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The Presidency of Ronald Reagan
"It's Morning Again in America."
- Developed his personal brand on the 80s
- The country was in trouble, brought down by leaders brought down
by nagging dilemmas.
- "Rescue America" and restore confidence.
- Emulated FDR's
- Used the power of the presidency to gut the welfare state
- Excoriated the Great Society (welfare recipients are too
lazy to get a job, lambasted the Soviet Union)
- Anti-environmentalism
- Gorbachev in the Soviet Union helped dissolve Am-Sov conflict.
Reagan took credit.
- Believed that slashing taxes would make America rich. Also wanted
to "crush the enemy"
- Treated as an essentially a religion; treated as infallible
despite any possible contradictory evidence
Questions
- What factors led to the election of Ronald Reagan and the rise of the
conservative movement?
- What is "Reaganomics?" What were its effects on American society and
the economy?
- How did Reagan's foreign policy toward the Soviets help end the Cold
War?
- Reagan was not a deepthinker. He was a patriot.
- Son of Irish-Catholic shoe salesman. Devout bible
- Won a football scholarship to a small college in Illinois during
the Great Depression. Washed dishes to make money in college.
- Worked as a sportscaster before Hollywood, served 3yrs in the army
in World War, making training films.
- Was a Democrat at the time.
- Delivered a speech on national television in support of Barry
Goldwater
- Won Governor of Calif. in 1966
- Part of his popularity came from his great ability as a speaker
(baritone voice and a wealth of entertianing stories)
- New Right was behind Reagan. Migration to the Sun Belt.
- Property taxes were reduced in California. Overwhelming majority
of voters agreed to Prop 113 to slash property taxes by 57%, also
making it harder to increase taxes later on.
- The idea spread across the nation. The New York Times called
it the modern Boston Tea Party, key in support for
conservative support for politicians like Reagan.
- Megachurches crusading against liberalism at home and
communism abroad sprung up.
- Reagan succeeded because he focused on a few main points:
- Reducing inflation, taxes
- Anti-Soviet foreign policy.
- Shrewd negotiator with congressional leaders and foreign heads of
state. Realized that running a democracy required compromise.
- Lots of optimism like FDR gave people a renewed sense of
confidence and purpose. "You have every right to dream"
- First thing Reagan did was freeze federal hiring. Replaced Truman in
the cabinet room with Coolidge (super anti-gov president). Reagan
believed government was the problem.
- 6 shots fired at Reagan before election. Increased support for him by
electorate.
Insiders at Reagan's White House realized he remained detached from
details of the decisionmaking process.
- Very relaxed, buoyant, elegant.
- Read newspapers over breakfast, went to his office at 9, an hour
of personal time, lunch, watched television. Whenever possible,
his schedule conduced to a positive, upbeat atmosphere.
- Reagan appointed officials who would help him succeed.
- David Gergen, office of WH Communications, worked to influence
news coverage of the WH.
- He and other aides operated under the premise that the press's
portrayal of the president would strongly affect public
opinion of the president.
- Gergen was proactive about establishing a "line of the day," a
single point of discussion with reporters. Said they "had to think
like a television producer."
Reaganomics
- Reflected two beliefs of Reagan:
- Least gov is best gov
- Give economic power to the private sector for sustained prosperity
- David Stockman, not a cabinet member but head of OMB, masterminded
Reaganomics.
- 1981 Economic Recovery Tax Act
- Aug 1, 1981, Reagan signed economic recovery tax act, cutting
personal income taxes by 50%, lowered max tax rate from 70% to 50%
- "Common sense economic plan."
- Theorists call it "Supply Side" economics
- Proposed solution to stagflation, believing that the rich would
spend their money on goods, and the spending would "trickle down"
benefits to the lower classes.
- Did not work as planned, causing the Recession of 1981-1982 and
increasing the federal budget deficit.
- Reduced Social Security and Medicare, the most expensive and most
popular fed. social programs to meet the budget deficit.
- According to Stockman, Reagan was too kind and gentle to make the
necessary cuts to balance the budget.
- Also continued subsidies for big corps. Reagan never fully
dismantled federal programs.
- Also made massive increases in military spending, @ $1.2T over
three years.
- The recession also had huge unemployment levels
- "Revenue increases" (tax lifting) were pushed by his aides,
including Stockman, but the Recession continued.
- Dems picked up 21 House seats.
- By summer 1983, economy started to recover because of increased
spending, lower interest rates, and partially because of lower tax
rates.
- Reaganomics did not help balance the budget.
1986 Tax Reform Act
- Top tax rate 50% -> 28% and bottom 11% -> 15%.
- Fed budget deficit went from $90B to $283B
- America had to borrow and raised interest rates to attract
capital
- Foreign money flooded into America, and the dollar rose
dramatically.
- Cheapened imports, forcing American companies to relocate
outside the country.
