Price, on Policy Making

8/10/2019 Price, on Policy Making

1/28


2/28

Policy

Making

n

Congressional

ommittees:

The

Impact f

Environmental

Factors

DAVID

E. PRICE

Duke

University

It

is well

established

hat

various

characteristicsf a

congressional ommittee

mayshape

and,

to

an

extent,

standardize

ts

handling

of

a

range

of

policy areas. This

article,

however, examines he

substantial

variations hat

most

committees

continue

to

displayas

they

move

from

issue

to

issue.

Why

s

it

that the

House

Commerce

Committee,Or

example,

approaches

ssues ike

major-disease

research,health care

delivery,

cable

television

development,and

power plant

siting

in

such

radically

different

ways? What

determinesthe

incentives

of

legislators

o

invest time and

effort

in

a

policy

area,

and to

orient

themselves

toward

broad

public

nterests,

once

involved?

Focusing

on

the

House

and Senate

Commerce

Committees,

he

article

takes

as its

data base

patterns

of

legislative

action

and

inaction in

major

areas

of the

committees'

urisdiction

during

1969-1974.

Particular

attention

is

given to

how

perceived

levels

of

group

conflict

and of

public salience

affect a

legislator's

orientation

toward

a policy

area,

and to

the

level

and

direction

of executive

involvementas

an

intervening

variable f

major

ignificance.

High-salience,

ow-conflict

areas

e.g.,

health

research)

generally

offer the

strongest

incentives

to

congressional

nvolvement,and

low-salience,high-conflictareas(e.g., communications egulation) he weakest,

while mixed

cases

(e.g.,

a

high-salience,

high-conflict

area

like

health care

delivery)

display

considerable

ariability.

Issues

may

change

considerablywith

time in

their

perceived levels

of salience

and

conflict, and

legislators can

influence, as well

as

respond

to, such

changes.

Congressional

nitiatives

often

respond to

perceived

neglect

on the

part

of the

executive,

or

disagreementwith the

content

of

its

moves.

But

particularly

n

high-conflict

areas,

congressional

ctivistswill

often find

that

their

success

requires

xecutive

nvolvement.

Recent

students of

the

United States

Con-

gress have

premised a

great

deal of

their

work

on

Woodrow

Wilson's

1885

observation

that

Congress

in

its

committee-rooms

is

Congress

at

work. 1 Single-committee and comparative

studies

have

reconfirmed

the

centrality

of

committees to

the life

and work

of

both

chambers,

have

delineated some

of

the dimen-

sions

along which

committees

significantly and

systematically

differ,

and

have

begun

to eluci-

date

the

linkages between

various

character-

istics of

committees

and the

policy

Congress

produces

(or

fails to

produce) in

the

areas

under

their

care.2 The

volume

and

often

the

*The author wishes to thank Terry Brooks and

Susan Skillen for

their

help

in

preparing

and circu-

lating successive

drafts of this

manuscript,

and Steve

Grant and

Steve Haeberle

for research

assistance.

For

their

valuable comments

on an earlier

version, thanks

are due

Jerry Hough,

David

Mayhew, Harris

Miller,

William Mishler,

Brad Pigott,

Lester

Salamon, and

Philip

Williams.

lCongressional

Government

(New York:

Houghton

Mifflin, 1913), p.

79.

2See

especially John

F.

Manley,

The

Politics

of

Finance:

The House

Committee on

Ways

and Means

(Boston:

Little, Brown,

1970);

David

E.

Price, Who

Makes the Laws? (Cambridge:

Schenkman, 1972);

and

Richard

F.

Fenno, Jr., Congressmen in

Committees

(Boston:

Little, Brown,

1973).

content of

congressional

output in one

or

another

policy

area is

greatly

affected

by the

goals

and

orientations

members and

aides

of

relevant

committees

bring to

their jobs,

the

skills and leadership styles of chairmen, and the

leverage

and

resources that

various

subcom-

mittee

arrangements

afford

individual

members.

But

if

there is no

escaping the

centrality of

committee-related

variables

to any

account of

congressional

policy

making, it

is also

obvious

that

the

committees of

Congress, like

the

institution

as a

whole, are

increasingly buffeted

by powerful

forces in

their

policy-making en-

vironment,

organized

interests and

govern-

mental

agencies

chief

among them. Thus

any

explanation of a

committee's

policy

role

not

only

must

include an

examination of

its in-

ternal

goals,

norms,

structures,

and

processes,

but

also must take

account of the

environment

in

which the

committee

subsists

and of

the

forces

impinging upon

its

operation.

This article

will

examine the

impact of

environmental

forces on

the

policy-making

ef-

forts

and

capacities

of

the

House and

Senate

Commerce Committees.

It is

frequently

striking

to note

how certain

characteristics of a

congres-

sional

committee

shape

and,

to an

extent,

standardize its

behavior over

a

range

of

policy

areas.3

Our

purpose

here,

however,

is

to

con-

3See

Price, Who

Makes

the

Laws?, pp.

9-10,

311-22, and

passim.

548

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3/28

1978

Policy

Making

n

Congressional

ommittees

549

centrate

on

variations

in the

behavior

of

single

committees

from

area

to area

and

on

the

extrinsic

factors

related

to

these

variations.

Examining

the

work

of only

one committee

in

each

house

enables

us

to control

for

commit-

tee-related variables which become confounded

with

these

environmental

factors

in

shaping

policy

outcomes.

It is

not

self-evident

how best

to

construe

the policy-making

environment.

What

sort

of

conceptualization

and

analysis

is most

likely

to

lead to

a

plausible

account

of

the

range

of

observed

behavior?

Theodore

Lowi

poses

one

possibility:

a

decentralized,

bargaining

assembly

such

as the

U.S.

Congress

will be

able

(and

inclined)

to assume

policy

leadership

on

some

types

of

issues

more

than

others.

Thus,

one

might expect to discern differing degrees of

congressional

initiative

and capability

with

re-

spect

to

policies

whose impact

on

society

promises

to

be distributive,

regulatory,

or

redistributive,

respectively.

But

to link

the

differentiation

of policy

type

to

the

explana-

tion

of congressional

behavior

and

of

the

executive-congressional

division

of

labor

as

Lowi proposes,

one

must

make

several

further

assumptions:

that

legislators

find

conflict

or

deadlock

costly,

for example,

and

that

there

is

an implicit

consensus

in each

branch

to grant

some degree of deference

to

the

other

in

the

sorts

of

policy

leadership

that it

does

best.

This being

the case,

one might

best look

at

variables

such

as

environmental

conflict

and

degree

of executive

involvement

directly,

par-

ticularly

since

Lowi's

policy

types

prove

a

blunt

instrument

for

distinguishing

among policy

areas

which congressional

committees

handle

quite

differently.4

Richard

Fenno offers

a

second possibility,

focusing

not

on

policy

characteristics

but

on

the

specific

outsiders

that take

an interest

in

[policy]

and,

hence,

in

the

committee.

