Episode 9: Government Shutdown: Bill Clinton, Newt Gingrich, & Dysfunctional Governance

With political gridlock in Washington DC at an all time high, government shutdowns–or the threat of them–have become a routine occurrence. National parks close. Federal paychecks stop going out. The National Institute of Health stops admitting new patients. How did we get to the point where it has become normal for the US Government to halt in its tracks? The history, in this case, is quite recent.

In the live finale of season 2 of our podcast The Past, the Promise, the Presidency: Presidential Crises we invited three special guests to discuss the first government shutdowns of the 1990s, the political showdowns between Newt Gingrich and Bill Clinton, and what the political environment of the 1990s can tell us about gridlock in Washington today.

Dr. Julian Zelizer, a Professor of History and Public Affairs at Princeton University, CNN Political Analyst, and author of Burning Down the House: Newt Gingrich, The Fall of a Speaker, and the Rise of the New Republican Party.

Dr. Leah Wright Rigueur, the SNF Agora Institute Associate Professor of History at Johns Hopkins University and the author of the award-winning study, The Loneliness of the Black Republican: Pragmatic Politics and the Pursuit of Power.

Dr. Sharron Conrad, one of your favorite voices from season one,  The Past, The Promise, The Presidency: Race and the American Legacy. Now, she is joining us from Tarrant County College, where she is an Associate Professor of History.

Dr. Leah Wright

Rigueur is an SNF Agora Institute Associate Professor of History at Johns Hopkins University.

Leah Wright Rigueur is an SNF Agora Institute Associate Professor of History.

As a trained political historian, her scholarship and research expertise include 20th Century United States political and social history, Modern African American history, with an emphasis on race and political ideology, the American Presidency and presidential elections, policies and civil rights movements, and protest and unrest in the United States. Rigueur’s award-winning book, The Loneliness of the Black Republican: Pragmatic Politics and the Pursuit of Power, covers more than four decades of American political and social history, and examines the ideas and actions of black officials and politicians, from the era of the New Deal to Ronald Reagan’s presidential ascent in 1980.

Rigueur’s research, writing, and commentary have been featured in numerous outlets including PBS, MSNBC, CNN, NPR, the History Channel, The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Atlantic, Politico, The Root, The New Republic, Polity, Federal History, and Souls. Since 2020, Rigueur has served as an ABC News Contributor.

Currently, Rigueur is working on two book manuscripts. The first, Race, Riot, Rebellion, and Backlash in America, examines moments of racialized rage in America from the Tulsa Massacre of 1921 through the Capitol Riots of 2021. The second book, Mourning in America: Black Men in a White House, examines race, political ideology, crime, and corruption throughout the 1980s, focusing on one of the most outrageous scandals in modern American political history: the Housing and Urban Development (HUD) scandal of the 1980s. Her research has been supported by the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study, the Hutchins Center for African and African American Research, the Ash Center for Democratic Governance and Innovation, and the Carr Center for Human Rights Policy.

You can follow Dr. Wright Rigueur on Twitter @LeahRigueur.

Dr. Julian Zelizer is the Malcolm Stevenson Forbes, Class of 1941 Professor of History and Public Affairs, at Princeton University, a

CNN Political Analyst, and

Co-Host of the podcast Politics and Polls.

Julian E. Zelizer has been among the pioneers in the revival of American political history. He is the Malcolm Stevenson Forbes, Class of 1941 Professor of History and Public Affairs at Princeton University and a CNN Political Analyst and a regular guest on NPR’s "Here and Now." He is the author and editor of 22 books including, The Fierce Urgency of Now: Lyndon Johnson, Congress, and the Battle for the Great Society(2015), the winner of the D.B. Hardeman Prize for the Best Book on Congress and Fault Lines: A History of the United States Since 1974 (Norton), co-authored with Kevin Kruse and Burning Down the House: Newt Gingrich, The Fall of a Speaker, and the Rise of the New Republican Party (Penguin Press). The New York Times named the book as an Editor's Choice and one of the 100 Notable Books in 2020. His most recent book is Abraham Joshua Heschel: A Life of Radical Amazement (Yale University Press, Jewish Lives Series).  In 2021-2022, he will publish three new edited volumes—Daniel Bell: Defining the Age: Daniel Bell, His Time and Ours (Columbia University Press, co-edited with Paul Starr); The Presidency of Donald J. Trump: A First Historical Assessment (Princeton University Press) and Myth America: Historians Take on the Biggest Lies and Legends About Our Past (Basic Books, co-edited with Kevin Kruse). He is currently working on a new book about the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party and the 1964 Democratic Convention.  Zelizer, who has published over 1000 op-eds, has received fellowships from the Brookings Institution, the Guggenheim Foundation, the Russell Sage Foundation, the New York Historical Society, and New America. He also co-hosts a popular podcast called Politics & Polls.  

You can follow Dr. Zelizer on Twitter @julianzelizer.

Dr. Sharron Wilkins Conrad is an Associate Professor of History at Tarrant County College and a host of Season One of The Past, The Promise The Presidency: Race and the American Legacy.

Dr. Sharron Wilkins Conrad joined Tarrant County College as an Associate Professor of History after spending two years as a Postdoctoral Fellow at the SMU Center for Presidential History.

Her research examined how perceptions of John Kennedy and Lyndon Johnson’s civil rights leadership developed, hardened and continue to circulate within the black community. A key aspect of her scholarship focused on the process by which Kennedy emerged as a civil rights hero for African Americans while Johnson—who fought for and signed into law historic civil rights legislation—has been viewed as being motivated solely by political self-interest.

Sharron received her PhD in Humanities from The University of Texas at Dallas in 2019. She holds a BA in History and Anthropology from Penn State University, and a MA in Public History from Howard University. Previously, she served as Director of Education and Public Programs at The Sixth Floor Museum at Dealey Plaza, interpreting the life and legacy of President Kennedy. Her professional career has included appointments at history museums around the country.

Sharron has published articles on African American chefs in the White House, as well as an excerpt from her master’s research on the life and times of Thomas Dorsey, a black caterer in 19th century Philadelphia. Her research has been supported by a Theodore C. Sorensen Research Fellowship from The John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum, a Moody Research Grant from The Lyndon Johnson Foundation, and a UTD Dean of Graduate Education Dissertation Research Award. In 2017 she was awarded the UTD President’s Teaching Excellence Award.

You can follow her on Twitter @SharronWConrad.