No CrossRef data available.
We use cookies to distinguish you from other users and to provide you with a better experience on our websites. Close this message to accept cookies or find out how to manage your cookie settings.
We use cookies to distinguish you from other users and to provide you with a better experience on our websites. Close this message to accept cookies or find out how to manage your cookie settings.
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 16 January 2009
To an increasing degree, the American states in recent years have taken the lead in domestic policymaking. In many areas — education, economic development, welfare reform, health care, housing and the environment, among others — state governors and legislatures are providing the initiative in identifying public needs, setting policy agenda and devising effective programmes to implement them.
1 Eisenhower, Dwight D., “Address to the 1957 National Governors' Conference,” in The Politics of American Federalism, ed., Eleazer, Daniel J. (Lexington, Mass: D. C. Heath, 1969), 188–93.Google Scholar
2 Weyrich, Paul M., “The Reagan Revolution That Wasn't,” Policy Review, (Summer 1987), 53Google Scholar
3 National Governors' Association (NGA), Making America Work: Productive People, Productive Policies, “Jobs, Growth and Competitiveness,” Washington, DC, 07 1987, xvii.Google Scholar
4 White, Leonard D., The States and the Nation (Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 1953), 3.Google Scholar
5 Sanford, Terry, Storm Over the States (New York: McGraw Hill, 1967), I, 20–24.Google Scholar
6 Advisory Commission on Intergovernmental Relations (ACIR), Regulatory Federalism: Policy, Process, Impact, and Reform (Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1984), 246.Google Scholar
7 Ford and Carter proposed several block grants but none were enacted. On rising federal expenditures, see Dilger, Robert J., “The Expansion and Centralization of American Governmental Functions,” in American Intergovernmental Relations Today: Perspectives and Controversies, ed., Dilger, R. J. (Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall, 1986), 25Google Scholar; also, Shannon, John, “Federal and State-Local Spenders Go Their Separate Ways,”Google Scholaribid, 181–82.
8 Weekly Compilation of Presidential Documents 18, 4, 02 1, 1982, 79–80.Google ScholarSpecial Analyses, Budget of the United States Government, Fiscal Year 1987, H-2. Also, see Peterson, George E., et al. , The Reagan Block Grants: What Have We Learned? (Washington, DC: Urban Institute, 1986), ch. 1.Google Scholar
9 Council of State Governments (CSG), “State of the States, 1985,” Address by Robb, Governor Charles of Virginia, in Book of the States, 1986–1987 (Lexington, KY: CSG, 1986), 1–2.Google Scholar
10 Democratic Governors' Association (DGA), Facing the Facts: The Democratic Governors' View from the States (Washington, DC, 1984), 91–98, 111–16.Google Scholar
11 CSG, “State of the States, 1985.”
12 U.S. News & World Report, “The Can-Do Mood in the States,” 30 12 1985, 6 01 1986, 32–40.Google Scholar
13 Broder, David S., “Conservative – and Activist – Governors,” The Washington Post, 25 02 1987.Google Scholar
14 Doyle, Denis P. and Hartle, Terry W., “The States Are Leading As Washington Wallows,”Google Scholaribid, 5 Sept. 1985.
15 Aronson, J. Richard and Hilley, John L., Financing State and Local Governments, 4th edn. (Washington, DC: Brookings Institution, 1986), 24–26Google Scholar; also Burns, James M., Peltason, J. W., and Cronin, Thomas E., State and Local Politics: Government By the People, 3 rd edn. (Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall, 1981), 239–40.Google Scholar
16 Reeves, Mavis Mann, “Look Again At State Capacity,” American Intergovernmental Relations Today, ch. 6.Google Scholar
17 CSG, “The State of the States, 1973,” Message of Governor Daniel J. Evans of Washington, Washington, DC, 1974.Google Scholar
18 ACIR, State and Local Roles in the Federal System (Washington, DC: ACIR, 1982), 3.Google Scholar
19 Sabato, Larry, Goodbye to Good-time Charlie: The American Governorship Transformed, 2nd edn. (Washington, DC: Congressional Quarterly Press, 1983)Google Scholar, see especially chs. 2 and 6, 198–201; also, Reeves, “Look Again At State Capacity,” 148–53.Google Scholar
20 ibid, 154–55, 157; also, Nathan, Richard P., “Institutional Change Under Reagan,” in Perspectives On the Reagan Years, ed. Palmer, John L. (Washington, DC: Urban Institute, 1986), 139Google Scholar
21 Treadway, J. M., Public Policy Making in America (NY: Praeger, 1985), 1.Google Scholar
22 On the NGA, see Sabato, , Goodbye to Good-time Charlie, 169–75.Google Scholar
23 Dilger, , “The Expansion and Centralization of American Governmental Functions,” 20–21Google Scholar; Council of State Planning Agencies, “About the Council of State Planning Agencies,” Washington, DC: CSPA, nd., ca. 1984, I; Education Commission of the States, Fact Sheet, Washington, DC, 1987.