He

thus compares

six House committees

according

to

which

outsiders -members

of

the

parent

House,

the

executive

branch,

clientele

groups,

or

the

party

leadership-have

the

most

intense

interest

in committee

affairs

and

the

greatest

capacity

for

pressure

and

influence.

He is

able

to

account

for

a

range

of

congressional

deci-

sions

in terms

of the influence

exerted

by

these

44policy

coalitions

with

the

goals

which

members

bring

to

one

committee

or another

as

his second

independent

variable.

But his

capaci-

4See Theodore

J.

Lowi, American

Business, Public

Policy,

Case Studies,

and Political Theory, World

Politics, 16 (July 1964),

677-715; and Price,

Who

Makes

the

Laws?, pp.

323-27.

ty

to explain

differing

levels

of congressional

interest

and assertiveness

is

reduced by

his

conceptualization

of

environmental

forces

mainly

in terms of the constraints

they

place

on

the pursuit

of these

independently

existing

'member goals. Fenno thinks of the environ-

ment

primarily

as

groups

of

interested

out-

siders

who

must be adapted

to. But

to

under-

stand

the

impact of

environmental

factors

on

policy

makers,

one must

also

think of

their

settings

as

fields of incentives,

opportunities,

and

constraints

that

shape their

priorities

and

strategies.

Exactly

which groups

of

outsiders

are able

to

command

their

attention

may be

less

important

than

certain

general

character-

istics of

these

groups

and

their policy

terrain

which

determine

how profitable

policy

mak-

ers are likely to regard various modes of

prospective

involvements

This essay

will assume

that

legislators

are

rational-economic

persons

who

maximize

their

political

profits,

and that

committee outputs

are

a

function

of

individual

initiatives.6

Neither

assumption,

as

will

be

noted,

is an

entirely

reliable

guide

to

congressional

policy

making.

But

for

the

slice

of

congressional

life

we

wish to

examine-the

remarkable

differences

in the

level

and

quality

of legislative

activity

across

a

single

committee's

jurisdiction-individual-

istic, maximizing assumptions about motivation

are of

considerable help

in making

sense of the

data.

We

assume that

legislators

ultimately

wish

to maximize

their

electoral

strength

and,

inter-

mediately,

to gain

the

favor of those

proximate

outsiders with

whom

their

committees

must

deal.

Our

method,

however,

will not

be

to

deduce

probable

behavior

from

these

premises,

but to

look concretely

at

how

Commerce

Committee

members

handle

(and

talk about)

a

range

of

policy

areas

and to

abstract

certain

environmental

factors

which

help

explain the

SSee

Fenno, Congressmen

in

Committees,

Chi.

2;

and

the

review

of this

book

by

David

E.

Price,

American

Political

Science

Review, 711

(June

1977),

701-04.

6For

a

characterization

of

the

economic

ap-

proach

to

the study

of politics,

see Brian

Barry,

Sociologists,

Economists

and Democracy

(London:

Collier-Macmillan,

1970),

Ch. 1. For

a suggestive

application

to

congressional

behavior,

see David

R.

Mayhew,

Congress:

The Electoral

Connection (New

Haven: Yale University Press, 1974), pp. 1-9 and

passim.

Seymour

Scher

takes

a similar approach

in his

explication

of

the conditions

under

which

commit-

tees become

involved

in

agency

oversight :

Condi-

tions

for

Legislative

Control,

Journal of

Politics, 25

(August

1963),

526-51.



4/28

550

The American

Political

Science

Review

Vol.

72

patterns

observed.

We

will,

in

particular,

focus

on how perceived

levels

of

group conflict

and

of public

salience

affect

a

legislator's

orien-

tation

toward

a policy

area-and

on the

level

and

direction

of executive

involvement

as

an

intervening variable of major significance.

Policy

Making

on the

Commerce

Committees:

Clientele-Centered

Areas

A preliminary

view

of the

Commerce Com-

mittees'

levels

of activity

during

the

period

covered

by

this study

(1969-1974)

is provided

in

Table

1.

Their jurisdictions

do not

coincide

perfectly:

House

Commerce's

responsibilities

in

the

energy

and

environmental

fields

are

broad-

er, and it shares railway labor, securities and

exchanges,

and public

health

with

committees

other

than

Senate

Commerce;

the

Senate

but

not

the

House

committee

handles

merchant

marine,

fisheries,

and

oceanography.7

The

in-

dicators

of activity

chosen do

not

measure

precisely

the

same

thing.

Bills

restricted

in

7The

House

committee's

jurisdiction

was

appreci-

ably

altered

by

the Committee

Reform

Amendments

of

1974,

which

took

effect

in the

94th

Congress.

Civil

aviation and surface transportation (except railroads)

were

transferred

to

the

new

Public

Works

and

Trans-

portation

Committee.

Commerce's

health

jurisdiction

was

expanded,

but Ways

and

Means

retained

its

claim

to

health-care

programs

financed

by payroll

taxes.

The

Senate's

Committee

System

Reorganization

Amend-

ments

of

1977 gave

Commerce

substantial

new

science

and technology

jurisdiction

but

further

re-

duced

its

claims

on environmental

policy.

scope

or impact

(or

initiated

and developed

elsewhere)

may

be reported

by

a committee

but

require

little

hearing

time.

On the other

hand,

the

desire

of

legislators

to

publicize

an

issue,

to

advertise

their

own leadership,

or to

convince

the groups pushing a bill of their industry and

good

will can

produce

extensive

hearing

activity

even

when

the prospects

(and

sometimes

the

desire)

for ultimate

passage

are remote.

Our

primary

interest

is

in how differences

among

the environmental

forces operating

in

each

of these

policy

areas

are reflected

in

the

level

and

content

of committee

output.

But

certain

general

characteristics

distinguish

the

Commerce

Committees'

environment

from

that

of many

other

committees.

In the first place,

the

committees

do

not

deal extensively

with

peak associations seeking redistributive

policies.8

The

distributive

and regulatory

measures

with which

the

committees

character-

istically

work

involve

organized

labor

only

peripherally

and seldom

raise the spectre

of

a

massive

reallocation

of

national

resources.

Bus-

iness

interests generally

seek

industry-specific

benefits

or

exemptions,

although

this

pattern

is

changing

as

consumer

and

environmental

initia-

tives

become

more ambitious

and

more

general

in

effect.

The

result is an

environment

in

which

group

conflict is,

while

sometimes

intense,

generally limited in scope; one need only to

look

at the

setting

of the

Education

and

Labor

or

Finance

Committee

to appreciate

the dif-

ference.

8See

Lowi,

American

Business.

