After Reagan left office, his two-term vice president, George H. W. Bush, carried on his legacy. In his 1988 presidential campaign against Michael Dukakis, the Democratic governor of Massachusetts, Bush defended conservative principles when he promised “Read my lips: No new taxes.” The Republican candidate attacked Dukakis for his liberal positions and accused him of being soft on crime. Bush also affirmed his own opposition to abortion and support for gun rights and the death penalty. At the same time, however, he also called for a “kinder, gentler nation” in dealing with social justice and the environment.

Once in office, George Bush had to deal with problems that he inherited from his predecessor. Reagan’s economic programs and military spending had left the nation with a mounting federal budget deficit, which slowed economic growth, resulting in another recession in 1990. Unemployment rose from 5.3 percent when Bush took office in 1989 to 7.5 percent by 1992, and state and local governments had difficulty paying for the educational, health, and social services that the Reagan and Bush administrations had transferred to them. To reverse the downward spiral, Bush abandoned his “no new taxes” pledge. In 1990 he supported a deficit reduction package that included more than $130 billion in new taxes, which failed to solve the economic problems and angered Reagan conservatives. He also departed from anti-Washington conservatives when he signed the Americans with Disabilities Act (1990), extending an assortment of protections to some 40 million Americans with physical and mental handicaps.

Bush had a mixed record on the environment. In 1989 the oil tanker Exxon Valdez struck a reef off the coast of Alaska, dumping nearly 11 million gallons of oil into Prince William Sound. This disaster created pressure for stricter environmental legislation. Thus, in 1990 the president signed the Clean Air Act, which reduced emissions from automobiles and power plants. However, Bush refused to go further, and in 1992 he opposed international efforts to limit carbon dioxide emissions, greenhouse gases that contribute to climate change.

Bush courted conservatives in his nomination of Clarence Thomas to fill the Supreme Court vacancy left by Justice Thurgood Marshall, the first African American justice. Thomas belonged to a rising group of conservative blacks who shared Republican views supporting private enterprise and the free market system and opposing affirmative action. As chief of the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission under Reagan, Thomas had generally weakened the agency’s enforcement of racial and gender equality in the workplace. He also opposed abortion and denounced welfare. Anita Hill’s charges of sexual harassment did not stop his advancement. Following his confirmation battle in 1991, Thomas became one of the most conservative members of the Court.

Yet Bush’s overtures to conservatives did not stem the drop in his popularity. After the president dispatched American troops and defeated Iraqi military forces in Kuwait in 1991 (see “Managing Conflict after the Cold War” in chapter 28), his approval rating stood at a whopping 89 percent. In sharp contrast, Bush’s poll number plummeted to 34 percent in 1992. This precipitous decline resulted mainly from his inability to revive the sagging economy. He ran for reelection against Governor William Jefferson (Bill) Clinton of Arkansas. Learning from the mistakes of Michael Dukakis as well as the successes of Reagan, Clinton ran as a centrist Democrat who promised to reduce the federal deficit by raising taxes on the wealthy and who supported conservative social policies such as the death penalty, tough measures against crime, and welfare reform. Though he did pledge to extend health care and opposed discrimination against homosexuals, Clinton relied on his mainstream southern Democratic credentials to deflect any claims that he was a liberal. Bush also faced a challenge from the independent candidate Ross Perot, a wealthy selfmade businessman from Texas, whose campaign against rising government deficits won 19 percent of the popular vote, mostly at Bush’s expense. In turn, Clinton defeated the incumbent by a two-to-one electoral margin.

REVIEW & RELATE

What was Reaganomics, and what were its most important long-term consequences?

How did conservative ideas shape the social, cultural, and political landscape of the 1980s and 1990s?