with the evolution of congress. How congress has changed in a number of ways. Thats what were going to be discussing today. I will do quick introductions of our panel. We certainly are going to talk amongst ourselves and then were also looking to open up to you. In the audience i know we have an even greater wealth of knowledge about congress. Lets begin. First, my comoderator and cohost, john sides, who is if you read your bios, not a professional staff member from the House Foreign Affairs committee. Thats an error. But has many wears many hats. Is associate professor of politics at George Washington university. One of the founders and contributors of the monkey cage. A Political Science blog with the washington post. And author of numerous pieces on campaigns and various attitudes towards institutions. So, im going to turn it to john shortly to my left, Colleen Shogan is the Deputy Director of the Congressional Research service. Shes an accomplished political scientist and scholar as well as somebody who has worked on capitol hill, combining, you know, Practical Knowledge and her scholarly knowledge and then also at crs, as i say, is the Deputy Director of the institution. One of the organizers of this collection. Next to colleen is john haskell, assistant director of Congressional Research service. Also a political scientist who has written, author of books like fundamentally flawed. Defence of legislative politics. A textbook on congress, congress in context. To my left, my colleague at the Bipartisan Policy Center, Don Wolfensberger, a scholar there, also a scholar at Woodrow Wilson institute. Hes had a long history on capitol hill as the staff director of the House Rules Committee, and staffer on the House Rules Committee for many years. Both in the majority and minority and a little bit in the majority. Also ran the congress project at the Wilson Center for a number of years. And thinks and writes about congress as well, including his Book Congress and the people deliberative democracy on trial. And then to sarah binder, who is both a scholar at the Brookings Institution as well as a professor at George Washington university. One of our experts on numerous things, but including the workings of the senate and the confirmation process and other topics. So, what were going to do it to john and then were going to hear from our Congressional Research service representatives, who will talk a little bit about the collection. Well have some reaction from don and sarah. Well have discussion here and then well turn it to you. So, john. Thanks, very much, john. Appreciate to be here. We appreciate the support of the Bipartisan Policy Center here. It has been in washington, d. C. Over 30 years. It is one of many regional Political Science associations here in the united states. In capsa, as we would say, represents not just washington but maryland and virginia, stretching even into West Virginia and pennsylvania. One of the things that were doing, and i think its illustrated here today, is to try to bring together the broader Political Science to die as practice in this community, which includes not just those of us with ph. D. S and people who have political sign experts and training and work in institutions like crs and other places. This was a really neat opportunity for us to put together a group of people that i think brings a real wealth of expertise, scholarly and otherwise, to this subject. The second thing we wanted to do with this event was to draw attention to the important work crs has done with this particular report. I think if youve followed congress, even in the very casual sense, its not hard to find yourself looking at graphs that show lots of things changing. A rise in the use of filibuster. Decline in the number of congressional staff. Decline of the number of laws being passed. A rise in the amount of money being spent on Congressional Elections. There was a phrase in Political Science from roughly the mid20th century that was the textBook Congress that we used to have. Basically, all the textbooks have been revised substantially since that point in time. Now, what we have is a congress that is very different. A Congress Certainly of the 50s and 60s, even the 1990s, so were very much in an era in which congress is evolving, for better or worse. This is a really useful opportunity for us to reflect on how its changed and to draw on the expertise crs brings to bear. Ill turn to colleen to introduce the report. Thank you. I want to thank the Bipartisan Policy Center, the National Capital area Political Science association, and certainly the National Press club today for hosting us to talk about the evolving congress. So, what im going to do just in a few minutes is to talk about why we decided to write this Committee Print at this particular moment in time. As john said, crs has one mission, which is to serve congress. We assist members in all aspects of their policymaking and representational functions. Because of this mission, we find ourselves on a daily basis, often, as you can imagine, in the weeds and facing a lot of deadlines. That work is entirely appropriate for crs because our unique mission to serve congress in its research functions, and for the research needs. The talented analysts and experts at crs also have the ability to look at the big picture. More specifically, we ask this question, how has the institution of congress changed over time . The evolving congress Committee Print is our attempt to answer this difficult question. Then the question becomes, why would Congress Want us to grapple with that particular question . The main reason i think is because if you want to examine a Political Institution, it makes sense to understand why development, why change has taken place. Theres a lot of pundits and some scholars out there who label congress, who label the legislative branch right now as dysfunctional or as broken. I think that comparing the contemporary Congress