“You know, George H.W. Bush was my best friend for 60 years. That’s a long time. And we were extraordinarily close. We won tennis tournaments together, we did a lot of stuff together. And I ran all of his campaigns. So, as Secretary of State, I was in a position where nobody was going to get between me and my president.”
Politics is a puzzle, and points of disagreement emerge due to different individuals viewing different puzzles, or different pieces. Therefore, if a political party wants a winning coalition, it is vital that everyone working on a campaign is aligned on what puzzle they’re looking at, and which pieces are needed to complete the all-important Big Picture. So I have started this essay with the words of James Addison Baker III, who will be known to many as George H.W. Bush’s right-hand man. Or, as Bush’s Secretary of State, Reagan’s Chief of Staff and later Treasury Secretary. Perhaps he’s also known to others as the attorney from Houston. Regardless of how one remembers him, I think it’s useful to begin with one of the highest-ranking American politicians of the 1980s and early 90s because he is a crucial piece of the thesis of this essay. Namely, the pragmatic and calculating figure who could negotiate and navigate through Washington politics during an era of Republican dominance.
Yet, this quote reveals something different to how he’s remembered. Here, he is recognising that his unique relationship with Bush, his close friend of 60 years, was something worth valuing and, by extension, protecting. Their pragmatic small-c conservative world was not the only faction competing for influence in the Republican Party. This raises the question: what happens when factionalism in political parties stops being a healthy means of formulating nuanced policy and becomes something that threatens the bonds that hold the party together?
This is where Lee Atwater comes in. Not as an opposite number to Baker, but as a symbol of the more brutal nuts-and-bolts elements of a political campaign. Atwater could not be more different to Baker: Baker was a pragmatist. Atwater was an electoral populist. Baker was a polished corporate lawyer from Texas. Atwater was a brash political consultant and blues guitarist from South Carolina. Baker specialised in political discipline, professional control and high-level government. Atwater specialised in hard-knuckle attacks on cultural issues. Perhaps Atwater was one of the earliest practitioners of what would later become culture-war politics.
Despite these differences, Atwater and Baker were not enemies. Instead, they were colleagues who were working to get the same president elected in ‘88. It is also apparent that they complemented each other’s skill sets. Without this collaboration of skills, would the win in ‘88 even be possible? The history of Atwater and Baker offers us a different interpretation of political factionalism today. Not that one represented good politics and the other represented bad, but that differing instincts could coexist because personal relationships allowed this to be the case.
The question, therefore, is what happens when a political party retains fierce factionalism but loses the personal norms that contain conflict? The 1980s GOP is a great case study to answer this question.
The 1980s Republican Party – The World That Made Them
I won’t give an exhaustive history of Reaganism, but it is still useful to take a look at the historical context to understand factionalism in a two-party system. Broadly speaking, the GOP at the time contained the following groupings, though it is important to note that some of these groupings overlapped with each other in informal coalitions to push a policy:
- establishment “East Coast” Republicans
- traditional conservatives
- economic conservatives
- social conservatives
- defence hawks
- pragmatic, independent political operators
Ronald Reagan becomes important here precisely because he could hold this coalition together, assembling the different elements of the factions into a coherent movement. From this, the basic argument is that factionalism itself is not a disease that needs to be ended in favour of complete ideological loyalty. Instead, political parties are meant to contain disagreement without causing the party itself to collapse. Can this be done today?
James Baker – Make Politics Work
James Baker, at his core, was somebody who understood bureaucratic machinery and how to use it to his advantage. One of the earliest examples of this was his agreement with Edward Meese. These two, along with Michael Deaver, formed the Troika that ran Reagan’s White House in the first term. Meese was a longtime friend of Reagan, which meant that when Baker was appointed Chief of Staff, Meese had to be reassured that he wasn’t being sidelined in favour of someone who campaigned against Reagan twice.
To solve the issue, Meese and Baker divided up their responsibilities: Meese in one column and Baker in the column beside his. Whilst Meese got prestigious-sounding titles on paper, Baker got exclusive management over information flow to Reagan. This included management over Reagan’s schedule, hiring and firing authority over all elements of White House staff and coordination of paper flow to the President. Meese requested a clause that allowed him the right to walk into any meeting with Reagan. Baker, “for symmetry”, added the same clause to his column. The result was that Meese effectively limited his ability to have private meetings with Reagan as Baker could be there for all of them.
Nonetheless, the Troika allowed the administration to function efficiently, as this piece of paper bridged the gap between conservatives and pragmatists. In particular, Baker started to use his management skills to advance the administration’s interests. Baker can put it better:
“Politics is oftentimes the art of the possible.”
