Presidential Leadership Change and Foreign Policy Roll-Call Voting in the U.S. Senate

• Date: 01 December 1972
• DOI: 10.1177/106591297202500403
• Author: Charles M. Sabatt,Charles M. Tidmarch
• Published date: 01 December 1972
• Subject Matter: Articles

613

PRESIDENTIAL

LEADERSHIP

CHANGE

AND

FOREIGN

POLICY

ROLL-CALL

VOTING

IN

THE

U.S.

SENATE

CHARLES

M.

TIDMARCH

and

CHARLES

M.

SABATT

Union

College

EW

OBSERVERS

of

American

foreign

policy

making

since

1940

would

dis-

pute

the

assertion

that

most

of the

major

decisions

in

this

area

of

policy

have

-t-

been

executive

decisions.

Yet,

although

the

President

and

the

foreign

affairs

bureaucracy

have

assumed

preeminent

leadership

in

managing

the

relations

of

the

United

States

with

the

rest

of

the

world,

formal

control

over

foreign

policy

remains

fragmented

and

congressional

participation

in

a

variety

of

activities

has

continued.1

Control

over

appropriations

in

particular

remains

a

major

instrument

of

congres-

sional

influence

upon

the

executive.2

2

If

a

President

is

to

be

an

effective

foreign

policy

leader

vis-a-vis

Congress,

he

must

depend

heavily

upon

the

members

of

his

own

party

for

core

support.

Should

the

President’s

party

be

in

the

minority

in

one

or

both

houses,

a

strictly

partisan

leadership

strategy

would

of

course

be

tantamount

to

inviting

failure.

Furthermore,

even

if

his

party

is

in

the

majority,

he

will

find

it

advantageous

to

cultivate

bipartisan

support,

if

for

no

other

reason

than

to

present

the

face

of

consensus

to

allies

and

enemies

alike

in

the

community

of

nations.

It

is

a

fact

that

members

of

the

President’s

party

in

Congress

tend

to

give

him

somewhat

more

support

than

members

of

the

opposition

party

in

roll-call

voting

on

foreign

policy

issues.

For

example,

in

the

Senate

in

1969

(91st

Congress,

1st

Session),

the

average

Presidential

Foreign

Policy

Support

Score

(a

Congressional

Quarterly

measure)

of

the

Republicans

was

71.3

percent,

while

the

average

Demo-

cratic

score

was

65.1

percent.3

Although

this

is

not

a

strikingly

large

difference,

it

is

significant

(not

in

a

statistical

sense)

if

one

considers

that

the

roll

calls

upon

which

the

scores

are

based

were

among

the

most

important

in

the

session.

Under

such

conditions

various

other

strong

pressures

(e.g.,

constituency,

interest

groups,

com-

mittees)

are

more

likely

to

be

exerted

on

senatorial

voting.

In

other

words,

it

is

NOTE:

The

authors

wish

to

thank

James

E.

Underwood

and

Norman

V.

Walbek,

both

of

Union

College,

for

their

comments

on

an

earlier

draft

of

this

paper.

1

Sheldon

Appelton,

United

States

Foreign

Policy

(Boston:

Little,

Brown,

1968),

pp.

85-109.

Other

important

works

dealing

with

congressional

participation

in

foreign

policy

making

include

Malcolm

Jewell,

Senatorial

Politics

and

Foreign

Policy

(Lexington:

University

of

Kentucky

Press,

1962) ;

David

N.

Farnsworth,

The

Senate

Committee

on

Foreign

Rela-

tions :

A

Study

of

the

Decision-Making

Process

(Urbana:

University

of

Illinois

Press,

1961);

James

A.

Robinson,

Congress

and

Foreign

Policy

Making

(rev.

ed.:

Homewood:

Dorsey

Press,

1967) ;

Roger

Hilsman,

The

Politics

of

Policy

Making

in

Defense

and

For-

eign

Affairs

( New

York :

Harper

and

Row,

1970),

chap. 4 ;

Robert

A.

Dahl,

Congress

and

Foreign

Policy

(New

York:

Harcourt,

Brace

and

World,

1950) ;

Leroy

Rieselbach,

The

Roots

of

Isolationism:

Congressional

Voting

and

Presidential

Leadership

in

Foreign

Policy

(Indianapolis:

Bobbs-Merrill,

1966).

2

David

Howard

Davis,

"The

Price

of

Power:

The

Appropriations

Process

for

Seventeen

For-

eign

Affairs

Agencies,"

Public

Policy,

18

(Spring

1970),

355-81.

3

The

scores

were

taken

from

the

Congressional

Quarterly

Almanac,

1969

(Washington:

Con-

gressional

Quarterly,

Inc.,

1970),

p.

1045.

The

CQ

staff

selected

nineteen

roll-call

votes

as

the

base

for

calculating

the

senators’

scores.