Table

1. Policy

Areas

Ranked

According

to Days

of

Hearings

Held,

Public

Bills

Reported,

and Public

Laws Approved,

91st-93rd

Congresses,

1969-1974

(Nominations

excluded)

Senate

Commerce

Committee

House Commerce

Committee

Days

of

Bills

Public

Days

of

Bills

Public

Area

Hearings Reported

Laws

Area

Hearings

Reported

Laws

Consumer

159

33

17

Health

206

60

47

Surface

transportation

121

32

18

Consumer

139

15

15

Environment

103

11

4

Surface transportation

120

20

18

Aviation

77

18

10

Communications

89

17

12

Communications

70

21

12 Securities

and

Energy/power

55

6

4

exchanges

86

7

6

Oceanography

51

12

12 Aviation

67

12

10

Merchant

marine

47

40

37

Energy/power

61

9

7

Foreign

commerce/

Environment

59

11

9

tourism 28 11 4 Railway labor 36 10 10

Commercial

fisheries

22 21

17

Foreign

commerce/

Fish and

wildlife

tourism

6

3

3

conservation

22 26

23

Coast

Guard

7

14

14



5/28

1978

Policy

Making

in

Congressional

Committees

551

A

second

and

related

characteristic

of

the

Commerce

environment

is the

relative

absence

of high-intensity

executive

branch

and

party

involvement.

As we shall

see,

the executive

role

is

hardly

a

passive

one,

but

Commerce

Commit-

tee matters are rarely at the top of the agenda

of the

administration

or of

the parties'

congres-

sional

leaders.

Committee

members'

initiatives

in

consumer

affairs,

oceanography,

environ-

mental

policy,

health,

merchant

marine,

and

aviation

often

represent

an attempt

to

counter

declared

administration

policies

and

priorities,

but

they just

as often-and

this applies

to

the

Johnson

as

well

as

the

Nixon-Ford

years-take

place

under

conditions

of

apparent

administra-

tion indecisiveness

and

neglect.

This

means

that

the pressures

and

positions

of party

and presi-

dency have a less marked (and less homogeniz-

ing)

impact

on the

policy-making

efforts of

the

Commerce

Committees

than

they

do

on

many

others.

Consequently,

other

environmental

fac-

tors-and

variations

among

them

from

area

to

area-probably

are more important

in shaping

Commerce

Committee

behavior

than they

are

on

committees

where

the policy

coalitions

facing

the group

are

more monolithic.9

We

turn

first

to policy

areas

where

the

main

forces

with

which legislators

must

contend

are

organized

and

relatively

narrowly

based

clientele

groups.

Communications.

The clientele

groups

con-

fronting

the

Commerce

Committees

differ

con-

siderably

in

their

degree

of intramural

conflict

and

in

the

executive and agency

support

they

enjoy.

Communications

is an

area

notable

for

both its high

potential

for

conflict

and its

relatively

high

degree

of

executive

involvement.

The conflict

potential

is

only

partially

at-

tributable

to

divergencies

among

the groups

trying

to

influence broadcast policy,

for the

preeminence of the commercial broadcasters

renders

communications

less

effectively plural-

istic

than

most

of

Commerce's

clientele-

centered

areas.

But

the National

Association

of

Broadcasters

and its

local

affiliates

are

poised

to

make

trouble

for legislators

who

would

chal-

lenge

the

comfortable

regulatory

situation

they

enjoy.

They

have

a few things

they

want

from

Congress-an

extended

license period,

for

exam-

ple,

and

scuttling

the fairness

doctrine -but

their

main

interest is

in

governmental

inaction

9Compare

Richard

Fenno's

description

of the

settings

of

the House Appropriations,

Ways

and

Means,

Foreign

Relations,

and Education

and

Labor

Committees:

Congressmen

in Committees,

Ch.

2.

on

such fronts

as license-renewal

criteria

and

cable

and public

television

development.

The

dominant

agencies

in the

area have

been

the

Federal

Communications

Commission

and,

from

1970

until

most

of its functions

were

transferred to the Commerce Department in

1977,

the

White

House Office

of

Telecom-

munications

Policy.

The OTP

was

mainly

iden-

tified

in its early years

with the

Nixon

admini-

stration's

criticisms

of

public

television

and

network

news

and

the White

House's

interven-

tion

in FCC deliberations

regarding

cable

tele-

vision.

But it

also developed

proposals

for

the

long-range

financing

of public

television

and the

eventual

deregulation

of

CATV.

On

these

and

other

matters,

FCC,

OTP,

and

broadcasting

industry

perspectives

have

sometimes

diverged,

but the agencies have generally been close to

the broadcasters

in

their

working

relationships

and

policy

preferences,

and they

no more than

the industry

have

desired

to

stimulate major

congressional

policy

initiatives.

Legislators

thus

find themselves

frequently

preempted

in

the

communications

field

and

perceive

new

policy

departures

and

critical

oversight

as distinctly

unwelcome.

Nor does

the

environment provide

sufficient

positive

incen-

tives

to

override

these

constraints

for

most

legislators.

The

cable operators

generally

cannot

match the resources of the commercial broad-

casters

and

neither,

of course,

can

the scattered

groups

interested

in such

matters

as

public

television,

children's programming,

and facili-

tating

challenges

to

license-holders.

Many

broadcasting

issues

are arcane and dimly per-

ceived

by the

public.

The

incentives

to

under-

take

reform

efforts are thus

rather

low and the

possible

penalties

for involvement quite

high.

I

suppose

public

sentiment

would

generally

be in

favor of

loosening

restrictions

on cable,

re-

flects one

veteran member

of the

House Com-

munications

Subcommittee,

but

you're

just

not

going

to see

many

congressmen

stepping

out

in

this

area. 10?

This is

not

to

say

that a

skillful legislator

could

not

manipulate

the

situation

to

advantage-dramatizing

issues, ap-

10Quotations

without

citations

are

taken

from

transcripts,

as

nearly

verbatim

as

possible,

drawn

up

from

memory

immediately

following

interviews

with

a

range

of

members,

aides,

lobbyists,

and agency

and

commission

personnel.

The basic

set

of interviews

was

conducted

in 1972 by

the

team studying

the

Com-

merce Committees

for

the

Congress

Project

(see

David

E.

Price,

et

al., The Commerce

Committees

[New

York:

Grossman,

1975],

p.

5). These

were

supple-

mented

by some

two

dozen

in-depth

interviews,

more

specifically

focused

on the

topic

of

the present study,

conducted

by

the author

in

1973

and

1975.



6/28

552

The

American

Political

Science

Review

Vol.

72

pealing over the

heads of the broadcasters

to

an incipient

public, mobilizing

reform-

minded groups to underwrite

such efforts. But

it would be

an uphill fight, and not without

risks.

In general, the Commerce Committees have

followed the course of

inaction and deference

which this configuration

of

environmental

forces would

lead one

to

predict.

Of the twelve

communications bills reported

by the commit-

tees

which

became

law

during

the 91st-93rd

Congresses,

six

dealt with such matters as

COMSAT

board election procedures and

the

conditions under

which

amateur

radio licenses

could be granted

to aliens; they were quite

limited in scope and,

in

most cases,

were

requested by the

FCC. One

public

law

(plus

one

vetoed bill and two Senate bills that died in the

House) concerned

the

regulation

of

campaign

broadcasting and

thus involved

party

and

presi-

dential

forces

external to the environmental

matrix

we

have delineated.

