BUSH, GEORGE H. W. (1924–)

George Bush served two terms as vice-president during the presidency of ronald reagan, who had been his rival for the Republican presidential nomination in 1980. With Reagan's support, Bush was then elected President in 1988. Bush was thus the first President since 1836 to be elected from the vice-presidency, an office that does not usually provide much prominence or stature to its incumbent. Bush was also one of the few Presidents in this century to have reached the White House without having previously won a single statewide election (he was defeated in bids to become U.S. senator from Texas in 1966 and 1970). With the exception of the popular leader dwight d. eisenhower, all the others in this category—william howard taft, herbert c. hoover, and gerald r. ford—proved to be one-term Presidents.

Apart from serving two terms in the u. s. house of representatives (1966–1970), Bush owed his political experience before 1980 to a succession of presidential appointments in the administrations of richard m. nixon and Gerald Ford. He served successively as U.S. ambassador to the United Nations (1971–1973), chief of the U.S. Liaison Office (that is, de facto ambassador) in the People's Republic of China (1974–1975), and director of the Central Intelligence Agency (1976). His performance in these posts made no enemies but also did little to define his political character or to win him a broad popular following.

In the 1988 presidential campaign, Bush courted the conservative constituencies of Ronald Reagan. He attacked his opponent for his affiliation with the american civil liberties union and expressed sympathy with several key conservative complaints against the constitutional rulings of both the warren court and the burger court. He thus expressed support for constitutional amendments to prohibit abortion and to reauthorize school prayer. He also supported a constitutional amendment to require a balanced budget. As President, he urged a constitutional amendment to overturn the Supreme Court's ruling that flag desecration is protected by the first amendment. None of these amendments was pushed with any sustained energy or intensity by the Bush administration, however, and none found majority support in Congress.

Bush's first choice for the Supreme Court when the retirement of Justice william j. brennan opened a vacancy in the summer of 1990 was characteristic of his nonconfrontational style as President. david h. souter, an almost totally unknown New Hampshire state supreme court justice, proved to have taken few public stands on constitutional controversies, and President Bush announced that he, himself, had neither questioned Souter nor learned from others what Souter's views might be on abortion or on other controversial subjects. Bush did, however, emphasize his expectation that Souter would fairly interpret the Constitution instead of "legislating" his own policy preferences. The President was prepared to indicate in general terms that he thought recent Supreme Court Justices had not always properly observed this distinction, but he did not single out any particular decisions for such criticism.

In general, during his first two years in office, President Bush adopted a conciliatory stance toward a Congress dominated by the opposition party. He did assert presidential prerogatives in vetoing congressional measures he thought overly restrictive of the presidency or of the constitutional duties of the executive branch, but he did not make this a major theme either. He conceded before his election that the so-called iran-contra affair in the Reagan administration may have involved significant departures from the law and pledged to observe legal constraints with complete devotion. He did make efforts to consult congressional leaders when he committed U.S. forces to conflict in Panama in 1989 and in the Middle East in 1990, and both efforts generally received broad support in Congress. Like his predecessors, however, President Bush did not acknowledge that he was bound by the 1974 War Powers Resolution; he submitted required reports to Congress, but presented these as voluntary measures of cooperation rather than compliance with binding law.

In the conflict over Iraq's conquest of neighboring Kuwait, President Bush pursued active diplomatic efforts, culminating in a United Nations Security Council Resolution authorizing the use of force to liberate Kuwait. After sending almost half a million American troops to Saudi Arabia, President Bush did finally seek and receive direct congressional authorization for the use of force in this conflict. U.S. air strikes followed within days of this vote in accord with a deadline established in both the U.N. resolution and the congressional resolution. Though the congressional resolution received only a bare majority in the Senate in a largely partisan vote, it was widely accepted as the constitutional equivalent of a declaration of war and essentially put an end to further legal debate about the U.S. military role in the war against Iraq. With the onset of decisive military operations, support for he President in the country rose to record levels.

Jeremy Rabkin
(1992)

Bibliography

Bush, George with Douglas Wead 1988 Man of Integrity. Eugene, Ore.: Harvest House.

Bush, George 1989 Statement on Signing the Treasury, Postal Service and General Government Act, 1990 (November 3, 1989) in Public Papers of the Presidents, Administration of George Bush, 1989. Washington, D.C.: U.S. Government Printing Office.