After leaving his Chief of Staff role, Baker would become Reagan’s Treasury Secretary.
An interesting source to look at, which I believe highlights Baker’s negotiating skills, is the October 1986 communiqué agreed between Baker and Japanese Finance Minister Kiichi Miyazawa. After the Plaza Accord of 1985, the dollar had depreciated sharply against the yen, putting pressure on Japanese exporters. Baker wanted Japan to stimulate domestic demand and buy more American goods in exchange for the stabilisation of the exchange rate.
What does this say about Baker as a negotiator? He used the exchange rate as a bargaining chip by using the threat of a depreciating dollar to bring Japan to the negotiating table. At the time, he was fighting calls in Congress for protectionism, so the agreement allowed him to demonstrate that he could reduce the trade deficit through international agreements as opposed to trade wars.
“He’s dumping all over NAFTA,” Baker once said of President Donald Trump in 2020. Baker had a role in forging the agreement. “That was a hell of a deal.”
Yet, conflict wasn’t abnormal in those years. What’s worth analysing is how those conflicts were resolved, and their lasting impact on the party. During Baker’s time as Treasury Secretary, he and Democratic Senator Bill Bradley produced competing plans to handle the Third World Debt Crisis. Baker, in October ‘85, proposed continued loans and required debtor nations to adopt free market principles. Bradley responded with something different: a halt to lending, a 3% cut in interest rates and a 3% forgiveness of principal annually for 3 years for nations showing growth. Eventually, the Brady Plan moved beyond the Baker Plan to incorporate actual debt reduction, which brought the debate closer to ideas that Bradley had advocated several years earlier.
Finally, during Baker’s time as Secretary of State under Bush Sr., he and Dick Cheney (Secretary of Defence) clashed over how involved the administration should be in Bosnia. Baker was willing to signal limited military backing to protect humanitarian relief and pressure Serbian forces. Cheney resisted this slide as he argued it could risk a quagmire. Eventually, the administration adopted a realist approach to limit its role to humanitarian aid and economic sanctions. Baker eventually persuaded Bush to approve a plan for US airstrikes against Serb positions to facilitate humanitarian aid to Sarajevo, but Cheney and Colin Powell opposed the proposal, and it was never implemented. Therefore, this shows that whilst the administration could disagree among themselves, loyalty didn’t require complete agreement. Baker was able to disagree with senior officials without the administration coming apart permanently.
It helped Baker massively that he had such a bond with Bush Sr.
“[Bush] used to refer to our relationship as a big brother/little brother, which was fine with me, because I was proud to be his little brother.”
And that he was a bridge between President Reagan and Vice President Bush.
“It’s easy for the Vice President and his staff to be resented by the President…It’s tough. There’s a natural tension there. I don’t think that existed in this administration.”
Clearly, personal relationships provided an informal political structure to manage disagreement.
Lee Atwater – How to Win
Where to start with the complicated man that was Lee Atwater? One can start by not immediately painting him as a villain. But rather, a man who felt politics like a performance. Uninterested in ideology, Atwater wanted to win. By understanding ordinary voters, television, and politics as an emotion, negative campaigning, identity and culture, he became indispensable when it came to adapting campaign tactics to fit the cultural landscape of late 80s America.
The Southern Strategy tapes allow us insight into his mind. In 1981, Atwater was interviewed and candidly explained the evolution of political messaging on race. He speaks of talking in the “abstract”, which was interpreted by historians as an illustration of how the party capitalised on racial anxieties during the Civil Rights Movement by moving toward “dog whistle” politics. Namely, using coded phrases such as “states’ rights”, “welfare reform” and “local control” to appeal to white, conservative voters. The popularisation of these techniques existed long before Atwater but would form a part of a realignment that would turn the South into a Republican stronghold.
That said, despite popularising this playbook, Atwater was not a particularly ideological person. But he was, above all, controversial, ambitious, a “hell-raiser” in his own words and a disruptor. He was willing to subvert ideology for electoral effectiveness.
“We both knew he believed in nothing,” Roger Stone told The New Yorker, referring to Atwater. “Above all, he was incredibly competitive. But I had the feeling that he sold his soul to the devil, and the devil took it.”
“He was just a remarkable individual in touch with what was on the minds of people. There would be times in the campaign…where he wouldn’t feel right about our message. He’d just go off to California or go spend some time talking to people and try to listen to what they were thinking about,” Craig Fuller commented on Atwater. “He’d read the kind of newspapers they sell at the check-out counters at supermarkets, to see what people are tuning into and paying attention to.”