24 For an extended list, see Kinsley, Michael, “The Withering Away of the States,” in Gittell, Marilyn, ed., State Politics and the New Federalism (New York: Longman, 1986), 66–67.Google Scholar
25 Doyle, and Hartle, , “The States Are Leading…”Google Scholar
26 Weyrich, , “The Reagan Revolution That Wasn't,” 52–53Google Scholar; quoted in Aim, Richard et al. , “Move Over Capitol Hill, The Action's Back Home,” U.S. News & World Report, 06 9, 1986, 22.Google Scholar
27 Nathan, , “Institutional Change Under Reagan,” 1986, 141.Google Scholar
28 The National Commission on Excellence in Education, “A Nation At Risk: The Imperative for Educational Reform,” A Report to the Nation and the Secretary of Education (U.S. Dept. of Education, Washington, DC, 19 04, 1983), 1–3.Google Scholar See also, The Twentieth Century Fund, “Report on the Twentieth Century Fund Task Force on Elementary and Secondary Education Policy” (New York: 1983).Google Scholar
29 See The Nation Responds: Recent Efforts To Improve Education (Washington, DC: U.S. Dept. of Education, 05 1984)Google Scholar, particularly the section entitled, “State Initiatives,” and 15. Also, Kirst, Michael W., Who Controls Our Schools: American Values in Conflict (New York: W. H. Freeman, 1984), 126–29Google Scholar, chapter 2. Almost every recent study on America's international competitiveness gives education high priority. See, Global Competition: The New Reality. President's Commission on Industrial Competitiveness (Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1985), 1, 56–57Google Scholar, and Johnston, William B., Workforce 2000: Work and Workers for the 21st Century (Indianapolis: Hudson Institute, 1987), xxvi–xxvii, 115–17.Google Scholar
30 National Governors' Association, Time for Results: The Governors' 1991 Report on Education (Washington, DC, 07 1986).Google Scholar
31 NGA, Results In Education: 1987 (Washington, DC, 07 1987).Google ScholarThe Washington Post, 16 03 1988, 4.Google Scholar
32 See, California State Department of Education, “Accountability for California Public Schools,” Sacramento, 1986Google Scholar; “Miami Schools: Laboratory for Major Changes,” The New York Times, 10 01 1988, 1.Google Scholar“Summary of Major Actions Taken by the New York Legislature in 1986,”Google Scholaribid, 10 July 1986. The Washington Post, 29 05, 1988, 8.Google Scholar
33 See Bailey, Stephen K., “Political Coalitions for Public Education,” Daedalus (Summer 1981).Google Scholar On business-education cooperation, see Hechinger, Fred M., “Turnaround for the Schools?”, Harvard Business Review (01/02 1985).Google Scholar The CED acknowledges the states' role in its two most recent reports on education, Investing in Our Children: Business and the Public Schools (New York and Washington, DC: CED, 1985)Google Scholar, and Children In Need: Investment Strategies for the Educationally Disadvantaged (New York and Washington, DC: CED, 1987).Google Scholar
34 The Nation Responds, 15Google Scholar; also, The Washington Post, 15 09 1987Google Scholar, and Doyle, Denis P. and Hartle, Terry W., Excellence in Education: The States Take Charge (Washington, DC: AEI, 1985).Google Scholar
35 Vaughn, Roger, Pollard, Robert, Dyer, Barbara, The Wealth of States (Washington, DC: CSPA, 1984), 5Google Scholar; NGA, Making America Work: Productive People, Productive Policies, “Jobs, Growth and Competitiveness” (Washington, DC: NGA, 1987), v.Google Scholar
36 Vaughn, et al. , Wealth of States, v.Google Scholar
37 Corporation for Enterprise Development, Making the Grade: The Development's Report Card on the States (Washington, DC: CFED, 1987), ch. 1Google Scholar; NGA, Policy Positions, 1986–1987 (Washington, DC: NGA, 1987), 236–43.Google Scholar
38 Leepson, Marc, “Keeping Business At Home,” Nation's Business, 05 1987, 68Google Scholar; also, Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta, “Florida: Poised for A Surge,” Economic Review (02 1983), 7–10.Google Scholar
