NEWS ANALYSIS : After Heady Start, Congress Ends Year in Partisan Fight

It began in high spirits, amid the flood of patriotism that washed over the land, finally submerging traumatic memories of Vietnam, as America rolled to a spectacular victory in the Persian Gulf. It ended in partisan bitterness and open political warfare between Democrats and Republicans over crime, jobs and taxes as the nation treaded the rising waters of a recession.

Rarely in the history of Congress has there been such a dramatic mood swing between the anxious but heady air that prevailed at the start of the legislative year and the poisoned atmosphere pervading Capitol Hill at the end of it.

Lawmakers who came to Washington in January at the start of the 102nd Congress were filled with the solemn yet also intoxicating sense that they were making history as they gravely debated and finally gave President Bush the authority to wage war upon Iraq.

But as the legislative year drew to a close, with the House and the Senate rushing to finish work on priority bills before adjourning in time for Thanksgiving, what lawmakers mostly were making was histrionics.

“Unbelievably irresponsible!” huffed House Speaker Thomas S. Foley (D-Wash.) this week, referring to the support that Bush had just given to a GOP tax plan hatched at the last moment for the principal purpose--or so Democrats suspected--of embarrassing the opposition. “Higgledy-piggledy!” chimed in Rep. Charles E. Schumer (D-N. Y.) as reporters dutifully transcribed this delightful sound bite onto paper without stopping to consider whether it made any sense. “We (Democrats) are not going to fall into the trap of accepting the President’s higgledy-piggledy tax plan!”

Truth be told, the Republicans did not have a detailed plan--just the general outlines of one--but Bush’s challenge to Congress to pass it gave Democrats the opening they needed to retain the initiative on an issue they believed Bush was trying to seize from them on the eve of adjournment.

Although many members voiced dismay at the thought of cutting short their vacations, Foley’s threat to reconvene Congress after Thanksgiving to draft a competing tax plan bought the Democrats political insurance: If Bush starts bashing them too badly on the economy during the recess, they can now come back to Washington and return the fire.

Bush had begun the year looking like the political equivalent of Superman’s stronger brother. He had beaten back Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein and won the Cold War. His approval ratings in the polls were at legendary levels. There was no way, or so it seemed back then, that a Democrat could beat him in 1992. But then the economy worsened, Bush did not respond with a convincing domestic agenda, the Democrats grew bolder in their Bush-bashing and the mood in Washington grew meaner.

If grave matters of war and peace weighed heavily on the minds of lawmakers at the start of the 102nd Congress in January, the more prosaic affairs of partisan politics clearly ruled the roost by November, defining the parameters for a down and dirty debate over jobs, taxes, civil rights and crime on the eve of an election year.

Both sides took a confrontational approach. “The whole session,” House Minority Leader Robert H. Michel (R-Ill.) lamented on the final day, “seemed steeped in politics. It may well be a precursor for next year.” With Republicans and conservative Democrats sustaining him, Bush vetoed bills on abortion and unemployment benefits; none of his vetoes have been overridden and his record now stands at 24 to 0.

Although the threat of a veto hung over the debates on most major and even some minor bills, nowhere was the partisan brawling uglier or more obvious than in the hearings that preceded the Senate’s confirmation of Bush’s two most controversial nominees this year--Clarence Thomas to the Supreme Court and Robert M. Gates as director of the Central Intelligence Agency. Both were ultimately confirmed, but not before their reputations were heavily battered at grueling hearings that ended in calls for a reform of the entire confirmation process.

The Thomas hearings in particular were likened by many senators to a “political earthquake” whose aftershocks may be felt well into the 1992 campaign because of the anger expressed by women’s groups at the way Republicans treated Anita Faye Hill, the law professor who accused Thomas of sexually harassing her.

As to what was substantively accomplished during the legislative year, Democrats and Republicans predictably disagreed.

“We were not very effective,” Michel said. “Congress did not do its job.” Although he conceded, on the final day, that “more was done in the last 24 hours than we did in the whole year,” Michel complained that lawmakers dallied far too long on major legislation like the highway and mass transit bill, which finally cleared only hours before adjournment. “The most significant job-creating bill we’ve got has been pooping along here for far too long,” he said.

Senate Majority Leader George J. Mitchell (D-Me.) held a different view, however. “No one ever declared a baseball game over after the fourth inning or a basketball game over at halftime,” he said, noting that the 102nd Congress was now only at the midpoint in its two-year session. “You can’t judge the accomplishments fairly until Congress has completed the full (two) years. Final action on many items tends to occur late in the process and the foundation has been laid this year for a productive Congress” next year.

Both sides agreed that the Gulf War resolution vote at the beginning of the year and the transportation bill passed at the end of it were the high-water marks of the legislative season. But although political brawling sometimes obscured it, there were a number of other major accomplishments during the first half of the 102nd Congress. Among the bills Congress passed:

* A civil rights bill reversing several recent Supreme Court decisions that made it harder for victims of racial discrimination to sue their employers. For the first time, the bill also extended the right to sue for damages to women, disabled workers and members of religious minorities discriminated against for reasons other than race.

* Two bills to bail out the savings and loan industry--one to infuse the Resolution Trust Corporation with another $25 billion to keep it operating until next spring and another to replenish the nearly insolvent Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation by expanding its authority to borrow from taxpayers.

* Legislation to extend unemployment benefits by between nine and 13 weeks to workers without jobs because of the recession. A compromise achieved after lengthy and often acrimonious negotiations with the White House, the legislation contains a “reach-back” provision allowing unemployed workers whose benefits have already expired to receive the extensions.

* A $291-billion defense bill that, reflecting some of the changes brought about by the end of the Cold War, strictly limits production of the costly B-2 Stealth bomber and provides for a more modest deployment of the “Star Wars” anti-ballistic missile system. Also reflecting the end of the Cold War, Congress approved a $500-million aid package, financed from defense budget funds, to help feed and demilitarize the Soviet Union this winter.

“We got a hell of a lot of work done that people didn’t expect us to do,” said Rep. Vic Fazio (D-West Sacramento) in summing up the session. “It wasn’t always pretty,” he conceded, “but we got it done.”

Staff writers William Eaton and Paul Houston contributed to this story.