Let’s also look at the American Political Foundation. When I was digging through the archive boxes on Atwater for research, I came across a document outlining the purpose of the APF. It was formed in 1980 and was a bipartisan nonprofit, founded by Republican William Brock and Democrat Charles Manatt to promote democracy and study how the US could help support political freedom abroad. The APF provides a useful reminder that Atwater operated within a wider political ecosystem that was running alongside his time as a campaigner. Atwater’s world not only contained electoral combat, but also institutions concerned with democracy and influence abroad.
When studying the life of Lee Atwater, a question comes to mind: what did Atwater understand about politics that the Republican establishment had underestimated?
In his mind, politics wasn’t just about presenting policy. It was about creating an emotional relationship between the party and the voter.
The Campaigns – Where Factions Meet
I will use oral history transcripts to illustrate how factions came together in times of campaigning.
“Lee was sort of the hired gun,” Baker said. “Lee was someone with tremendous talent. We used him in ‘84, brought him over from the political office of the White House, and he became the liaison between me and the Chief of Staff’s office and the campaign.”
Baker continued.
“I remember Lee was very concerned about [Baker coming in to the ‘88 campaign], and I went to see him. I said, “Look, Lee, you’re going to come out of this better and stronger by virtue of the fact that I’m coming over here than you would otherwise. We’re going to do it in a way that preserves your dignity and your credibility.”…I didn’t get in the way of…his ability to do the organisational and political strategy work that he’s good at.”
“We all had very different skills, came from different regions of the country, but somehow, intuitively, [Bush Sr.] knew that we were going to be a good fit.” Craig Fuller, one of the primary political strategists of the ‘88 campaign, commented in his transcripts, in reference to him, Bob Teeter and Lee Atwater. “That was one of the great pleasures of that whole campaign, the three of us. Atwater, Teeter, myself, plus Nick Brady, Bob Masbacher and Roger Ailes, the so-called “Group of Six.”
Whilst Atwater had a strong relationship with Vice President Bush in the ‘88 campaign, there was inevitable friction in styles sometimes. Fuller recalls:
“So [Atwater] was somebody that the Vice President just simply enjoyed being around. Lee knew this, so it’s not telling stories that he wasn’t aware of. He would at times drive the Vice President crazy. He would appear in print with something the Vice President would be upset about, and yet mostly it was me who would call Lee and say,
“Okay, we’ve got a little problem, Lee.”
“I know, I know. Is he mad at me? What’s the man saying?” He’d always say, “What’s the man saying?”
“Well,” I’d say, “He’s not very happy, but don’t worry. Come on over for lunch.” He’d say, “What should I say at lunch?” “Just ignore it.”
Fuller recognised the impact of Atwater’s absence in ‘92.
“If you could point at one thing that was distinctly different in the reelection campaign, it was the absence of Lee Atwater, who really didn’t allow any of us to get lost in the “inside the beltway” thinking. He was just constantly forcing us to look at realities.”
The central argument of this essay looks at how factional disagreement should be handled without tearing the party apart. Fuller talks about how he approached it.
“I talked about the importance of keeping a campaign together. I said, “Look Lee, we are very different, we operate differently. We’ve known each other for quite a while, but we have absolutely the same objective. There’s going to be lots of frictions between our staffs on issues. We just cannot let anybody drive a wedge between the two of us. If we prevent that, we have a better chance of succeeding.” We essentially made a pact that that wouldn’t happen. I know there were times he was frustrated with me and probably there were some times I was frustrated with him, but whatever the frustration was it got resolved between the two of us.”
The nature of the campaign meant that Fuller felt that the individuals involved grew closer because of it.
“It wasn’t always that simple, but truthfully, it was as good a relationship as anybody could ever have wanted in the position I was in. I hope [Atwater] would, if he were here, be able to say the same thing. At the end, as I said, we all were better friends, Bob Teeter, Roger Ailes, Bob Mosbacher, Nick Brady and myself, which is a rare thing in a presidential campaign.”
Fuller reminisces on how the group were told about Dan Quayle’s selection as Bush’s running mate and then comments on the G6.
“I know Jim Baker thought he knew who it was going to be; he didn’t think it was going to be Quayle. The Vice President was concerned that people were feeling strung out in this process, so we literally go into the commandant’s bedroom, six guys, or four guys or something. We call Lee Atwater and we say, “You’ve got to come over here right away.” Bush and Baker go into a bathroom and Bush tells him it’s Quayle. They come out and I could see Jim was a little surprised.”
