Whoever Is President, An Administration Needs Oversight

I'm as interested as the next person in all the excitement about how Washington will work with Barack Obama in the White House, but there's an important question that's been missing. It has to do not so much with the new President as with the new Congress, and it should be high on every attentive citizen's list of concerns: Will Congress live up to its responsibility to exercise robust oversight over the new administration?

This is especially important given the Democratic label that President Obama and the majorities in the House and Senate will share. Over the last two years, particularly in the House, Democrats began to delve into the activities and record of the current Republican administration. Once their own party controls the White House this will be harder to do, for obvious partisan reasons: There's a natural inclination to avoid inquiries that might seem to undermine the President or give ammunition to his political adversaries.

It is vital that congressional leaders set that concern aside, for the simple reason that vigorous congressional oversight of the administration - any administration - is necessary for our government to function properly.

This is, of course, what Congress under our system of government is supposed to do - to put the national interest first by holding the President and his administration accountable for their actions. It is Congress's responsibility, in other words, to ensure that the country is functioning properly and our laws are working as intended; that they are achieving the purpose Congress envisioned when it passed them; that resources are being used effectively and efficiently; and that executive authority is being exercised properly and in keeping with the laws and values that govern it.

Congress failed miserably at this task during most of the last eight years, and even with stepped-up scrutiny since the 2006 elections, it has fallen well short of the ideal, with unfortunate results: Witness its failure to explore vigorously administration plans to deal with the threats to the American economy.

Robust oversight need not be adversarial. Indeed, if Presidents understand Congress's constitutional role, they will see its activities as helpful. Constructive oversight brings fresh eyes and insightful questions to policy-making and its implementation. The plain fact is that the executive branch tends to wear blinkers: Its members are there in support of the President, and they are often reluctant to cast critical judgments on his decisions or on the implementation of policy.

This last point is particularly important, since Americans have in recent years lost confidence in the federal government not just because of the policies it pursued, but because of its failure to act effectively, whether in Iraq or in helping Louisiana and Mississippi recover from Hurricane Katrina. A Congress that is functioning properly would turn administration officials into regular visitors to Capitol Hill, quiz them relentlessly, and make them explain their policy decisions and how they are implementing federal programs.

So what would effective oversight look like? Congress has several tools for holding federal agencies accountable, including periodic reauthorization, personal visits by members or staff, review by the Government Accountability Office or inspectors general, subpoenas, hearings, investigations, and reports from the executive branch to Congress. The point is to make oversight a part of the daily business of Capitol Hill, and to make it as bipartisan as possible.

There will certainly be times when the Democratic and Republican leaders of particular committees disagree, but they should be able to sit down at the beginning of a new Congress and agree on the bulk of the committee's oversight agenda. Even more important, for oversight really to work, members must receive a clear message from the congressional leadership of both parties that it is a priority and that it will be done in a bipartisan, systematic, coordinated way.

For in the end, oversight is not about politics, it's about the institutional responsibility that Congress bears to ensure that the federal government is serving the American people's interests. This is even more important in this day and age, as newspapers shrink their Washington bureaus and, with them, their investigative abilities.

In 1787, John Adams wrote of what were to become the House, the Senate and the presidency, "Without three divisions of power, stationed to watch each other, and compare each other's conduct with the laws, it will be impossible that the laws should at all times preserve their authority and govern all men." It is as true today as it was 221 years ago, and the start of a new administration and a new Congress is exactly the moment for our leaders to recommit to that ideal.

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Congress, Too, Can Set The Agenda

Once he is sworn in on January 20, our new president will command all eyes. After a long campaign in which he and his rival traded policy prescriptions and accusations about their respective flaws, the country will be anxious to see the White House's agenda. Congress, it seems safe to say, will be an afterthought, its views given weight only insofar as they might hinder or abet the president's plans.

And really, why should they matter? The 435 House members and 35 senators who ran in November's elections present a cacophony of views — they're liberal and conservative, from large states and small, representing every conceivable kind of American voter. It's impossible for them to speak with one voice or with the institutional heft to be found at the other end of Pennsylvania Avenue.

Moreover, Congress long ago abandoned the practice of trying to put forward its own plans, and Americans have certainly lost the habit of looking to it for leadership. Even Congressional Quarterly, a magazine whose reason for being is to parse every nuance of life on Capitol Hill, carried a cover story a month before the election entitled, “11 Issues for the Next President.” It said, “The winner of the Nov. 4 election will face the most difficult roster of top–tier issues in a generation while trying to restore the country's faith in its government.” On everything from the economy to taxes, energy, and our nation's infrastructure needs, it suggested, Congress would be left to react, not to create.

While this picture certainly fits our national expectations, there are two problems with it: It's not how things are supposed to be; and it's not healthy for the United States.

The Constitution sets out a very clear expectation that Congress and the president are to be colleagues — equals — in determining the course of the country. And there is a compelling reason for this. The very forces that make it difficult for Congress to speak with one voice, especially its members' closeness to the diverse constituencies from which they hail, also provide Congress with a fine–textured understanding of national concerns and sentiment.

Better than any other part of the federal government, Congress reflects the regional, ideological, economic and cultural diversity of the United States.