39 Leepson, , “Keeping Business At Home,” 67–70Google Scholar; also, Corporation for Enterprise Development, Making the Grade, 3–6Google Scholar; and Novack, Janet, “Supply Side Success Story,” Forbes, 17 11 1986, 144–53.Google Scholar
40 GovernorCuomo, Mario M., “Message To The Legislature,” Albany, NY, 9 01 1985, 14–27Google Scholar; and “Message To The Legislature,” Albany, NY, 6 01 1988, 25–26.Google Scholar
41 Vaughn, Roger, “Creating Opportunity: Reducing Dependency Through Economic Development” (Washington, DC: CSPA, Aug. 1984), 10–11.Google Scholar
42 The New York Times, 4 10 1987, 45.Google Scholar
43 Broder, , “Conservative – and Activist – Governors.”Google Scholar
44 NGA, Making America Work, “Bringing Down the Barriers,” and “Jobs, Growth and Competitiveness” (Washington, DC: NGA, 1987), vi–x, 18.Google Scholar
45 The New York Times, 7 07 1986, 1.Google Scholar
46 Lamar, Jacob V. Jr, “From Welfare To Workfare,” Time, 3 02 1986, 16–18.Google Scholar
47 Barnes, Fred, “Move Over Mario,” The New Republic, 14 04 1986Google Scholar; NGA, “Bringing Down the Barriers,” 19.Google Scholar
48 Kaus, Mickey, “The Work Ethic State,” The New Republic, 7 07 1986, 22–23Google Scholar; Lamar, , “From Welfare to Workfare,” 17.Google Scholar See also, “Four Efforts to Battle Poverty,” Scholastic Update, 23 03 1987, 25Google Scholar; NGA, “Bringing Down the Barriers,” 26.Google Scholar
49 Chua-Eoan, Howard G., “Welfare-Plus in Washington,” Time, 19 01 1987, 23.Google ScholarThe New York Times, 25 10 1987, 1.Google Scholar For criticism of workfare, see, e.g., Kaus, , “The Work Ethic State,” and Joint Economic Committee, Congress of the United States, Hearing, “Workfare Versus Welfare” (Washington, DC: GPO, 23 04 1986), 2–23.Google Scholar The Manpower Demonstration Research Corp., e.g., found Illinois' programme “deficient” and unproductive due to underfunding, in The Washington Post, 2 12 1987, 23.Google Scholar
50 On the Administration's GROW plan, see Whitman, David, “The Key To Welfare Reform,” Atlantic Monthly (06 1987), 24–25.Google Scholar
51 Joint Economic Committee, “Workfare Versus Welfare.” For Moynihan's plan and remarks, see The New York Times, 19, 26 07, 1987Google Scholar, both 1; Clinton, Bill, “Welfare Reform As an Investment,” The Washington Post, 10 12 1987.Google Scholar
52 NGA, “Bringing Down the Barriers,” 10–11, 16–17Google Scholar; Clinton, , “Welfare Reform As an Investment.”Google Scholar
53 Despite new federalism, Washington's funding for health care increased in constant dollars during the 1980s, in Peterson, Paul E., Rabe, Barry G., and Wong, Kenneth K., When Federalism Works (Washington, DC: Brookings Institution, 1986), 221Google Scholar; Wilson, Florence A. and Neuhauser, Duncan, Health Services in the United States (Cambridge, Mass: Ballinger, 1985), 2nd edn., 131–33.Google Scholar
54 Ibid., 227–36.
55 Aronson, and Hilley, , Financing State and Local Governments, 70–71.Google Scholar
56 Ibid., 71. Califano, Joseph A. Jr, America's Health Care Revolution (New York: Random House, 1986), 151, 158.Google ScholarPubMed
57 Starr, Paul, The Social Transformation of American Medicine (New York: Basic Books, 1982), 398–99.Google Scholar
58 Lamm, Richard D., “Health Care: An Era of Hard Choices,” DGA Facing the Facts, 21–27.Google Scholar
59 Starr, , The Social Transformation of American Medicine, 399Google Scholar; Califano, , America's Health Care Revolution, 153.Google Scholar
60 Ibid., also Lamm, , “Health Care: An Era of Hard Choices,” 25–26.Google Scholar
61 Califano, , America's Health Care Revolution, 154, 160.Google Scholar
62 Lamm, , “Health Care: An Era of Hard Choices,” 25Google Scholar; also Doyle, and Hartle, , “The States Are Leading…”Google Scholar
63 NGA, Building Affordable Long Term Care Alternatives; Integrating State Policy (Washington, DC: NGA, 1987), i–iii.Google Scholar
