Congress and the Executive I

LBJ orders some pants.

The simulation manual

Make use of institutional memory:

• Fall 2016 Simulation
• Spring 2016 Simulation
• "House of Claremont" -- the 2014 simulation
• Blog posts and video of 2009 simulation
• Video of 2008 simulation

Article I and Article II

Hamilton in Federalist 8: "It is of the nature of war to increase the executive at the expense of the legislative authority."

LBJ and negotiation

Trump

Statements of Administration Policy

1— Strongly Support Passage
2— Support Passage
3— Do not Object to Passage
4— No Position on Passage
5— Oppose
6— Strongly Oppose
7— Secretary’s veto Threat (single and multiple agency)
8— Senior Advisor’s Veto Threat
9— Presidential Veto Threat

CQ on presidential success (see Thurber, pp. 14-15)

From CQ:

Of all Senate votes (117), 36 percent were taken with knowledge of where the president stood on the issue. For the Senate, that is the highest score for a president’s first year since Ronald Reagan’s 128 in 1981.

When nominations are weeded out, the Senate voted 23 times knowing Trump’s position (10 percent). But only 19.7 percent of Senate votes cast with the president’s stance known were not nomination votes, the second-lowest total in three decades.

Senate Republicans opened the floodgates for nominations, giving Trump 94 confirmation floor votes last year, compared to 44 for Obama in the last two years of his presidency while the chamber was under GOP control.