One bill dealt with a

matter that many legislators saw as potentially

of high public appeal:

ending the

local blackout

of sold-out

professional sports

events.

The

four

remaining public

laws and

a

second

vetoed bill

were

public broadcasting

authorizations.

All of

these

were

quite

modest

measures;

none au-

thorized funds

for a

period

of

more

than two

years or substantially altered the statute under

which

public broadcasting

operates.

1

1

Conspicuously

absent

from this list are the

long-debated

proposals which would give

the

regulation

of cable

television

a statutory base.

What

former

FCC

Commissioner

Nicholas John-

son

once called the

never-ending saga

of cable

television illustrates nicely

the

disincentives

and constraints

facing legislators

in the com-

munications area.

Senate Communications

Sub-

committee hearings in 1971

helped smoke out

the

FCC's

plans

to

loosen

the restrictions which

had frozen cable development since 1966.

But

it

was

OTP that

orchestrated

the

ensuing

consensus agreement between

the commis-

sion and the broadcast and copyright interests

that

objected

to its

proposals; legislators

had

almost

nothing

to do

with

the policy

out-

come.12

This

reluctance

to come to

cable

11The White House in 1974 allowed

OTP to send

forward

a

long-range funding proposal

long sought by

CPB advocates. But various

intra-industry and intra-

congressional conflicts delayed

enactment until

the

94th

Congress-and then only as a five-year authoriza-

tion shorn of the unusual concurrent

appropriations

provisions which proponents had sought (P.L.

94-192).

12See

John

Paris, Communications, in

Price,

et

al.,

Commerce

Committees, pp.

240-51;

and the

wry,

television's defense can

largely

be attributed

to

the

broadcasters' political

potency.

At the

same

time,

the

crosscurrents

were

strong

enough

to

make an

outright endorsement

of

NAB

ob-

jectives seem

perilous as well. As

a House

Commerce aide points out, the FCC-OTP epi-

sode was one of a

sequence

of three

shots

Congress

has

had at

cable,

each

one

aborted.13

...

A

mutual veto

power has

developed be-

tween the

broadcasters and cable.

Congressmen

just

aren't going to

stick their necks

out. The

OTP's 19 74 cable

deregulation initiative

helped

persuade House

Subcommittee Chairman Tor-

bert MacDonald to

seize

a nettle

most mem-

bers

of

Congress

[had]

sought to

avoid ;

he

ordered a

staff

study, which came out

close to

the

OTP

position.

But

by

the same

token,

when

in 1976 it was announced that the White House

would

not

be

sending up

a

deregulation

bill

as

anticipated, it could

confidently

be

predicted

that

congressional action was

unlikely.14

Members

of

the

communications

subcom-

mittees have

undertaken a few

publicizing and

investigative

ventures-Pastore's 1972

hearings

on

television

violence,

for

example,

and a

series

of

House

hearings on

films

and

broadcasts

demeaning

ethnic, racial,

or

religious groups

-which no

doubt

reflect

calculations of broad-

er

political

appeal. Similarly, while

some mem-

bers have sought industry favor by seeking to

repeal equal-time

requirements, to

eliminate

pay

television,

to

loosen

standards for

license

renewals,

and

so

forth, others

have

been

de-

terred from

supporting

such

measures

by

the

prospect

of

appearing uncritically

sympa-

thetic.

1 5

But

such

symbolic gestures

and

defen-

sometimes bitter, comments by

FCC

Commissioners

Lee, Johnson, and Wiley on the commission's

OTP-

induced reversal: Final Cable Television Decision

(Washington: Television Digest, 1972), pp. 142-52.

13The first episode came in 1960 when the cable

forces, led by Oklahoma's Senator Robert Kerr,

turned back an attempt led by Pastore and supported

by commercial broadcasters to put cable

under FCC

regulation. The second confrontation occurred

in

the

House

in

1966 as the

Commerce Committee

reported

but

the Rules Committee

killed

a bill

confirming

the

FCC

in the

jurisdiction

over cable it

has

assumed.

The commission's claims were ultimately upheld in

the

Southwestern

Cable

case, 329 U.S. 157 (1968).

Broadcasting, February 2, 1976, p. 19; April 12,

1976, p.

26.

1

50n Senate Subcommittee Chairman John

Pastore's caution in the license-renewal area, see Paris,

Communications, pp. 219-23. The House and

Senate

committees

in 1974 reported bills

which



7/28

1978 Policy Making

in

Congressional

Committees

553

sive scruples

hardly

add up

to

a public

orientation,

much

less

to

independent

policy

entrepreneurship.16

The basic pattern

we

have

delineated

still

holds:

a

regulatory

situation

highly

favorable

to the broadcasters,

with a

matrix of incentives and constraints that places

a

low

premium

on

congressional

interference.

Aviation.

Comparable

results

are produced

by

a

slightly

different

array

of forces in

aviation

and

surface

transportation.

The organized

interests

are more

fragmented,

and

no one

industry

segment

occupies

a

dominant

position

compara-

ble

to

that of

the

commercial

broadcasters.

As

in

communications,

legislators

sometimes

enter

the policy-making

fray only

to cancel

out

one

another's

efforts,

but

the fact that

the

environ-

ment is more complex and the strengths of the

contending

interests

more

nearly

equivalent

provides

strong disincentives

to

venture

into

controversial

areas

in

the first place.

There is,

however,

a countervailing

consideration:

in

aviation

and

surface transportation,

what

is

at

stake

is not merely

a regulatory

modus

vivendi

but

also

massive

governmental

promotional

programs.

As

a House transportation

aide puts

it, the

various

transportation

modes

all

want

champagne;

they

usually

just

disagree

on the

brand.

This

is

important

in

creating

an incen-

tive for action as well as inaction. The fact that

public

knowledge

and interest

are perceived

to

be

minimal

makes for

reduced

scruples

about

supporting

one

sort

of promotional

package

or

another-though,

of course,

it also

reduces the

incentives

for broader sorts

of lawmaking

and

oversight.

strengthened

the

presumptions

in

favor

of

incumbent

license

holders

but

which

provided

for

only

four-

and

three-year

license

terms

respectively.

In both

cases,

the

bills were amended by overwhelming

floor

votes

to

include

the

five-year

term

sought

by

the

broadcasters.

The

rebuffed

House

committee

leaders

subsequently

dragged

their feet, however,

and

a

House-Senate

conference

was

never

convened.

16A

considerably

bolder

effort

was

initiated

by

Lionel

Van

Deerlin,

who

inherited

the

House

subcom-

mittee

from

MacDonald

in 1976.

A former

broad-

caster

long

interested

in communications

policy,

Van

Deerlin

began

hearings

in

the

95th

Congress

aimed

at a

basement

to attic

revamping

of the

Communica-

tions

Act.

