American Politics Commons^™

Editor's Note, Padraig O'Malley

New England Journal of Public Policy

"Of all the difficulties facing the historian in his task of understanding and discussing the past, none can be greater than that of emphatically recreating the popular 'mood' defining any particular event or period," writes Paul Kennedy. This issue of the New England Journal of Public Policy is about mood and politics and how synergistic interplay of the two in recent years reflects both the national and local psyche.

Who Was That Woman I Didn't See You With Last Night?, Norman W. Merrill

New England Journal of Public Policy

The 1988 presidential campaign elicited numerous complaints about negative campaigning. But compared to the vicious rhetoric popular at the birth of the republic the rhetoric of the latest campaign was quite mild. Invective rhetoric was employed by the Founding Fathers, men like John Adams, Alexander Hamilton, and James Callender. The partisan press of the time contributed greatly to the harsh tone of politics. All participants felt free to make acerbic remarks directed at the man rather than the issue, a tradition that continued throughout the nineteenth century and into the twentieth. Many of the charges made by American politicians were …

Women, Politics, And The Nineties: The Abortion Debate, Susan Estrich

New England Journal of Public Policy

The fight for political empowerment of women may finally break wide open over the issues of reproductive freedom. This article posits that while public attention has focused on courtroom attempts to limit Roe v. Wade, the issues will ultimately be decided in the political arena. Here, Estrich says, the framer of the question may be the ultimate victor. For those on the pro-choice side of the debate, the next election cycle may be their first real opportunity to vote as a bloc and wield real political power.

Women And Power: Women In Politics, Cathleen Douglas Stone

New England Journal of Public Policy

Are women making progress in the political arena, or are their frustrations at access to elective office severe enough to warrant their own political party? This article examines the statistics and argues that women should seize political power by voting as a bloc. As loyalty to traditional parties declines while their interest in and sensitivity to social issues grows, the moment is right for a real increase in women's political power.

The Past As Prologue? What Past Industrial Conflicts Within The Gop Tell About The Future Of The Bush Administration, Thomas Ferguson

New England Journal of Public Policy

This article analyzes patterns of GOP campaign finance with an eye to the light they can shed on the future of the Bush administration. After flashing back to 1980 and 1984, it presents a detailed statistical breakdown of who contributed to whom in the 1988 GOP primary, based on a large and carefully constructed sample of top corporate executives and investors. The Dole campaign emerges as especially important for the clues it provides about the opponents of major changes in U. S. policy toward Eastern Europe and the USSR.

Editor's Note, Padraig O'Malley

New England Journal of Public Policy

For months on end we were subjected to the rituals of irrelevance: to posturing as patriotism, incoherence as eloquence, innuendo as nuance, character assassination as candor, sound-bites as substance, carefully memorized one-liners as expressions of spontaneity, self-righteousness as self-deprecation. Misstatement, outright fabrication, deliberate falsehood, and conscious distortion were spewed out by spin-masters, merchants of manipulation, propagandists, pollsters, shysters of the slick and technicians of the fast fix, all in the name of the democratic process. Nor were the two presidential candidates, Michael Dukakis and George Bush, themselves immune to the malaise, proving themselves extraordinarily adept time and again at not …

The Search For Voice: Ideology And Perspective In The Black Community, Phillip L. Clay

Trotter Review

During the last seven years, there has been a significant shift to the right in the ideological perspectives of Amencan political institutions and behavior. Despite some in consistencies, the direction is clear. The term “moderate” has acquired a conservative meaning, and liberals have been split into neo-liberal and neo-conservative camps. At this moment American society is informally declaring that it is not committed to achieving the goal ofequal outcomes long espoused by a mainly liberal national political and institutional system.

The shift to the right is working changes on traditional black ideological perspectives, both among blacks and between black and …

The "New" Black Neo-Conservativism: A Critique, James Jennings

Trotter Review

In this presentation, I will examine some of the general ideas, explanations and logic regarding black life conditions offered by a group of intellectuals who have come to be described as “Neo-Conservative.” I will not concentrate my critique on particular individuals, however; my focus will be primarily on the ideas and proposals that they have offered, especially those ideas that have been associated with public policy proposals.