“You end up oftentimes forming a lot of relationships, but there are not that many trusting relationships, which is why I always thought that group of six was so remarkable. We really did get to know each other, personally, professionally, and that’s unique. In a way, it was this group, I almost defy anybody to find a group where—I mean Roger Ailes didn’t want to go into government and didn’t. Bob Teeter didn’t want to go into government and didn’t. Lee Atwater didn’t want to go into government and didn’t. Mosbacher kind of did, and did. Brady was already in the government. And I really wanted to leave.”
Sigmund Rogich, who was also involved in the ‘88 campaign, talks about his experience too.
“Lee Atwater was the guy I would come to with ideas all the time. People in my business have a lot of ideas. I told Larry King one time in an interview on TV that I had 1,000 great ideas for the White House and the President had the good sense to throw out 999 of them. And that’s the way it is. You know, you’re undaunted, you come back again.”
During the ‘88 campaign, the GOP deployed a campaign ad aimed at portraying Democratic nominee Michael Dukakis as weak on crime. The ad focused on convicted rapist and murderer Willie Horton. The ad was condemned by many for its racial undertones since Horton was African American, and the party was accused of fear-mongering. It is seen today as an early example of “politics of hate”.
Atwater made a well-publicised remark on the topic.
“We’re going to make Willie Horton Dukakis’s running mate,” which he later apologised for.
“Lee walked to the beat of a different drum,” Rogich said of that.
Rogich then talks of James Baker.
“One thing about Jim Baker is that he would admonish us to not do something stupid. We were pretty well-versed on what we could do and what we could not do.”
“Baker kept the reins on Atwater and all of us for that matter. He had the closest relationship with George Bush. On the subject of Lee, Lee Atwater was a very talented guy who understood changes in demographics. He was a student of social movement and baby boomers.”
“Back to Jim Baker. I thought that the difference was that he was the credible gentleman companion of the President. He was in ’84, he was his eyes and ears in the White House. When they formed that leadership element of Deaver, Baker, and [Edwin] Meese, it later became just Deaver and Baker, and ultimately it became Baker. I think he was there in ’88 throughout the whole process. He was in the headquarters just about every day—he was with the Vice President regularly. He was the one who would most often go over our commercials with the President-to- be. He was the credible witness to what was going on at the headquarters.”
Lee was the day-to-day campaign mechanic, who understood the process. He could come up with a lot of wild notions too, but Baker would have a way in which to bring us all together to sort things out, whether it was me or Lee Atwater or Roger Ailes or Bob Teeter, whomever, he had a calming influence and an ability to sift through ideas and keep things on track. He had a good way of running meetings and getting us out of the debate and down to finalising what we had to do.”
Winning vs Governing
Transcripts upon transcripts tell us that Baker understood how to govern and Atwater understood how to win, but this distinction should not be exaggerated, as Baker was still a formidable operative and Atwater did understand institutions well. A healthy system is not one where political aggression doesn’t exist, but one where this aggression is balanced with negotiation, human relationships and restraint.
Atwater was an early case study in the political logic that would eventually become the norm in modern American politics. Party polarisation, permanent campaigning, partisan media, social media and political brands have taken the techniques that Atwater exploited in the 1980s and amplified them.
The disappearance of informal restraints means that factional disagreements are turned into signs of disloyalty to the party. Baker’s influence was largely down to his personal relations. Therefore, whilst a political system can have coherent, formal conventions, when the informal conventions disappear, it becomes more difficult to keep the party together.
But was Baker really the answer? Or was he simply a very talented individual operating in a different era? The more uncomfortable question is whether their generation created the political norms that would later become problematic.
The era was by no means a golden era. Instead, it is a good demonstration that political parties needed a range of personalities and skills to convert a campaign victory into governance.
The lesson is not that one man was the problem, and the other was the answer, but that both were products of their political world at the time – and products of its fierce factionalism. They could turn disagreement into competition and not turn competition into villainisation. Baker’s gift was governing power, and Atwater’s gift was making power achievable. What is missing today are the elements that used to link them together.
I’m going to let Atwater have the final word. Atwater would pass away in March 1991 from brain cancer and spent his final months apologising to all those who were on the receiving end of the divisive campaigns that he ran. He wrote in Life magazine in February 1991:
“My illness helped me to see what was missing in society is what was missing in me: a little heart, a lot of brotherhood. The 1980s were about acquiring – acquiring wealth, power, prestige. I know. I acquired more wealth, power and prestige than most. But you can acquire all you want and still feel empty. What power wouldn’t I trade for a little more time with my family? What price wouldn’t I pay for an evening with friends? It took a deadly illness to put me eye to eye with that truth, but it is a truth that the country, caught up in its ruthless ambitions and moral decay, can learn on my dime. I don’t know who will lead us through the 90s, but they must be able to speak to this spiritual vacuum at the heart of society – this tumour of the soul.”
