Presidents, Parties, and the State

ISBN-13: 9780521662772 / Angielski / Twarda / 2000 / 318 str.

Scott C. James

Opis

This book challenges dominant theories of regulatory politics by placing presidential elections and national party leaders at the center of American regulatory state development. In the years between 1884 and 1936, the Democratic party abandoned its traditional regulatory agenda to enact the programs of voting blocs deemed pivotal to the consolidation of national party power. Coalition-building imperatives drove the decision-making calculus of Democratic leaders, prompting legislative intervention to secure outcomes consistent with national party needs. In the end, Democratic choices proved consequential for the character of the American regulatory state. The Democratic party turned its governing power to the build-up of national administrative power and the consolidation of corporate capitalism.

Recenzje

"In Presidents, Parties and the State, Scott James offers a fresh, original, and convincing account of the development of some of the central parts of the progressive regulatory project. Neither a group-based nor new institutional account can adequately explain the passage of the Interstate Commerce Act, the creation of the Federal Trade Commission, or the politics of the Public Utility Holding Companies Act. Instead, a party systems perspective is needed, one that focuses on the attempt to form and hold national majorities, one that gives agency and leadership to the president, and one that, along the way, explains major changes of direction in party politics. It is an achievement to be able to say something so bold and persuasive about so important -- and heavily studied -- a period." John H. Aldrich, Duke University

Spis treści

Acknowledgments; 1. Introduction: parties, presidential elections, and regulatory choice - a party system perspective; 2. Swing states, business Mugwumps, and the Interstate Commerce Act of 1887; 3. The Progressive party vote and the Federal Trade Commission Act of 1914; 4. Progressive Republicans and the 'Death Sentence' for public utility holding companies during America's second New Deal; 5. Conclusion: parties and the American regulatory state; Bibliography; Index.