GOP-Led 108th Congress Ends With Mixed Results

When Republicans took control of the Senate and added to their majority in the House two years ago, they had high hopes for what a GOP-dominated government could achieve.

“The American people have indicated that they want the Congress

So what happened?

Congress frequently got tangled up in partisan politics and, as lawmakers rushed to get out of town and campaign for reelection, they left behind a long list of things that did not get done.

The Congress that was elected two years ago got off to a rocky start when Lott was forced to resign as Senate Republican leader in December 2002 after saying the country would have been better off if segregationist Strom Thurmond had been elected president in 1948. Asked the other day what had happened to his hopes for a long record of accomplishments after the Republican takeover, he responded:

“I said that? Let me see, what is the official line? Oh yes, Democratic obstructionists blocked us.”

“Unprecedented obstruction,” added Sen. Bill Frist (R-Tenn.), who succeeded Lott as the Senate Republican leader.

To which Rep. Robert Menendez (D-N.J.) replied: “Only in Washington would Republicans, who control everything -- the White House, the House and the Senate -- blame Democrats, who control nothing, for all of their failures.”

Congress approved just four of 13 regular spending bills for the new fiscal year, which began Oct. 1. The rest of the government is operating on stop-gap spending authority that will expire Nov. 20.

Lawmakers failed to approve a variety of President Bush’s priorities, including an energy bill, a measure to cap liability awards for medical malpractice and other bills to curb what some consider excessive litigation against businesses. They approved their sixth temporary extension of highway programs and eighth temporary extension of welfare programs because they couldn’t agree on final bills.

“This Congress may be more readily defined by what they have failed to finish than what was actually completed,” said Keith Ashdown, who monitors Congress for the watchdog group Taxpayers for Common Sense.

To be sure, the 108th Congress, which took office at the beginning of 2003, did pass a number of major laws. Foremost among them was one granting a prescription drug benefit to Medicare recipients.

There was a $350-billion tax cut that included reductions in income tax rates; tax relief for married couples and families with children; and cuts in dividends and capital gains taxes.

Congress enacted Bush’s plan for thinning forests to reduce wildfire risks and a measure that makes it a separate crime to harm a fetus during the commission of a violent federal crime against a pregnant woman. Finally, Congress adopted a prohibition against a late-term abortion procedure.

Most of these bills were passed last year, and three federal courts have branded the abortion prohibition as unconstitutional. This year, Congress’ biggest achievement was extending Bush’s most popular middle-class tax cuts.

On the highest-profile issue of the year, the House and Senate have passed different versions of legislation to overhaul the nation’s intelligence services. Congress hopes negotiators from the two chambers can forge a compromise so that the full House and Senate can come back to approve, and Bush can sign, a bill before the Nov. 2 elections.

Even that won’t write this Congress’ last chapter. Congress will probably have to reconvene after the election for a lame-duck session, if for no other reason than to pass a giant spending bill to keep the government going.

In recent weeks, Congress took votes on measures that its leaders knew were going nowhere -- largely to send election-year messages to voters.

The House voted down a bill to revive the draft, and both chambers killed a constitutional amendment to ban same-sex marriage.

“As we got closer to election day, the Republicans in Congress began to play more and more to their base,” said Eric Uslaner, a University of Maryland political science professor. “The leadership focused its attention on the issues that they knew would never become law but that reinforce the party’s support among social conservatives.”

Marshall Wittmann, a senior fellow at the centrist Democratic Leadership Council, said the crowning achievements of Republicans in this Congress were “one of the greatest expansions of the welfare state in the Medicare drug bill and a ballooning of the federal deficit. The era of big government is back, and the conservative revolution is kaput.”

Congressional Republicans blame the Senate, where the 51 Republicans, although in the majority, have difficulty attracting the 60 votes they need to overcome filibusters.

In some cases, however, legislation has been stymied within Republican ranks by ideological and even personality conflicts.

A case in point: a split between House and Senate Republicans over how much the country can afford for highways.

“There’s such a polarized atmosphere in town that very little gets passed,” said Rep. George P. Radanovich (R-Mariposa). “Even though we have a majority, we don’t have it filibuster-proof.”

Republican leaders are already talking about the next Congress the way Lott spoke about the one just ending.

“There’s more to be done,” Sen. George Allen (R-Va.) said recently. “And I am hopeful that when we come back next year, we’ll have a reinforced majority who will actually want to do things that are constructive and positive for the American people, rather than petty, partisan obstructionism and negativity.”