Bush to Govern on Promise of Unity

Dec. 13, 2000 -- George W. Bush, a relative neophyte at the politics game when he was elected governor of Texas five years ago, wooed voters with his folksy, nice guy image, and his promise to unite the nation.

“We need a uniter, not a divider,” Bush was fond of saying during his 15-month presidential campaign.

When it comes to governing in the White House, that might very well become Bush’s mantra, political experts say.

“He will attempt to bring bipartisanship and comity to Washington,” said James Thurber, a presidential scholar at American University in Washington.

“But he will find it very difficult with razor thin margins in the House and the Senate and because he has had no clear mandate. No matter what, he’ll inherit gridlock and will continue on major issues talked about in the campaign.”

The trick, experts say, will be for Bush to set the tone from the beginning.

“It strikes me that he is going to want to offer an olive branch and be a unifier,” said Michael Franc, vice president of government relations at the Heritage Foundation, a conservative Washington think tank. “He will want to toss it into the court of Congressional Democrats. They will be looking for signals as to how they should respond.”

Bush Works to Unify

In fact, Bush made unity the theme of his first speech as president-elect Wednesday night.

“I hope the long wait of the last five weeks will heighten adesire to move beyond the bitterness and partisanship of the recentpast,” Bush said from the chamber of the Texas House of Representatives.

He was introduced by the highest-ranking Democrat in his state,House Speaker Pete Laney. Bush aides said the introduction, and thesetting, were intended to signal bipartisanship.

“Here, in a place where Democrats have the majority,Republicans and Democrats have worked together to do what is rightwith the people we respect,” Bush said. The chamber was packedwith legislators of both parties, state officials, Bush staffmembers and family.

Laney said Bush and he “found we could have policy differenceswithout gridlock … debate without bitterness.” He called Bush“a leader you can trust and respect.”

Republicans Are Supportive

Bush’s aides firmly believe no one is better suited than he to grapple with the partisanship that now grips Congress. And at the U.S. Capitol today, Republicans were encouraging.

“He needs to reassure the American people. I think he needs to ask for their help and their support,” said Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott, R-Miss.

Sen. Pete Domenici, R-N.M., echoed Lott’s comments.

“He will issue a call for bipartisanship and working together,” he said.

That means compromise, and the Republican lawmakers who met with Bush’s running mate Dick Cheney today have been sending that signal for weeks.

“It may not necessarily be a long agenda. But it will be a very important agenda,” Lott said.

Since the end of the campaign, Bush has stayed away from controversial issues like his $1.6 trillion dollar tax cut plan, preferring to stress less contentious education reforms backed by both parties.

Tackling the Issues

Bush initially appealed to a wide swath of voters across the nation by combining traditional Republican values of big tax cuts and less government while campaigning on the traditionally Democratic issues of education, Medicare and Social Security.

During the campaign, Bush talked often about his skill at working with Democrats in Texas while he governed that state. The same sort of conciliatory strategy will have to be applied in Washington, political watchers say, in order to move his agenda through Congress.

“Governor Bush has an impressive track record reaching across party lines and working with Democrats in Austin,” Franc says. “One would hope that would be able to the same in Washington.”

But Bush just may find Washington to be an entirely uncharted territory.

“He talked about working with Democrats in Texas, but I think he will soon learn that Washington, D.C. is not Austin, that Capitol Hill is a steep hill to climb.”

In his first year, Franc says, Bush will most likely push for his promises of educational reform, an increase in military preparedness and a revamp of the nation’s Social Security system.

“Education is his strength,” Franc says. “He is comfortable and commanding when he speaks about that issue. He knows where he wants to go. He has a vision.”

He will have a much tougher time, the experts say, in pushing through his proposed across the board tax cuts, a plan the Democrats fundamentally disagree with. In that case, Bush may have to move slower, introducing few tax cut measures at one time.

“Three or four tax bills could be done without moving heaven and earth,” Franc says.

To get any legislation through Congress, Thurber says, Bush is going to have to work at building coalitions of Republicans and Democrats on his side of the issues.

“He is going to have to move incrementally and not boldly,” Thurber says. “Americans do not want bold action at this point. They don’t perceive major problems out there that need to be solved.”

A Low-Key President

What appealed to voters during the campaign, and what ultimately could make Bush successful in governing, is his low-key personality. Bush is a likable guy, experts say, and has character traits that make him easy to get along with.

Bush is also skilled at championing his ideas, while getting others to carry them out, experts say.

As opposed to Al Gore, who is known as a micro manager, Bush is better at “the fairly mundane and extremely important factor of organizing the presidency,” said Fred Greenstein, a Princeton professor who has written on what it takes to be president.

“He’s better at delegating and somehow fostering a team that doesn’t fall apart.”

Bush, Greenstein says, is also a master politician.

“I think he’s a very sharp politician,” Greenstein says. “He’s he natural pol. He knew the names of all the other fraternity pledges at Yale.”

ABCNEWS’ Dean Reynolds and The Associated Press contributed to this report.