Persuasion and the Bully Pulpit: Expanded Evidence on Strategies of

Presidential Leadership

Chad Murphy – Assistant ProfessorAnnie Morris – Alumna

University of Mary Washington

Outline

• This project– Re-affirmation of the importance of nationally

televised addresses

• Next Step: causal mechanism– Signaling vs. Bully Pulpit

• Future research: Other methods of influence– Face-to-face bargaining– “Going local”

This Project

• Are presidents able to use their rhetoric to influence the legislative process?

• More specifically, are presidents able to use their rhetoric to alter congressional behavior?

Neustadt and Bargaining

• Neustadt – “presidential power is the power to persuade”

• Bargaining with members of Congress was at the heart of executive power

• This changed for a number of reasons in the mid 20th century

Tension in the Literature

• Kernell and “going public”– Nationally televised addresses – The “bully pulpit”

• Edwards’s counter-argument– Most likely case studies– Necessary conditions

Multiple Questions Emerge

• Do nationally televised addresses work?

• How?

• Other methods?

Persuasion vs. Observed Behavior

• Persuasion involves a change in behavior– Dahl’s story of the man screaming into traffic

• Most scholarship on this topic looks at observed behavior

• We look at a change in behavior depending on presidential speeches

Krehbiel’s Veto “Experiment”

Veto Overrides as an Appropriate Test

• Endogeneity– President decides when to give the speech, but

Congress decides when to override

• Difficult test– MCs have already taken a position– All other avenues of potential persuasion have

taken place– Veto override represents a bad situation for the

president

Main Hypothesis

• H1: When presidents make a speech after the initial passage vote but before the veto override attempt, members of Congress will be more likely to switch their vote from the initial passage vote to the veto override vote.

Variables• Dependent: Did the MC switch in the president’s

direction?• Explanatory: Did the president make a speech?– Before the original vote?– Before the veto override?

• Control:– Original vote margin– Party support in Congress– Presidential approval– President’s party

Simple Model

Variable Coefficient

Speech Before Original Vote

-0.084+(0.056)

Speech Before Veto Override

0.057*(0.034)

Future Work

• What is the underlying mechanism?• Signaling• “Surprise” vetoes• Co-partisans

• Bully pulpit• Presidential approval• Popularity differential• Charismatic presidents

• Others?

Future Work

• Face-to-face bargaining– Classical conception of persuasion– Kucinich and Air Force One– Coding presidential meetings with MCs

• “Going local” – Barnstorming tour– Press coverage improves

Discussion

• We find support for the power of nationally televised addresses as persuasive

• There is a need to return to studying nationally televised addresses