“Tilting at Windmills? Valiant Efforts to Restore Civility to the U.S. House of Representatives, 1996-2004,” September 26 Colloquium with Historian and MU Alum Frank H. Mackaman

Frank H. Mackaman, Historian Emeritus at the Dirksen Congressional Leadership Research Center and an alum of Mizzou’s History Ph.D. program, will return to his former stomping grounds on September 26 for a talk exploring the backstory behind a small group of congresspeople’s recent attempts to promote civility in the U.S. House of Representatives and the lessons we might take from these inspired efforts, even in their failure. The talk will be held at 3:30pm in Jesse Hall 410, and this post will be updated with live stream links as those become available.

Abstract

From 1996 through 2004, a little-known congressman from central Illinois led a small group of colleagues in a concerted effort to promote civility in the U.S. House of Representatives. For the first and only time in congressional history, these men and women organized a series of four “civility retreats,” as they were known, to counter the trend toward discourteous behavior in the House. After almost a decade, however, they gave up, having failed at the task. In this presentation, I propose to use their efforts to: (1) identify the persistent obstacles to civility in the House; (2) describe the remedies proposed by what I call the “civilistas”; and (3) speculate about the causes of their failure. If the past is prologue, perhaps there is something to be learned from this ill-fated civility initiative.

Frank H. Mackaman is Historian Emeritus, The Everett McKinley Dirksen Congressional Leadership Research Center. He directed The Center’s work for over 30 years before retiring in 2022. Mackaman also served as Deputy Director and then Director of the Gerald R. Ford Presidential Library and Museum, 1987-1995. He is the author and editor of books, articles, book reviews, and Web sites. He most recently contributed to Disruption: The Senate During the Trump Era (Oxford University Press, 2024). Mackaman received his B.A. from Drake University in 1971; an M.A. in History from University of Missouri in 1972; and a History Ph.D. from MU in 1977. The title of his interminable dissertation was “United States Loan Policy, 1920-1930: Diplomatic Assumptions, Governmental Politics, and Conditions in Peru and Mexico.”