Kerry Not So Liberal, Bush Not So Conservative

By Jeffery A. Jenkins

Where does President George W. Bush stand ideologically? Some liberals contend that he is an extremist, more conservative than Ronald Reagan, a proponent of rolling back the many social and economic reforms of the New Deal and Great Society. At the same time, some conservatives argue that he is an advocate of expanding the federal government, typified by the recent, massive expansion in Medicare, and is thus out of step with the laissez-faire brand of economics that underlies traditional conservatism.

In reality, the truth lies somewhere in the middle.

As my earlier Perspective piece on John Kerry’s voting record showed, the ideological facts behind competing political passions and rhetoric can be quite illusive. Despite all the joined-at-the-hip comparisons of Kerry to Edward Kennedy, the analysis showed that Kerry is a moderate relative to his party’s Senate delegation, slightly left of center.

Using a variant of the same methodology this time, I compared Bush’s ideological score to those of both Republican Senators and other Republican presidents across time. I also looked at how Kerry's positions compare with other Democratic presidents, extending my earlier analysis comparing his voting record with those of other Democratic Senators.

For simplicity, I examined President Bush’s score in the last full Congress, the 107th, relative to Senate Republicans.

As it turns out, President Bush is positioned near the dividing line between the center-right and right quartiles of the party. So, while clearly right of center, he is not a part of the most conservative segment of the party, which at that time was anchored by the likes of Senators Phil Gramm and Jesse Helms.

Historically, he is considerably more conservative than presidents Dwight Eisenhower and Gerald Ford, somewhat more conservative then President Richard Nixon, slightly more conservative than his father, President George H. W. Bush, but less conservative than President Ronald Reagan.

Note that it is commonly observed that George H. W. Bush was a distinct moderate, who often drew the ire of conservatives loyal to the legacy of Ronald Reagan. In fact, George H. W. Bush’s presidency was a study in contrasts. In his first two years as president, he spoke of “a thousand points of light” and emphasized a “kinder, gentler” brand of conservatism. His policy stances were reflected in an ideological score that falls near the middle of the Republican Senate delegation, slightly right of center. In his last two years as president, he was battered by a stagnant economy and challenged for the nomination from the right by Patrick Buchanan. The active courting of his conservative base that followed is reflected by the movement of his ideological score into the extreme-right quartile.

Is George W. Bush following his father’s lead? That is, with his recent support of a constitutional amendment banning gay marriage as the 2004 election looms, is he moving rightward in the latter half of his term? Not necessarily. Some of his other recent policy positions, such as his support of steel tariffs and immigration liberalization, suggest otherwise. A clearer view of his ideological positioning likely will emerge as November approaches. But, as of now, it appears that President Bush may be attempting to maintain his current “middle-of-the-road” brand of conservatism, taking some hard-right stances but also portraying a “compassionate conservatism” side.

Developed by Keith Poole of the University of Houston and Howard Rosenthal of Princeton University, the methodology I employed is used mainly to uncover the ideological predilections of members of Congress. The simple algorithm uses congressional roll-call votes as inputs and produces “ideological scores” for members of Congress – based on how frequently (or infrequently) they vote alike – which can be arrayed from left to right.

Presidents can also be placed on this left-right continuum, based on the positions they take on congressional roll-call votes. That is presidents will often make their preferences known on a given issue, prior to the issue being voted on in Congress. I used these presidential positions to determine how President Bush would have voted, had he been in Congress. The President’s ideological score was then compared to those of his party’s congressional delegation, to determine just how conservative (or liberal) he is.

What about Senator John Kerry, the would-be president? Should he become president, what should we expect? How does this left-leaning moderate, based on my early analysis, compare to other recent Democratic Presidents?

In fact, only President Lyndon Johnson appears more conservative than John Kerry; Presidents Jimmy Carter and Bill Clinton appear slightly more liberal than Kerry; and President John F. Kennedy, to whom Kerry often is compared, appears considerably more liberal than the current Massachusetts senator trying to follow in his footsteps.

Should we expect Kerry to behave differently if elected President? As noted earlier, presidents do not operate in a vacuum. Their actions often are heavily influenced by changing external conditions around them.

Take Presidents Kennedy and Johnson, who both served in the Senate before becoming President. Both also became more liberal once in the White House, though each took a different path. Kennedy began his presidency tentatively, by pursuing a moderate path and thus placating the conservative Southern wing of his party. But midway through his term, he established a clear and decidedly liberal agenda, primarily with his activist policies on desegregation and civil rights for African Americans. Johnson, on the other hand, began his presidency in a distinctly liberal fashion, by maintaining Kennedy’s legacy and pushing through the range of social programs underlying his Great Society. But, consumed by Vietnam and social unrest at home during his second term, Johnson moderated his positions substantially.

If the Kennedy and Johnson cases are at all indicative, we might expect Kerry, free from the deliberative and cooperative shackles of Senate politics, to move to the left upon becoming president. Whether such a move would be permanent, or whether he would moderate over time, is unclear. Thus is the uncertainty of political life.

In the end, what does all of this mean? Put simply, the American people have a real choice in 2004. Rather than appear as “echoes,” Bush and Kerry represent very different ideological views of the world. While neither carries a distinctly extremist mentality, their views of the role that government plays in the economy and society meaningfully diverge. We will know in November which view carries the day.

Jeffery A. Jenkins is an assistant professor of political science and a faculty fellow at the Institute for Policy Research, Northwestern University.