Early indications,

however,

were

that

the

project

had

attracted

little public

interest,

that

the

Senate committee was lukewarm,

and

that

the

broad-

casters'

attitudes

ranged

from suspicion

to

hostility;

the

rewrite,

Van

Deerlin

acknowledged,

would

be

a

longer

range

proposition

than

I first

thought.

See

Broadcasting,

December

12,

1977,

pp.

21

-22;

Decem-

ber

19,

1977,

p.

21.

Important conflicts

within

the aviation

in-

dustry

include

those

between

commercial and

general (private)

aviation

on

airport

and

airways

development

priorities

and on the

distribution

of the burden

of user

taxes,

and between

the

various levels of scheduled carriers( trunk,,

local service or feeder,

and air-taxis or

commuter

airlines) concerned with federal

regulatory policy and the distribution

of sub-

sidies. Congressional

advocates

of one

or

another

of these

interests must

weigh

the

rewards

of initiative

against

the likelihood of

opposition

and

conflict.

Moreover,

the

presence

of

the Civil Aeronautics

Board

(which

certifies

carriers

and approves rates, routes,

and

mergers)

and

the

Federal

Aviation

Administration

(which

administers

safety,

traffic

control,

and

airport development programs),

often

makes

congressional

initiatives

appear

either

unpromis-

ing or superfluous.

The

FAA is

strongly promo-

tional

in

its

orientation

( I'm

an aviation

man,

declares

one

administrator.

My

first

objective

is the promotion and expansion

of

civil

avia-

tion.

If it

weren't,

I

shouldn't

have the

job ),

although

its

proposals

and

preferences

are

sometimes

tempered by

budgetary

and

other

considerations

as they

make

their way through

the

executive branch.

The

CAB

has also often

proved

deferential to the

industry-allowing,

for

example,

the

local service airlines to achieve

trunkline

status

through

its

approval

of routes

and

large-aircraft

purchases ?-although

aiding

one

segment

of the

industry

often

means

offending

another and

creating pressures for

executive

or

congressional

intervention.

The

congressional agenda

in aviation matters

reveals a

willingness,

ordinarily, to

let

latent

conflicts

lie

and to

live

with

the regulatory

status

quo.

Only

ten aviation

bills

processed by

the Commerce

Committees became law

be-

tween

1969

and

1974,

and

of these four

were

restricted

in

scope and

relatively noncon-

troversial.

A fifth

bill

aimed to alleviate

the

financial

plight

of

U.S. international

passenger

airlines

in

marginal ways,

but

avoided

what

Senate

Commerce Chairman

Magnuson

termed

the more difficult

problem

of

direct govern-

mental assistance.18

Two-

public

laws

were

directed

at

highjacking;

perceived

public

con-

cern was sufficient to

instigate

Senate passage

of

two additional anti-hijacking

measures and

two aimed

at

the

elimination

of

sonic

booms,

17See George

C.

Eads, The Local

Service Airline

Experiment

(Washington: Brookings, 1972).

18Congressional Record

(daily), October 10,

1974,

p. 18899.



8/28

554 The

American Political Science Review

Vol. 72

but not

to

compel House

agreement.

The

incentives

and

constraints facing

con-

gressional

promoters of civil

aviation are

clearer

in

the

remaining three

cases, bills

authorizing

(and

amending) a

major new

airport and

air-

ways development program.19 Carriers, locali-

ties,

and

airport operators had

been

pressing for

more funds

and better

facilities for

a

decade,

but the

crosscurrents of

industry and

executive

conflict had

frustrated

aviation's

promoters in

Congress.

Action came

only when the

deteriora-

tion

of

airline

service

and safety

reached crisis

proportions and

was given

heightened public

salience

by

the

work

slowdowns of the

Profes-

sional Air

Traffic

Controllers

Organization,

protesting the

inadequacy of

equipment

and

working

conditions.

Familiar

environmental

ob-

stacles reappeared, however.20 The Nixon ad-

ministration

insisted that user

taxes must

be

sufficient to

cover

costs, and

opposed the

financing of

such frills

as

terminal

facilities. In

1972 the

president

vetoed a bill

which raised

the

airport aid

authorization

and

increased the

federal

share of

the

matching

formula.

General

aviation,

while

alarmed

by

overcrowded

facili-

ties

and restrictive

local

practices

designed

to

discourage small-plane

traffic,

nonetheless was

wary

of a

program

that

would

raise their fuel

taxes

while

benefiting

mainly

the

larger

munici-

pal airports. The airlines have ordered steak

and

lobster, said

a

general

aviation

spokesman;

general aviation has

ordered

spaghetti

and

is

getting

stuck

with the check.

Several

congres-

sional

compromises,

such as

the

establishment

of a

separate

development

program

for

general

aviation

airports,

served to conciliate

the

pri-

vate

users,

if

not

totally

to

win

them over.

Much less

movement is

visible

in

other

areas

of aviation

policy.

Proposals

to

charter

and

regulate

commuter

airlines as

third-level

scheduled

carriers,

for

example,

have

not

gotten

past the hearing stage. As a Senate counsel

explains:

19See the

account in

Andrew

Weiner,

Aviation,

in

Price,

et

al., Commerce

Committees,

pp.

200-11.

200n

the

obstacles

posed

by

the

Eisenhower and

Johnson

administrations

to

legislators

wishing to

broaden

and expand

the

Federal

Airport Act of

1946,

see

Randall B.

Ripley,

Congress

Champions

Aid to

Airports,

195

8-59, in

Frederic N.

Cleaveland,

et al.,

Congress and Urban Problems (Washington: Brook-

ings,

1969), pp.

20-71; and

Congressional

Quarterly

Almanac,

1968, pp.

621-23. On

the

general-com-

mercial

aviation

and

city-state

conflicts

involved

in

the

1946

legislation, see

Ripley, Congress

Champions

Aid, pp.

24-25.

Senator Pearson put

the

bill

[S 796,

92nd

Congress]

in as a favor, but

he

has never

gone

down

the line.

There

are simply too many

diverse

interests. Some second-level [local-

service]

carriers are on

each side.... The

Pearson

bill represents the position of about

seven commuter lines, but

there are over 100

of

them; generally it's the

larger ones that

are

behind this....

There

is

no administration

position ;

it's impossible to formulate one....

The likely result for the

neat future is no

action.

Restrictive CAB rulings led to Senate

efforts in

1973 to loosen restrictions

on charter airlines.

But this too was an effort

that legislators

did

not

relish,

and for

which

they could

not have

high hopes. An aide discussed

the difficulties:

The

charters

don't compare with the skeds

[schedule

airlines] in their lobbying force,

the

money

they can spend.... Yes,

[Aviation

Subcommittee

Chairman]

Cannon

and especial-

ly [full

committee Chairman] Magnuson

are

reluctant to

oppose

the skeds.... Ordinarily

we would rather

these

problems

be handled by

the CAB,

but

there has

been a shift

[in

chairmen]

there which means the charters

wouldn't

have a chance.