In my opinion, the media and the scholarly community have focused too much on individuals, rather than examining closely and analytically the public policy ideas associated with Neo-Conservatism. I will seek to critique …

The Search For Voice: Ideology And Perspective In The Black Community, Phillip L. Clay

William Monroe Trotter Institute Publications

During the last seven years there has been a significant shift to the right in the ideological perspectives of American political institutions and behavior. Despite some inconsistencies, the direction is clear. The term "moderate" has acquired a conservative meaning, and liberals have been split into neo-liberal and neoconservative camps. At this moment American society is informally declaring that it is not committed to achieving the goal of equal outcomes long espoused by a mainly liberal national political and institutional system.

The shift to the right is working changes on traditional black ideological perspectives, both among blacks and between black and …

Trust, Self-Interest, And Representation In Economic Policymaking: Rhode Island Reconsidered, Thomas J. Anton, Darrell M. West

New England Journal of Public Policy

Industrial policy has become an increasingly central focus of political debate as American society struggles with new and troubling economic realities. Yet despite the importance of this subject, little is known about how the public gains or processes information on these matters, or about the evaluative standards used to judge industrial-policy proposals. A recent referendum in Rhode Island offered a unique opportunity to study these questions. Citizens participated directly in the debate over new industrial policy by soundly rejecting the Greenhouse Compact, a novel and comprehensive plan to "reindustrialize" Rhode Island. Here we report the results of a public opinion …

De Facto New Federalism: Phase Ii?, John Shannon

New England Journal of Public Policy

1985 marked year seven for de facto new federalism, the fiscal decentralization process nudged along by strong public support for the Reagan administration's conservative policies and growing fiscal stringency at the federal level. New federalism is most dramatically illustrated by the national government retreat along the entire state-local aid front — a kind of "sorting out" — as an increasing share of the federal budget goes to strictly national government programs. The mounting public concern about massive federal deficits will quicken the federal pullback on the state-local aid front. The only question is whether it will be a ragged retreat …

De Facto New Federalism And New England: A Discussion, Kenneth Curtis, Chester Atkins, Richard Licht, David Walker, Roger Porter

New England Journal of Public Policy

Using John Shannons paper as a broad frame of reference (see previous article), a panel discussion titled "The Changing Nature of FederalI State Relations: The Fiscal Impact on New England" took place on 18 November 1985 at the University of Massachusetts at Boston. The discussion was sponsored by the John W. McCormack Institute of Public Affairs and was presented in a roundtable forum. The members of the panel were Kenneth Curtis, former governor of Maine; Chester Atkins, member of Congress from the Massachusetts Fifth Congressional District; Richard Licht, lieutenant governor of Rhode Island; David Walker, professor of political science at …

Rhode Island: The Defeat Of The Greenhouse Compact, Ira Magaziner

New England Journal of Public Policy

Rhode Island has not shared equally in New England's economic resurgence of recent years. A major reevaluation of the state's economic malaise in 1982-84 resulted in a $250 million program called the Greenhouse Compact to improve business in the state. Initially supported in polls by a two-to-one margin, the Compact was defeated overwhelmingly when it went to a statewide referendum. The timing of the referendum and mistakes in the public relations strategy and in the structure of the Compact all played a role in the outcome, but post-election polls showed that defeat, based on a massive shift of undecided voters, …

John W. Mccormack, Paul M. Wright

McCormack Graduate School General Publications (active until 2013)

A short biography of Boston native and United States Congressman John W. McCormack, prepared for the dedication of John W. McCormack Hall at the University of Massachusetts at Boston, April 26, 1985.

Urban Distress, Educational Equity, And Local Governance: State Level Policy Implication Of Proposition 2 1/2 In Massachusetts, Edward P. Morgan

McCormack Graduate School General Publications (active until 2013)

This report examines the impact of Proposition 2-1/2 on different types of communities and the implications of this impact for state aid and state-level policies. The effects of 2-1/2, especially first-year effects in public education, are evaluated from the perspective of four general policy objectives or values: equity, efficiency, accountability, and local autonomy. The primary concern of this report is for various considerations of equity and inequality.