- Largest creditor nation -> largest debtor nation. Trade imbalance
of $170B by 1987.
- More jobs created in 1980s than lost, but half of those lost were in
high-wage industries and half of those gained were below the poverty
line.
- Exacerbated growing wealth inequality, a two-tiered society.
Reagan and Foreign Policy
- Reagan's Foreign Policy was very supported by the public.
- Very anti-communist interventionist foreign policy
- Reagan Doctrine wanted to roll back communism in the "third world"
- Gave military support to freedom fighters in Angola, others
- Military advisers and millions of dollars to reactionary
regime in El Salvador and overthrow of Sandinistas by Contras.
- Reagan believed the eventual elimination of nuclear weapons would be
achieved by "peace through strength."
- Believed a strong defense was the best deterrent to aggression
- Secretly authorized contact with Soviet leadership, but acted like
a hawk in public about the Soviets. Denounced the "evil Empire."
- Reagan escalated the arms race with the announce of the Strategic
Defense Initiative ("Star Wars") to intercept and destroy missiles in
flight before they hit the US.
- Skepticism by the media, gov officials, and scientists
- But Congress eventually allocated $30B to the program, but SDI,
although never implemented, when matched by the Soviets, helped
bankrupt the country.
1984 Presidential Election: Reagan vs Walter Mondale
- Mondale took the midwestern ethos of hard work and public service.
- Jimmy Carter's runningmate. Took an active and daily role in all major
decisions.
- Mondale had a chance of winning if he could capitalize on Americans'
sense of fairness.
- Said proposals were a Trojan Horse for lowering taxes on the
wealthy
- Redistribution of wealth and power from gov to private, poor to
rich, workers to capitalists
- Reagan claimed to believe in conservative egalitarianism
- In hindsight, there is no way anyone could have beaten out
Reagan. The economy was booming, unemployment was low, Moscow
Olympics boycott gave Reagan a ton of pub support.
- Mondale lost in a landslide, only getting Minnesota.
- The election was about traditional values and America's opinion of
itself as well as the economic status of the country
- There were growing questions about foreign policy.
- Reagan said, "we brought America back" as his campaign slogan.
- Americans wanted to celebrate the new era of "good feelings."
War in Nicaragua
- Dictator in Nicaragua overthrown by leftwing uprising of Sandinistas.
- Reagan suspended foreign aid to Nicaraguan gov't and authorized covert
war to bring down Sandinistas in favor of the Contras.
- Reagan's justification of intervention was to prevent the growth of
communism.
- Support of contras was unpopular because of a fear of another Vietnam.
- Boland Amendment passed by Congress banned CIA and DOD from
funding the Contras.
- National Security Council Advisor John Poindexter and Oliver North
authorized plan to fund the Contras.
- Authorized arm sales to Iranian government. Hostile to the US,
but Reagan was critical of Carter's stance on the gov.
- US asked Iran to pressure Lebanon to release American
hostages kidnapped by Hezbollah, paramilitary group funded
by Iran.
- North overcharged Iran for the weapons and used the extra
money to supply the anti-Communist forces with arms and
supplies
- Trading arms for hostages were problematic, since more
American hostages were taken by Hezbollah when one was
released. This was in secret because Reagan said he
wouldn't negotiate with terrorists.
- Scheme unraveled when American cargo plane for the Contras
crashed in Nicaragua. Three died, one captured. Journalists
revealed the scandal.
- John Tower's investigation gave the administration a slap on the wrist
- John Walsh, investigator under multimillion, contradicted Tower
investigation by concluding that it was directed by the top of the
Reagan administration.
- Congress, at the time, found no smoking gun that Reagan knew about
or authorized the Iran-Contra Deal.
- North got limited protection from prosecution and took a
melodramatic tone.
- Congress, Speaker of House decided not to impeach Reagan because
Reagan would be treading on thin ice: either Reagan authorized his
admin or he couldn't control it.
- Ruined his public image. Investigations led to 6 indictments.
- Only John Poindexter received a jail sentence---6 months for
obstruction.
Mikhail Gorbachev and the End of the Cold War
- Gorbachev came to power in 1985. Reintroduced detante to reduce arms
and focus on economy. Glasnost, openness, was a better form of
"superpower cooperation" that Reagan wanted.
- Reagan originally acted like the threat of Communism was to blame for
every problem of the United States.
- Gorbachev was willing to consider mutual reductions in nuclear
weaponry.
- INF Treaty was cuts to nuclear weapons and destruction of various sys.
- Did not end the Cold War, but it helped
- Soviet Union announced it would stop Brezhnev and allow satellite
Communist states to self-determine.
- Bruce Springstein performed in East Berlin, requested by the East
Berlin to boost their image.
- "I'm not here for any government. I'm here for you to play
rock and roll."
- The Wall topples, but this is just the beginning.
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