Senate Commerce

Republicans

opposed the

bill, citing

the CAB

and

the

administration

in

their support of the regulatory

status

quo.21

Their position prevailed in the House Com-

mittee, where

key leaders were, as one observer

put it, close to the skeds.

Such

locked-in

policy

areas

sometimes

become

destabilized

in a manner conducive

to

congressional

policy

initiatives,

but

that too is

largely

a matter

of shifts

in external environ-

mental

conditions.

For

example,

the

admini-

stration,

concerned

with the

inflationary

im-

pact

of

regulatory policy,

shifted

its

position

on

charter

deregulation

in

1975.

At

the

same

time,

legislators

perceived

a

consumer

uprising

in

reaction to rising air fares and the CAB's

elimination

of

family, youth,

and other

special

fares.

Thus Cannon

and his collaborators could

for the first

time

be bullish about their

bill's

prospects:

We're

going

to succeed.

[Because

of

the administration

shift?

]

It's

not

just

that.

It's

the

broader public

concern. It's become an

issue,

for

the

first time I

can

remember,

not

just

a

fight

among

different classes

of

carriers.

As

21The bill (S 1739, 93rd Congress) was never

brought to

a vote in

the

Senate. For

an

account of

the

crossfire

among

lobbyists and the

desire of

senators to

avoid the

issue

( Either

way

you

vote

you're in

trouble ), see

Congressional

Quarterly

Weekly

Report,

September

29,

1973, pp. 2593-94.



9/28

1978

PolicyMaking n

Congressional ommittees

555

it turned out,

a series

of CAB reversals

largely

mooted

the issue.

But

the

episode

demon-

strated clearly

the relation of environmental

conditions to the

viability

of consumer-oriented

initiatives in the

aviation area.

Surface

Transportation.

If

members of the

aviation subcommittees

must tiptoe among

contending industry

factions, their promotional

efforts nonetheless

reflect a conviction that

aviation is

a

transportation

mode uniquely

important to the

nation and to their districts.

As a former

chief

counsel testifies, most Senate

Commerce

members

regard

aviation

as

the

super-mode :

their

philosophy is, hell,

build

all the

airports you

can.

Legislators concerned

with

surface

transportation,

by contrast,

must

take much more explicit account of intermodal

conflict, responsible

as they

are for

motor

carriers, railroads, and domestic water carriers.

Cutting

across

these

intermodal

conflicts are

carrier-shipper and labor-management cleavages.

Legislators

are thus

quite

content to let the

Interstate Commerce Commission handle

most

regulatory questions-all

the more

since

the

ICC,

like

the FCC

and

CAB,

is valued

by

the

carriers for the

stability and protection

from

competition

it

provides

the industry.

The

prospect

of conflict does

not

always

discourage initiatives-in fact surface transpor-

tation ranks

high

in the number of bills

reported

and the

days

of

hearings

held-but it

often dooms what initiatives

are taken

to

failure.

During

the

91

st-93rd Congresses the

landscape was littered

with bills that

had

enough industry

and

congressional support to

be

reported by

a committee

or

passed by

one

house, but

ran afoul of crosscurrents of opposi-

tion short of

final

enactment-a

proposal

per-

mitting railroads to

charge freight forwarders

lower

rates

than

other

shippers,

a

requirement

that states spend 5 percent of their federal

highway

funds

on

rail-highway crossing

im-

provement,

a

bill to provide loan guarantees

for

certain common carriers of

express (i.e.,

the

Railway Express Agency),

and

bills designed

to

assure

western and

rural

shippers

an

adequate

supply of freight

cars.22

22The

exception

that

proves

the

rule is a

bill (H.R.

8298)

approved

in 1970

which

blocked

an ICC

decision

unfavorable

to

regulated

water

carriers.

The

complexities

of intermodal

rivalry

were outlined

by

a

Senate

aide:

The best

example

[of

one mode

effectively

outmaneuvering

its

rivals]

is a

very

complicated

one:

the water

carrier

mixing

rule....

The

railroads

were

successful

in holding

off

action

Similar

rivalries

inhibit the initiation

of

promotional

legislation, although

efforts

to

develop

a

positive-sum

package

advanced con-

siderably

in the

92nd Congress.23

In

this

instance, the

impetus

was provided

by the

Department of Transportation's development

of deregulation

proposals designed

to

increase

the

railroads' ability

to provide

competitive

service.

The American

Trucking Associations

(ATA) earlier

had denounced the

deregulation

and

subsidy proposals

sought

by the railroads-

aimed

at

destroying

federal

regulation

of

transportation,

a raid on the Treasury. 24

But the DOT

initiative alarmed

them, and,

fearful that the

railroads

might ally

with the

administration, they

sought

a

united

front.

The

railroads and

water carriers, stymied

in their

efforts to secure enactment of their own

proposals,

decided

to cooperate.

The

result

was

the

Surface

Transportation

Act

(S 2362),

an

extravagant package

authorizing $5

billion

in

loans to transport

companies,

increased

in-

vestment tax

credits, and

liberalized proce-

dures

for the

approval

of

rate

increases

and

rail

line abandonments-but

omitting

provisions

which

would

facilitate rate reductions

and

thus

excite competition

within or

between

transpor-

tation modes.

Senate Surface

Transportation

Subcommittee

Chairman Vance

Hartke,

freed

from the perils of cross fire among the

carriers,

had little

hesitancy

in heralding their joint

request:

for

a long

time, but

the water

carriers

finally

got smart.

They

[the

regulated carriers]

joined

with

the railroads

in supporting

a bill that

would

screw the

unregulated

water

carriers.

That

got the

bill

through the

House.

Then they

came over

to the Senate,

where the

railroads

didn't

do

as

well. The final

bill pleased

[both

classes

of] water

carriers;

the railroads

were

finessed. But the whole business comes up again

this

year,

and

it

may very

well

come

unstuck.

In fact,

the agreement

did not come

unstuck

but

was

given

permanent

status by

P.L. 93-201.

As

the same

aide

reflected

in

1975:

I

thought

the

whole

thing

would

blow up,

but it

went through

very

easily....

I

guess

the

railroads

just decided,

what the

hell, they

could

live with

it. They

probably

didn't

want to

upset

the

water carriers

at a time

when they

were

trying

to

get the

Surface

Transportation

Act

through

[see

below].

And

they

must have thought that

they

weren't really giving

up

much;

the bill

just

ratified a

de

facto

situation

they'd

been living

with

for a long

time.

23See the account

by

Robert

Fellmeth and

Jona-

than

Low,

Surface Transportation,

in

Price et

al.,

Commerce

Committees, pp.

160-83.

24

CQ

Weekly

Report,

October

2, 1971, p.

2022.



10/28

556

The

American

Political Science Review

Vol. 72

The transportation

industry

is its

own

worst

enemy.