64 Ibid., xii–xiv, vi.
65 Ibid., 3.
66 Iglehart, John K., “Falling Through the Safety Net,” The Washington Post, Health Sect., 2 12 1986.Google Scholar
67 NGA, “Broadening Medicaid Coverage of Pregnant Women and Children: State Policy Responses” (Washington, DC: NGA, 02, 1987), i–ii, 31–36.Google Scholar
68 Massachusett's plan described in The Washington Post, 10 09 1987, 15Google Scholar; also, The New York Times, 22 11 1987, 1.Google ScholarThe Washington Post, 14 04 1988, 16, and 26 04, “Editorial.”Google Scholar
69 Califano, , America's Health Care Revolution, 214–15Google Scholar; also, “Summary of Major Actions Taken by the New York Legislature in 1986,” in The New York Times, 10 07 1986.Google Scholar
70 Proffer, Lanny, “Weathering the Storm of Liability Litigation,” State Legislatures (Washington, DC: National Conference of State Legislatures, 11/12 1985), 15.Google Scholar
71 As reported in The New York Times, 22 09 1987, By, 30 09 1987, 18Google Scholar; The Washington Post, 9 09 1987, 3, 1 01 1988, 11.Google Scholar
72 Treadway, , Public Policy Making in American States, 1, 182–83.Google Scholar “National policy can also be imposed on states and localities,” noted Schurr, Sam H. et al. , Energy in America's Future: The Choices Before Us (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1979), 466.Google Scholar On the importance of professionalized policymaking, see Peterson, et al. When Federalism Works, 20.Google Scholar
73 Etzioni, Amitai, An Immodest Agency: Rebuilding America Before the 21st Century (New York: McGraw-Hill, 1984), 174–75.Google Scholar
74 Barnes, Fred, “The Death of the Reagan Presidency,” The New Republic, 22 12 1986.Google Scholar The White House appeared paralyzed to Broder, “Conservative- and Activist-Governors,” and Doyle and Hartle, “The States Are Leading.…” An editorial by the Washington Post entitled “Paralysis” described federal inaction on budget matters, 13 09 1987.Google Scholar Also, a number of political analysts, such as Etzioni, opined that “The Party, Like Reagan's Era, Is Over,” in The New York Times, 16 02 1987.Google Scholar
75 Weyrich, , “The Reagan Revolution That Wasn't,” 50, 53.Google Scholar
76 E.g., according to The Washington Post – ABC News Poll conducted in April 1987, participants named Nixon, Carter and Reagan most frequently when asked: “In your lifetime which president did the worse job?” See The Washington Post, 22 04 1987, 1.Google Scholar
77 Schlesinger, Arthur M. Jr, The Cycles of American History (Boston: Houghton-Mifflin, 1986), 284–85.Google Scholar See also, Schlesinger, , “The Imperial Temptation,” The New Republic, 16 03 1987, 17–18.Google ScholarNeustadt, Richard E., Presidential Power: The Politics of Leadership (NY: Wiley, 1960), 193.Google Scholar
78 See Reeves, , “Look Again At State Capacity,” 144–45Google Scholar; poll results reported in Lipset, Seymour Martin and Schneider, William, The Confidence Gap: Business, Labor and Government in the Public Mind (Baltimore: John Hopkins University Press, 1987) rev. edn., 82–83.Google Scholar Americans found state government more trustworthy and far less wasteful of public funds than the national government in a recent ACIR poll conducted 6–14 June 1987, as reported in The Washington Post, 8 09 1987, 21Google Scholar; Sabato, , Goodbye to Good-time Charlie, 80.Google Scholar
79 Peterson, et al. , When Federalism Works, 26.Google Scholar
80 On Congress' frustration with itself, see e.g., Hackler, Tom, “What's Gone Wrong With the U.S. Senate?” American Politics, 01 1987, 7–11Google Scholar, Broder, David S., “Why Is America In Such A Sour Mood?” The Washington Post, 16 09 1987Google Scholar, and “Words, Not Actions, in the Senate,” The Economist, 3 10, 1987, 31.Google Scholar On revived Congressional activism, see e.g., The New York Times, 11 01 1987, 19Google Scholar, and The Washington Post, same day, 1.
81 NGA, “Jobs, Growth and Competitiveness,” 1–3.Google Scholar
82 The Project on the Federal Social Role, established in 1982, was comprised of distinguished present and former federal and state legislators, academicians and policy analysts. See Chisman, Forrest and Pifer, Alan, Government for the People: The Federal Social Role – What It Is, What It Should Be (New York: Norton, 1987), 9–14, 268.Google Scholar
83 Cuomo, , “Message To The Legislature,” 1988, 3.Google Scholar National Governors' Association, “Restoring the Balance: State Leadership for America's Future,” A Background Paper, 21–23 02 1988, 4.Google Scholar
84 See e.g., “Prototype State Constitution,” in State Government: CQ's Guide to Current Issues and Activities, 1987–1988 (Washington, DC: Congressional Quarterly, 1987)Google Scholar, Appendix; and The Washington Post, 1 12 1987, 4.Google Scholar
85 On the Commission's origins and purposes, see ibid, 12 Jan. 1988, 19, and Cuomo, , “Message To The Legislature,” 1988, 25.Google ScholarVice PresidentBush, George “scornfully” called it the “Cuomo Commission” in The Washington Post, 11 03 1988, 9.Google Scholar