invading Grenada; and refusing to make major con-
cessions to the Soviet Union in nuclear arms negoti-
ations. As a result, U.S. military resources grew sub-
stantially during the early 1980’s.
Congress, however, pressured Reagan to with-
draw American troops from Lebanon following the
terrorist bombing of a barracks in Beirut in 1983
and adopted the Boland Amendment in 1984 to pro-
hibit the provision of American military aid to the
Nicaraguan Contras. After Mikhail Gorbachev be-
came the Soviet leader in 1985, more Americans and
members of Congress began to favor reductions
in defense spending and a more conciliatory policy
toward the Soviet Union. Reagan and Gorbachev
negotiated and signed the Intermediate-Range Nu-
clear Forces (INF) Treaty in 1987, and the Senate
ratified it in 1988. The INF treaty was used as the ba-
sis for achieving a more comprehensive nuclear
arms reduction agreement with the Soviet Union
known as the Strategic Arms Reduction Treaties
(START I and START II). In 1989, Congress gener-
ally supported the continuation of START negotia-
tions by President George H. W. Bush, as the Cold
War ended with the disintegration of the Soviet
Union and the communist governments in Eastern
Europe. It also supported Bush’s invasion of Panama
to remove dictator Manuel Noriega.
Impact From 1981 until 1987, the U.S. Congress
was divided between a Democratic House of Repre-
sentatives and a Republican Senate. The Democratic
House compelled the Reagan administration to mod-
erate its efforts to reduce taxes, domestic spending,
and economic regulation, while the Republican Sen-
ate enabled the White House to appoint many con-
servative judges and delay serious treaty negotia-
tions with the Soviet Union on nuclear arms control.
After the Democrats won control of both houses of
Congress in 1986, the policy-making relationship be-
tween Congress and Presidents Reagan and George
H. W. Bush became more combative and less coop-
erative.
Further Reading
Baker, Ross K.House and Senate. New York: W. W.
Norton, 1989. Study of the differences between
the U.S. House of Representatives and the Senate
that includes details of Congress during the
1980’s.
Davidson, Roger H., and Walter J. Oleszek.Congress
and Its Members. Washington, D.C.: CQ Press,
- Study of Congress that includes legislative
issues and leaders from the 1980’s.
Derbyshire, Ian.Politics in the United States from Carter
to Bush. New York: Chambers, 1990. Broad survey
of American politics from 1976 to 1989.
Johnson, Robert David.Congress and the Cold War.
New York: Cambridge University Press, 2006.
Comprehensive study of congressional influence
on U.S. military and diplomatic policy during the
Cold War. Bibliographic references and index.
Smith, Hedrick.The Power Game: How Washington
Works. New York: Ballantine Books, 1988. De-
tailed analysis of politics between Congress and
the president during the 1980’s.
Sean J. Savage
See also Beirut bombings; Bork, Robert H.; Bush,
George H. W.; Conservatism in U.S. politics; Elec-
tions in the United States, midterm; Elections in the
United States, 1980; Elections in the United States,
1984; Elections in the United States, 1988; Foreign
policy of the United States; Iran-Contra affair; Liber-
alism in U.S. politics; O’Neill, Tip; Reagan, Ronald;
Reagan Doctrine; Reagan Revolution; Reaganom-
ics; Social Security reform; Tax Reform Act of 1986;
Tower Commission; Wright, Jim.Congressional page sex
scandal
The Event Scandal involving members of the U.S.
House of Representatives who had sexual
relations with under-age assistants
Date July, 1983
Place Washington, D.C.
The scandal was the first of many to surface in American
politics during the 1980’s, exacerbating post-Watergate
skepticism regarding the integrity of elected officials.
On July 14, 1983, the House Committee on Ethics
recommended that two representatives, Illinois Re-
publican Dan Crane and Massachusetts Democrat
Gerry Studds, be reprimanded for engaging in sex-
ual relationships with congressional pages. Pages, a
select group of administrative assistants working for
Congress, are under eighteen years of age. The com-
mittee accused Crane of engaging in a relationship
with a seventeen-year-old female page in 1980 and
Studds of a similar relationship with a seventeen-246 Congressional page sex scandal The Eighties in America