There

are

so many

differences

among

the

railroads,

the

truckers,

and

the

water

carriers

that

we

cannot

make

a start

on

solving

the

industry's

problems....

I

have

urged

[them]

to

lay

aside

their differences....

Now

the Association of American Railroads, the

Water

Transport

Association,

and

the

American

Trucking

Associations

have

done

what

I

asked

them

to

do.25

In

the

end,

however,

this

alliance

did

not

fare

as well as

the

one the

promoters

of

aviation

had

forged

in

1970.

The

proposal

provoked

vulnerable

shippers,26

farm organizations,

and

local

communities,

so that

its champions

ran

up

against

environmental

fragmentation

and

con-

flict

after

all.27

The

Surface

Transportation

Act

was

brought

to a

vote

in neither

chamber

in

the 92nd Congress. The House Committee

brought

a

far more

limited

bill to

the

floor

in

the

93rd

Congress,

but too

late

for a

conference

to

be

called ( It

took

us a long

time,

Brock

Adams

apologized

to

his

colleagues,

because

we

had

to

get

the

various

modes

to agree ).28

It was

only

in

1976,

after

the

administration

had

made

an

issue

of

regulatory

reform

and

the

difficulties

of the railroads

had

been

given

heightened

public

salience

by

the

failure

of the

Penn

Central

and five

other

lines,

that

a

2

Congressional

Record

(bound),

July

28, 1971,

p.

27633.

260n the

role

of

shippers

in this and

subsequent

confrontations,

see Michael

J. Malbin,

Rail

Reform

Issue

Divides

Carriers,

Major Shippers,

National

Journal Reports,

February

2, 1974, pp.

171-80.

27Less important

was the

fact that

some

legislators

grew increasingly

wary of

the

electoral impact

of

appearing

too

subservient

to the

industry.

The

loan

guarantee

giveaway

was

the

worst part

of

the bill,

one

counsel

recalls.

But

we couldn't

get anybody

interested in focusing on that. That's what Jack

Anderson

stressed.

But the senators

were mainly

concerned

with

other

provisions,

those

that

drew

fue

from opposing

interests.

Anderson

portrayed

(Washington

Post,

June 6,

1972, p.

Bi

1)

Hartke

and

other

friends of

the

railroads

and

big truckers S

as sneak[ing]

through

a

bill that

could

cost the

taxpayers

more

than

$5

billion....

Ralph

Nader's

transportation

experts

call it

the

worst

such

bill

they

have

ever seen. This

had

some

effect on Hartke,

whom

an aide

described

as

then at

his nadir

politically

in Indiana.

He

pulled

back...

He

stuck by

the bill

but just

didn't go out

of

his

way.

But

full committee

chairman

Magnuson

and

other

members

responded

to the carriers' blandish-

ments

to

keep

the

bill

alive,

and

backed off

only when

the

crossfire

of

opposing

interests

became

intense.

28Congressional

Record

(Daily),

December

10,

1974,

p.

H1501.

deregulation

and financial assistance

package

(P.L.

94-210) was

enacted.

But the bill's

deregulation

provisions were

limited

and ap-

plied

only to the

railroads,

while the

authoriza-

tions

were cut back

in the face of a veto

threat.

Public orientations and appeals, in fact,

rarely

enter into

surface transportation

de-

liberations.

A partial

exception is

AMTRAK,

which legislators

perceive

to have

considerable

political appeal

not only

to affected regions

and

communities

but also to the

general public.

While this

reduces

the impact of

confirmed

opponents

of subsidized

rail passenger

service

(e.g.,

the National

Association of

Motor Bus

Owners),

it

does

not prevent acquiescence

to

the carriers

on low-visibility

items-and,

no

more than

in

the

case of public

broadcasting,

does it lead legislators to more than a sporadic

defiance

of

the administration's budgetary

and

programmatic

constraints.

Railroad

safety has

also

occasionally

become

a

public issue;

as

a

Senate

Commerce

aide

recalls,

You rememberall

that business about

trans-

porting

nerve

gas

across

the

country

in

freight

cars.

We

gearedup

hearingson that

[S

1933,

91st Congress]

and actually got pretty

good

press

coverage-unheard

of

in the surface

rans-

portation

area. And we

produced

a

safety

bill

that

for the

first time wasn't

just

a labor

matter,aimed

at employees....

A few additional

congressional

ventures-the

underwriting

of research on high-speed ground

transportation,

for

example,

and

an

abortive

proposal

to set

up

regional planning

and fund-

ing

entities aimed at

achieving

balanced trans-

portation 29-also

bore marks

of a broad

pub-

lic orientation

and appeal.30

But the policy-

making

environment does

not, by and large,

29The

balanced transportation

proposal

(S.

2279, 92nd Congress) never got anywhere, recalls

one

aide.

The

carriers

were suspicious,

and

the

administration

was

dead-set

against it.

As

for

farther-

reaching

proposals

to

use highway

trust

fund

monies

to

develop

other

modes

of transportation:

Magnuson

has

equivocated

on that

one....

Part

of the

problem

has been

a reluctance

to

offend another

chairman

[the

Public

Works

Committee

is responsible

for

highway

policy];

also, Magnuson

fought

for a separate

aviation

trust

fund and

doesn't want

to do

anything

to

jeopardize

that. Still,

if Magnuson's

staff

had

been

able

to

convince

him that 'balanced

transportation'

was a

good

PR

issue,

he might

have

pushed

it

more

strongly.

30More particularistic

proposals

were

often

justi-

fied in

these

terms

as

well.

This

is

everybody's

problem,

explained

astronaut

Wally

Schirra

in an

industry

advertisement

on

behalf of

the

Surface

Transportation

Act.

If

America

can't deliver

the



11/28

1978

Policy Making in Congressional Committees

557

encourage

such

ventures.31

The main

problem

with


observed

one

counsel,

is that

nobody

seems

to

care

about

it....

The only

people

listening

are those

who

are

going

to

object

[to

departures

from

the

status quo]. Echoed Brock Adams, who be-

fore

his appointment

to

President

Carter's

cabinet

was

the

most

active legislator

on

the

House

Subcommittee:

Transportation

is

such

an

unrewarding

thing.

Merchant

Marine.

Somewhat

more rewarding

in

legislators'

perceptions,

and

more impressive

(at

least quantitatively)

in congressional

output,

are

merchant

marine

and commercial

fisheries

policy.

Neither,

Table

1 suggests,

inspires

ex-

tensive

publicizing,

information-gathering,

or

oversight efforts, but the 91st-93rd Congresses

nevertheless

saw

the passage

of

37

public

laws

in

the

merchant

marine

area

and

17

dealing

primarily

with the

commercial

fisheries.

Most

of these

were restricted

in scope,

but

they

included

a

major

reformulation

of the

construc-

tion-differential

and

operating-differential

sub-

sidy

program

for

the merchant

marine

and

frequent

increases

in

the

president's

authoriza-

tion requests

for the program.32

goods,

we'll

all pay

the price, higher prices,

for

fewer

goods....

