41: Inside the Presidency of George H. W. Bush ed. by Michael Nelson, Barbara A. Perry (review)

History will likely be very kind to George H. W. Bush. His one-term presidency (1989-1993) came as two disruptive events, the end of the Cold War and the Reagan Revolution, were rewriting the rules of both international relations and domestic politics. Even though his failed 1992 reelection bid revealed a disconnect with the electorate, Bush governed admirably in those troubled times. His celebrated prudence and thoughtfulness served him well as he bridged the gap between the old and the new world orders.

This theme of Bush as a transitional president is prevalent throughout 41: Inside the Presidency of George H. W. Bush. The essays in this collection originated at a 2011 conference celebrating the opening of the Bush Oral History project at the University of Virginia’s Miller Center. The project, a joint venture between the Miller Center and the Bush Presidential Library Foundation, consists of fifty interviews, of which thirty-one are presently open to researchers. With only 20 per cent of the documents at the Bush Library currently accessible, these oral histories are the best material from which to craft the first draft assessment of Bush’s administration. They are central to the book’s analysis.

It must be said that 41 has an undue emphasis on domestic policy over foreign, largely due to the nature of the oral history source base. Though Bush’s policy agenda was not as robust as that of his predecessor, he shepherded a number of important measures through Congress, including the updated Clean Air Act and the Americans with Disabilities Act. The politics and controversy surrounding the 1990 budget deal, however, have overshadowed any of the administration’s accomplishments in the historical memory. Here Bush violated his self-imposed pledge never to raise taxes and agreed with Congressional Democrats on a package that managed the spiraling budget deficit and ensured that economic growth would occur later in the decade. While Bush undoubtedly saw this as the right path for the country, his deviation from Reaganomics ran afoul of the right wing of the Republican Party and doomed his reelection prospects. In an excellent chapter, Hugh Helco explains that Bush’s patrician conservative disposition was out of step with the post-1964 movement conservatism. Bush hoped that his personal relationships with members of Congress would insulate him from controversy, but he was unprepared for the level of partisanship and rancor that defined late-twentieth-century politics. Chapters on Supreme Court appointments, the John Tower controversy, and Congressional relations emphasize just how ideologically rigid and polarizing Washington had become and how unprepared Bush was for this new environment.

Bush is likely most notable for presiding during the fall of the Soviet Union and the dissolution of the Cold War system. As the United States emerged as the sole superpower in a formerly bipolar world, Bush and his national security team preserved stability and encouraged the spread of the liberal capitalist values of the United States. Bartholomew Sparrow, in perhaps the strongest essay in the anthology, attributes this success to the personalities of the key decision makers in the administration. Secretary of State James Baker and National Security Advisor Brent Scowcroft were longtime friends and colleagues of Bush; they developed a working relationship that was decidedly nonadversarial and set the tone for their deputies. This harmonious process meant that key decisions were often worked out at the staff level with very little controversy. Sparrow indicates that this orderly, cooperative system was noticeably absent during the George W. Bush administration even though people like Condoleezza Rice, Dick Cheney, and Bob Gates served in both White Houses. Sparrow contends that the lack of collegiality and cooperation among staffers in the later Bush administration caused things to turn out quite differently in the 2000s.

41 anticipates some of the questions that might arise as time advances and contemporary events necessitate reappraisals. Sparrow’s...