According to Bill Clinton and the Democrats, the 1998 Congress was a "do nothing" Congress, and, in one sense, they were correct. No major legislation was passed -- not the Tobacco Settlement, nor Campaign Finance Reform, nor the Patient’s Bill of Rights, nothing was done to "save" Social Security, and, when all was said and done, the budget showdown was over a 1 percent increase in spending. From a Republican perspective, it could be said that it was a good thing that the 1998 session was a "do nothing" Congress, because we withstood the Democratic assault without giving up too much ground. However, the fact that our side was on the defensive, when we controlled both houses of Congress, left a lot of us wondering about the quality of our leaders. It was like President Lincoln watching his generals commanding the Army of the Potomac fail to defeat General Lee and his smaller Army of Northern Virginia. To quote President Lincoln, "What can I do with such generals as we have?"
     The Democratic strategy in the 1998 session was to force the Republicans to accept their legislative initiatives, and to stymie Republican legislative initiatives, on the basis that the Republicans had only a narrow majority in the House; could not break a filibuster in the Senate; and, that even with bills they could pass, they could not override a Presidential veto. As a result, Congressional voting became very polarized, with Democrats refusing to compromise on anything, and waiting for Bill Clinton’s "rope-a-dope" strategy to force the Republicans, in the end, into capitulation. In fact, this was the most polarized Congress since I began constructing my index. There was an unprecedented average gap of 49 points between the Republicans and the Democrats in the two chambers on economics and civil liberties. This polarization made many Republicans look like true-blue libertarians (which we don’t quite believe, we just think they're better than the lousy Democrats).
     Before discussing what votes I included in this year’s index, perhaps I should discuss some of the votes not included: NATO expansion (i.e., the Czech Republic, Hungary and Poland); national missile defense, partial birth abortion or any other abortion issue, the budget deal, fast-track trade initiatives, and Puerto Rico statehood. Arguments could be made that there are libertarian positions on at least some of these issues. However, I considered these votes to be less useful for a libertarian index than the included votes (which isn’t to say the votes I included are perfect, only that they were better). For example, whether NATO should expand eastward is not, in my mind, the key question. The key question is what are we doing in NATO now that the Soviet Union has collapsed?

Rollcall Votes
     In the area of economics, I included votes on the highway bill, on hiring 100,000 new teachers, on the freedom of Medicare patients to "privately-contract" for services, to establish Social Security personal retirement accounts, to increase regulations on HMOs, to increase spending on various welfare programs, to restrict military base closings and to de-fund the space station, to cap punitive damages, and to reduce the holding-period required to qualify for the lower capital gains tax rate. I also included votes on private property rights and the environment, labor union organizing, the minimum wage, the Tax Limitation Constitutional Amendment, Glass-Steagell repeal, the IMF, and the so-called UN Debt. 

High and Low Ratings
     Two Congressmen and one Senator scored 100 on the economics index: Rep. Sue Myrick of North Carolina (the first woman member of Congress to register a 100), Rep. Steve Chabot of Ohio and Sen. John Ashcroft of Missouri (both of the guys being repeat 100 scores). Fourteen Congressmen and two Senators made only one bad vote. Five Congressmen (Cox CA, Radonovich CA, Rohrabacher CA, Royce CA, Salmon AZ) and both Senators (Kyl AZ, Thompson TN) got dinged on the space station vote. Three Congressmen were tripped-up on Glass-Steagell repeal (Christensen NE, Hefley CO, Schaffer CO). One on federal regulation of college sports (Hoekstra MI). Three on the highway bill (Neumann WI, Paxon NY, Smith MI). And, two on private property rights (Portman OH, Sanford SC).

Personal Liberties
     In the area of civil liberties, I included votes on campaign finance reform, federal regulation of alcohol and tobacco, the war on drugs, choice in education, gun control and immigration. I also included votes on racial preferences, national identity cards, Bosnia, IRS taxpayer abuse, government-sponsored speech, ballot access, prayer in public schools, and the bans on human cloning, same-sex military training and gay adoptions. With many of these "hot button" social issues, it seems that politics is the struggle of which side -- those wanting to prohibit it versus those wanting to mandate it -- will get to force their view onto everybody else. The libertarian option, of allowing each person to decide for himself, is hardly ever considered. Thus, we have yet to obtain one perfect score. This year, we have our second near miss, Senator Connie Mack of Florida, whose one boo-boo was agreeing to the increase in the cigarette tax included in the tobacco settlement.

Ron Paul

Clifford F. Thies e-mail

Past Chairman, Republican Liberty Caucus
Professor of Economics and Finance
  at Shenandoah University