Who

needs

the Surface Transportation

Act?

We

all do.

Fellmeth

and

Low,

Surface

Transporta-

tion,

p.

179.

3 'Eighteen


measures

became

law during

the

91st-93rd

Congresses:

three

railroad

safety

and

hazardous

materials

control bills,

two

extensions

of

the

experimental

high-speed

ground

transportation

program,

four

AMTRAK

authoriza-

tions,

three bills responding

to the

Penn

Central

and

other

bankruptcies

and

providing

for continuing

rail

service

in the northeast,

a

bill

providing

loans

to cover

rail damage done by summer floods in 1972, the two

formulations

of

the water

carrier

mixing rule,

and

three

minor

administrative

measures.

This

excludes

ten

public

laws

in the

area

of railway

labor,

most

of them

minor

in

scope

and relatively

noncontroversial

but

of

particular

interest

to House Commerce

Chairman

Harley

Staggers

because

of the

character

of his

West

Virginia

constituency.

321ncluded

among

the 37

merchant

marine

bills

were

8 regular

and supplemental

authorizations;

a

1969

bill continuing

the subsidy

programs

and

the

Merchant

Marine

Act

of 1970,

which

revamped

them

extensively;

five bills pertaining

to boat

and

waterway

safety; nine industry-backed bills which liberalized the

conditions

for

transferring

cargo among

barges

carried

by

foreign

vessels,

permitted

the

sale of

subsidized

(but

laid-up)

passenger

vessels,

allowed

terminal

op-

erators

and stevedores

to acquire

a

lien on

vessels

they

supplied

or serviced,

loosened

restrictions

on ship-con-

At first

glance,

the maritime

industry

ap-

pears

fully as

fragmented

and conflict-ridden

as

any

of the other

transportation

modes:

The industry's

non-subsidized

ompanies

have

fought

bitterly with

the subsidized ines;

con-

ference operators have scrapped with inde-

pendents;tramp

operators

have tried to

enjoin

grain

shipments

via tankers;

the

NMU has

opposed the

SIU; and small

shippers

have

sought added

protection

from abuses

of the

conferencesystem

and the

big business

organi-

zations

supporting

t. In the shipbuilding

n-

dustry,

bitter battles have

been

waged

between

East and

West coast

yards and

between

the

industry'spublic

and private

ectors.33

Such

conflicts

generally

imperil

attempts

to

deal

with

maritime

regulation.34

But the

last

major promotional effort, the Merchant Marine

struction

assistance,

liberalized

the

mortgage guarantee

program

to promote

investment in shipbuilding,

made

cruise and

mail business

more accessible

to U.S. flag

passenger

vessels,

and raised

load limits

for

ships

on

international

voyages;

and

thirteen additional

minor

measures.

33Samuel

A.

Lawrence,

United States

Merchant

Shipping Policies

and Politics (Washington:

Brookings,

1966),

pp.

295-96.

34The House Merchant Marine and Fisheries

Com-

mittee,

for example,

sought

in 1971 (H.R.

155) to

ensure

flexible operating

conditions

for U.S. barge-

carrying ships

sailing

between foreign

ports by

modify-

ing

a restrictive

U.S.

statute

which invited

foreign

retaliation.

House Committee

Chairman

Garmatz

pre-

sented

the bill

as strongly

supported by

all shipping

management,

labor, and

the Government

agencies

(Congressional

Record

[bound],

May 3,

1971, p.

12998),

but

protests

from Sealand

and other

con-

tainer-ship

operators,

which

in certain situations

com-

peted

with the barge

carriers,

threatened the

bill and

led

to Senate amendments

restricting

its

applicability.

This sort

of conflict, a

former Senate

Commerce aide

recalls, is quite common:

It was really

a 'nothing' bill,

but it ended up

taking

lots

of time because Sealand

didn't

like

it. Some

senators began

to choose

sides.... My

main job was

to keep bills

[like

this]

from

exploding

in

the laps

of

members,

to

keep

Magnuson out

of intra-industry

conflict......

[Even

when a bill was

passed]

we would always

avoid these conflicts-pass

them along

to the

administering

agency,

though they

should

have

been

decided as a matter

of

policy....

I

can

show

you

language

in a dozen reports

where

we

avoided coming

down on one side

or the other.

For another

example,

this time

involving labor-

management

conflicts,

see the

account of the delay

of

a

bill

permitting

the sale

of five

laid-up passenger

vessels: Price

et

al.,

Commerce

Committees, pp.

282-84.



12/28

558

The American Political Science Review Vol. 72

Act

of 1970, was also threatened

by intra-

industry

conflicts-between

shipyards and their

suppliers regarding

the continuation of the

requirement that subsidized

vessels must be

built with materials

of U.S. origin, between

newly-subsidized carriers and their competitors

regarding the rate at which the

former must

shed their foreign

holdings

in

order to be

eligible for subsidies, between these

same car-

riers

regarding the

status of the indirect

subsidies the

newly

subsidized

lines

had previ-

ously

received

via

cargo preference, and so

forth.35

The bill's

passage was assured

only

when

participants

agreed to set aside

a dispute

over

whether

a line's

enjoyment of

indirect

subsidies should affect its

operating subsidy

entitlement;

the

question

was the

subject

of a

pending administrative proceeding, and the

Senate

Report

took

pains

not to

prejudge

the

outcome.36

These

and other conflicts

were,

however,

contained; the

less-advantaged segments of the

industry realized that,

rather

than

questioning

the benefits

enjoyed

by

the subsidized

lines, it

was more fruitful

to

seek

comparable benefits

for themselves.37

And

there was no

doubt that

the

launching

of

this new

maritime

program

was

important

to

its

congressional

champions.

In

maritime, as in aviation policy,

substantial

rewards await the legislator who, having tra-

versed the

shoals of intra-industry

conflict, can

put

together a

positive-sum promotional pack-

age.

The

industry

has

the organization

and

the

resources to

reward its

friends and channel their

efforts,

and

industry

objectives

can

normally

be

accommodated without

exciting

the

opposition

of other

transportation modes

or of

the

public.

Moreover,

the

merchant

marine,

even more

than

aviation,

is

perceived

as

a

localized

in-

terest,

essential to certain constituencies.

Its

promotion

thus

comports especially

well with

the perceived responsibilities of maritime-

district

legislators-who

naturally

flock to the

Senate

Commerce and House Merchant Marine

and

Fisheries

Committees-and

with the

pat-

terns

of

accommodation and

reciprocity typical

of

distributive

and

constituency-related policy

areas.

35For a somewhat veiled discussion of the accom-

modations reached on these questions see Committee

on Commerce, U.S. Senate, 91st Congress, Report to

accompany

H.R.

15424, August 10, 1970, pp. 19,

30-31, 55-59.

36Ibid., pp. 34, 63; and Senate Committee on

Commerce, Sub

Price, on Policy Making

Documents