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Summary
Summary
Journalists have called the U.S. Senate an empty chamber; politicians have lamented that the institution is broken--yet the Senate was once capable of greatness. Senators of the 1960s and '70s overcame southern opposition to civil rights, passed Great Society legislation, and battled the executive branch on Vietnam, Watergate, and its abuses of power. The right's sweep of the 1980 elections shattered that Senate, leaving a diminished institution in its wake.
Ira Shapiro spent 12 years working for Senators Gaylord Nelson, Abraham Ribicoff, Thomas Eagleton, Robert Byrd, and Jay Rockefeller. The Last Great Senate is his vivid portrait of the statesmen who helped steer America during the crisis years of the late 1970s, transcending partisanship and overcoming procedural roadblocks that have all but strangled the Senate since their departure. The Last Great Senate is necessary reading for all those who wonder how the Senate used to work and what happened to the world's greatest deliberative body.
Author Notes
Ira Shapiro came to Washington in 1975 and spent 12 years working in senior positions in the Senate, playing important roles in accomplishments as diverse as the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, the Senate Code of Ethics, and completing the Metrorail system. During the Clinton administration, he served as a leading U.S. trade negotiator, ultimately earning the rank of ambassador. He lives in Potomac, Maryland.
Reviews (4)
Publisher's Weekly Review
At a time when the hapless U.S. Congress has received low approval ratings, Shapiro, a former Senate staffer and now an international trade lawyer, looks back at a golden era of lawmakers who performed admirably in a period of domestic and foreign crisis in the late 1970s. Using Capitol Hill documents, media accounts, and interviews with congressional and White House officials, he shows this was a time of active legislators on both sides of the aisle putting aside partisanship and ideology to create a national energy formula, strengthen the Panama Canal treaty, control a tax revolt, investigate Watergate, and stifle numerous crises in the Mideast. Shapiro ably paints the political stumbles of the "outsider" administration of President Jimmy Carter in dealing with a congressional powerhouse consisting of senators Robert Byrd, Howard Baker, Ted Kennedy, Jacob Javits, Henry "Scoop" Jackson, Richard Lugar, and George McGovern. The administration and the Senate were at odds over nuclear weapons reductions, OPEC schemes, and saving financially troubled New York City and Chrysler. In his chronicle of Beltway politics, Shapiro's excellent account of wise, capable U.S. senators putting constitutional concerns over party and ideology to do the people's business is a prime example of how Washington can overcome its present deadlock. Agent: Kathleen Anderson. (Feb.) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.
Choice Review
Shapiro presents an assessment of the Senate in which he served as a senior staffer. Intricately weaving legislative summaries with biographical snippets of courageous senators during the Carter presidential years, the author provides a much-needed contextual study of both legislative processes and characteristics of statesmanship. Both are particularly poignant in this current time of gridlock. There is a deep necessity to return to the framers' design of the fundamental basis of the Senate, where men must be "committed to the national interest." Throughout, Shapiro also raises criticisms of the Republican Party's rightward shift, where decisions are now made to force Democrats to "cast painful votes that could be used against them in future campaigns." Such a shift, according to the author, breaks new ground. But does it? Lacking historical comparison, Shapiro sees the late 1970s body from the inside, lamenting the demise of his Great Senate. The framers foresaw branch conflicts, factional divides, personal quarrels, and inter- and even intra-party conflict as normal. Partisan unity does not a great Senate make--statesmanship, even without crises, does. The "last great Senate" then takes on a whole new meaning. Summing Up: Recommended. Most levels/libraries. G. Donato Bentley University
Kirkus Review
Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Library Journal Review
The U.S. Congress wasn't always gridlocked. Members of the Senate weren't always hyperpartisan. Controversial issues like SALT II and the Panama Canal Treaty would probably be DOA in Congress today, but Shapiro, who was on the staff of several senators during that time, reminds readers that during the Carter administration, the Senate passed controversial landmark legislation with bipartisan support, facing issues on their merits. Shapiro identifies important legislation and treaties debated in the Senate from 1978 to 1980, explaining positions and senators who played important roles on each side. He describes the debate and amendment process used to create a bill that could pass. He also discusses domestic issues the Senate battled over, such as government-backed loans to save New York City from default and a bailout for the Chrysler Corporation. Senators Ted Kennedy, Henry "Scoop" Jackson, Robert Byrd, Howard Baker, and Ted Stevens, for example, found ways to compromise, allowing national interest to prevail over partisan and ideological rhetoric. VERDICT Shapiro's thorough analysis and background stories of these senators remind readers that the Senate once worked despite partisanship. Readers interested in political science and government history will enjoy the author's engaging style and historical perspective.-Jill Ortner, Sch. of -Information & Lib. Studies, SUNY Buffalo (c) Copyright 2012. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Table of Contents
| Prologue | p. ix |
| 977 | |
| 1 The Grind | p. 3 |
| 2 The Natural | p. 25 |
| 3 Great Expectations, Different Agendas | p. 39 |
| 4 Hawk and Dove | p. 61 |
| 5 The Appearance of Impropriety | p. 83 |
| 6 The Liberal Filibuster | p. 103 |
| 1978 | |
| 7 A Year of Living Dangerously | p. 117 |
| 8 The Panama Canal Fight | p. 135 |
| 9 Venturing into the Middle East | p. 157 |
| 10 An Epic Business-Labor Clash | p. 171 |
| 11 Saving New York | p. 185 |
| 12 Closing Days | p. 201 |
| 1979 | |
| 13 Before the Storm | p. 223 |
| 14 Energy Battles After the Iranian Revolution | p. 241 |
| 15 Fighting the Economic Tide | p. 263 |
| 16 SALT II: Death by a Thousand Cuts | p. 285 |
| 1980 | |
| 17 A Tough Political Climate | p. 301 |
| 18 Americas Last Frontier | p. 317 |
| 19 Fighting to Survive | p. 327 |
| 20 The Lame-Duck Session | p. 355 |
| Epilogue | p. 361 |
| Acknowledgments | p. 377 |
| A Note on Sources | p. 379 |
| Interviews | p. 383 |
| Notes | p. 385 |
| Bibliography | p. 445 |
| Index | p. 453 |