This is crucial to crafting good policy, policy that is consistent, relevant, and sustainable over the long term. Such policy springs not from a single opinion about what's needed, but from sharp analysis and civil dialogue among people with different points of view, values, and experiences.

Congress, in other words, is as indispensable an actor in laying out a national policy agenda as is the president.

That it has chosen not to play that role in recent decades — with a few exceptions, like last year's boost in the minimum wage — has turned it into a reactive body with very little control over the policy debate; he who sets the agenda, after all, controls the discussion and usually the results, and recent presidents have been extremely forceful about putting forth both a domestic and foreign agenda. It has been politically easier for members of Congress to let the president take the lead, especially since it is very hard work to craft an agenda that a majority of both houses can agree upon.

Given this history and the degeneration of Congress's policy–crafting muscles, it seems unreasonable to expect that Congress will suddenly set about advancing its own agenda for every problem, foreign and domestic, that assails us. Yet surely it's in a position to act more forcefully than in the recent past. If it wishes to fulfill its constitutional role and rebuild its standing as an institution that commands the respect of the American people — and, more important, earns legitimacy as a branch of government — it should certainly start to put forward initiatives to which the president can respond.

Congress needs to be a more assertive presence in Washington generally, even if it does it piecemeal rather than in a comprehensive way, and it certainly needs to flex its policy–making muscles more frequently than it does now.

How might it do so? I'd suggest that the party caucuses in each house — that is, the meetings at which Democrats and Republicans gather to work on their own marching orders — would be the appropriate place to start. Democrats in Congress ought to see it as their responsibility to put forward their own agenda for the nation, even if it's only in a few arenas; so should Republicans. The parties might even find some common ground. And in the debates over what these agendas should be, and then the conversation with the White House as they're moved forward, Congress might just find its own voice. That would be a good thing not only for its members, but for us all.

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The Decision To Go To War

As Congress struggled to stave off financial meltdown recently, it was hard to imagine that it could ever face a more serious issue. Yet from time to time it does: when it ponders whether or not to send young Americans to war.

Watching the gyrations on Capitol Hill over the economic bailout, I couldn't help but reflect that while there was great uncertainty about how Congress would respond to the economic crisis — Would it side with the White House plan? Would it modify the plan or try to come up with an alternative of its own? — there is rarely uncertainty about war. If the President wants it, he gets it.

Our nation has long argued over whether this is how things should be. To my mind, the Constitution seems clear on the subject, stating in Article I, Section 8, that “Congress shall have power...to declare War.” Yet it also refers to the President as “Commander in Chief,” and in the ambiguity left by those two phrases it has seeded an ongoing political debate over how much right Congress has to tie the President's hands when it comes to the commitment of troops abroad. The courts, recognizing a political morass, have steered clear of the subject, leaving it to Congress and the White House to sort things out, and by and large not settling the question of which branch may exercise which powers.

Since World War II, the White House has prevailed. Harry Truman contended he didn't need congressional approval to fight in Korea. Congress sat on the sidelines for the invasions of Panama and Grenada in the 1980s, and made only modest steps to assert itself when U.S. troops got involved in Somalia in 1992, Haiti in 1994, and the Balkans in the mid–1990s. It willingly gave its go–ahead to the Vietnam War and the two wars in Iraq, turning power completely over to the President to do as he wished.

In essence, for over a half–century Congress has been content to act as an afterthought, rather than the President's equal when it comes to war–making. It has left the question of when to go to war up to the President.

The political reasons for this abdication of responsibility are straightforward. Committing U.S. troops to battle is a high–stakes move, and members of Congress would rather not have to make that decision themselves. It is far easier simply to let the President do it, then give him credit if he called it right and condemn him if he didn't. Moreover, the American people have a history of siding overwhelmingly with presidents who make the call for war; standing in the way is politically risky for any member of Congress — except in hindsight, as the current war in Iraq and the earlier war in Vietnam have demonstrated. None of this was what the Framers envisioned. The Constitution was drafted at a time of deep distrust of monarchy and, indeed, all forms of concentrated power. No single person, our founders believed, should have the responsibility for making the gravest decision a president can make: whether to send young men (and, now, women) into battle.

While 2008 is not 1789, and the world is a very different, more dangerous place than when the country was founded, I find myself in basic agreement with the founders. In our representative democracy, it is Congress — not the President — that gives voice to the concerns of ordinary Americans. Yet from war–making to the budget to setting the national agenda, Congress in recent decades has been all too willing to take a back seat to presidential authority. It has lost the skills and the political will that would allow it to be a co–equal branch of government.

So while it is too much to expect that, when it comes to the profound issue of war, Congress will suddenly start re–asserting itself in a major way, I don't think it's too much to ask it to start rebuilding its competence as a consultative body. Simply put, presidents should consult widely, surely beyond their closest advisors and especially with Congress, before they make the decision to go to war. If the President is determined to send Americans into battle, there is very little anyone can do to stop him. But ensuring that members of Congress and others can ask hard questions before the final decision is made at least offers a chance for wise and cool heads to weigh the risks, and for national policy–makers to proceed without blinkers on.

In the end, the calculation is simple. Going to war is the most important decision a government can make, because it means that young people will die. That decision ought not be made by one person, even if that person is the President of the United States.

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