Hillary Rodham Clinton is the front-runner in the Democratic presidential primary and Jeb Bush is a front-runner in the Republican one. And although there is a lifetime of politics between now and the next election, there is a good chance that, on November 8, 2016, Americans will choose between a Bush and a Clinton for the second time in 25 years. Americans could have their third Bush presidency or another turn for the Clintons.
To many Americans, this is troubling. Last year, former first lady Barbara Bush said that “there are more than two or three families that should run for high office in America”. Sixty-nine per cent of Americans agree with that statement, according to a 2014 poll from NBC News and the Wall Street Journal. This March, in another NBC News/WSJ survey, 39 per cent of the voters said they would think more or somewhat more favourably of a candidate whose last name was not Bush or Clinton. Similarly, a majority said that electing Hillary or Jeb would represent a return to the policies of the past.
There is no denying that the status quo — of a White House claimed by one or the other family — is unusual and I will not criticise anyone disturbed by a pattern of “Bush, Clinton, Bush, Obama, Bush” or “Bush, Clinton, Bush, Obama, Clinton”.
But I also do not think it is as bad as it looks. Observers have called this a “dynastic” election. This headline from a January edition of the New York Times, is typical: ‘Are Two Dynasties Our Destiny?’
“Dynasty” may apply to the Bush family. Indeed, Jeb, in his announcement speech, described himself as “a guy who met his first president on the day he was born and his second on the day he was brought home from the hospital,” before declaring that “not a one of us (presidential candidates) deserves the job by right of resume, party, seniority, family or family narrative. It’s nobody’s turn”.
But that term does not apply to the Clintons. Hillary neither came from a political family nor joined one. Instead, she entered politics as a partner to Bill and after two decades as a political spouse, set out on her own career, first as a senator, then as a presidential candidate, then as a top diplomat, and now — again — as a presidential candidate.
Given the degree to which she has built her career in tandem with her husband’s, Hillary is not a dynastic candidate as much as she is a tightly connected one. For some, of course, this is a distinction without a difference, which is why it is important to note that national political dynasties are a recurring part of American life.
The first father-son presidential duo, in the 19th century, was John Adams and his son, John Quincy Adams, the second and sixth presidents of the United States. The Harrison family also produced two presidents, William Henry and Benjamin. The Breckinridges dominated Kentucky politics and sent senators, House members and a vice-president to Washington. Two other antebellum presidents — John Tyler and Franklin Pierce — came from distinctly political families.
The 20th century brings more familiar names: Theodore Roosevelt and his cousin Franklin Roosevelt; William Howard Taft, his son Senator Robert A. Taft, his grandson Senator Robert Taft Jr and his great-grandson, former Ohio governor Robert Taft III. Most famously, there is the Kennedy clan.
The fact that dynasties are normal — that Senate seats and governorships and presidencies have moved between and within families with ease — may be alarming (America is not especially meritocratic) but it is also mostly harmless. American democracy was not stronger after two Adams presidencies in quick succession, but it was not weaker, either. Besides, despite the frequency of dynasties, the vast majority of powerful positions in national politics go to people who aren’t connected to political families.
One last point. George W. Bush was a very different president than his father and if elected, Hillary will be a different president than her husband. Hillary faces a different Democratic Party than Bill did and has to make different choices for different ends. The same is true for Jeb and the Republican Party. Their surnames aside, neither is “more of the same”.
When you vote for president, you vote for an administration of bureaucrats and assistants and a whole host of appointees. What matters most is the party and its network of operatives, activists and policymakers and not the individual at the head of that party. If Hillary had won in 2008, her administration would have looked a lot like the one Obama put together. And on the same score, a Jeb White House probably would not look too different than a Scott Walker White House or a Marco Rubio White House.
The aesthetics of another Clinton or Bush presidency do not look great, but the optics have little bearing on what either candidate would do in office.
— Los Angeles Times
Jamelle Bouie is a staff writer for Slate.
