| The thesis investigates the effect of the public's assessment of how well the president is "handling his job" on the president's success in the legislative arena. Previous work on the topic is limited to roll-call floor votes on which the president has taken a position. This thesis focuses on the president's priority legislative items, includes all levels of congressional decision-making, (including voice votes and committee decisions), and codes for compromises. Ordered probit is used to accommodate the trichotomous dependent variable. The legislative histories of presidents Richard Nixon, Jimmy Carter, Ronald Reagan, George Bush, and Bill Clinton are analyzed. This method corrects for possible bias in previous work and, unlike previous studies, finds no effect of approval on power. |