Today and and the lawmaking function of whats going on right now on clil, to the congress 30 years ago, 40 years ago or 50 years ago, without understanding fully how those59 representational a poli policymaking functions have changed does not provide a full answer to that question. In fact, its problematic. So it comes to this. If the incentives and decisionmaking structures have changed as political scientists, we know the institution and those who inhabit the institution will respond accordingly. The stark dichotomy of a Congress Today, a congress that functioned well in the good old days versus the contemporary congress that is supposedly failing, i think, misses the larger picture. Furthermore, its also help for members of congress to look at the institution in this with this perspective. Its also very helpful for them if they want to understand the institution in a larger historical and political environment to have easytoread, axe sccessible es to help them understand about the evolution of congress. I think some cynics would say that members of congress arent interested in those types of inquirying today and learning about the development of the institution. Both myself and john haskell, who will join me at the podium soon, we both know thats simply not correct. Its not a correct supposition to make. Lastly, i think the evolving congress was also written because it helps fill the void present today in academic Political Science. I recently attended the midwest Political Science Association Conference in chicago. I was looking at the panels that were presented over the three days in chicago. You flip through the program and decide what youre going to attend. It seemed to me that there were very few panels addressing the development and the history of institutions over time. I wasnt sure if it was just me looking at the program or not. I talked to my colleagues and friends at the conference. Yes, everybody concurred that that was the case. I think the study of american politics has moved away from a focus on answering very difficult, complex, messy questions, such as, how and why does congress evolve. There are certainly notable exceptions to my very generalized statement, for sure. But american politics seems to be today much more interested in finding very neat answers, using very sophisticated methodologies, to very small questions. I understand fully why this trend occurred in Political Science. However, it is shifted the focus of talented graduate students away from answering the most relevant and difficult questions that can be answered by our discipline. Let me be clear. Everybody in this room and everybody who works in politics knows that difficult political questions are not answered by tightly defined models. In real politics, causal arrows point in both directions. Causal relationships are over determined. These cant be completely discarded by political scientists. You cant just do whatever you want in your research. Its not giving you a license to discard social science methodology. They have to be accounted for and dealt with by political scientists, but that does not mean that that analysis should not be attempted or done. Legislators, in my opinion, look to scholars particularly for answers to the big questions, such as identifying the pressures affecting the development in the institution in which they serve. Crs, with smart analysts, trained largely in academia, but steeped in the daytoday workings of congress is uniquely positioned to answer these challenging inquiries about the future of representational democracy in the united states. So, thank you. And now i would like to be joined by john haskell, who is the person responsible for bringing this Committee Print to fruition. Of course, i second what colleen said, and we appreciate the opportunity to discuss the Committee Print. Not just with the distinguished group of panelists we have, but also were eager to hear your questions. I do request that any criticisms of the print be directed generically to john, and ill defer to the organizers of the panel, which are sides and fortier here. Our objective with the evolving congress was to provide perspective on the debates of the functioning of the institution. In other words, we wanted people to get the context right. In my view, the authors of the print there were, i think, 29 people involved in writing the print, all analysts at crs did an excellent job at just, that getting the context right. Kind of a kickoff to speaking intelligently, discussing intelligently potential reforms. Im going to do a brief summary of what i think they achieved. Im leaving out a lot. But i think they made they made at least three key contributions. First of all, we reminded people in the print that high levels of partisanship in congress are more than norm in u. S. History than the postworld war ii period of compromise and consensus that folks often harken back to. As an aside, i think its amusing and interesting to note that much of the informed thinking in the 50s and 60s, the heart of that postwar period, criticizes the dysfunctional system that people seem to look back at now nostalgically. As an undergrad i was assigned the dead lolock of congress and made that comparison. That was written in 1963. As many of you know, the apsa in the 1950s, i think its safe to say, ver vently advocated for something that might resemble parliamentary style or responsible party model. In any case, we cant wish away the way the party system has evolved and the way it is now. Second, crs pointed out how members lives and work have changed irrevocably due not just to the evolution of the parties but also Campaign Financing pressures, technology, social changes and really even the housing market. These changes particularly relate to the representational side of members jobs, although they also have an impact on the members legislative work. By the way, those changes we cant wish away either. Last but not l