After five years of fractious political combat, President Barack Obama declared independence from Congress on Tuesday as he vowed to tackle economic disparity with a series of limited initiatives on jobs, wages and retirement that he will take without legislative approval.
Promising "a year of action" as he tries to rejuvenate a presidency mired in low approval ratings and stymied by partisan stalemates, Obama used his annual State of the Union address to chart a new path forward relying on his own executive authority. But the defiant, go-it-alone approach was more assertive than any of the individual policies he advanced.
"I'm eager to work with all of you," a relaxed and confident Obama told lawmakers of both parties in the nationally televised speech in the House chamber. "But America does not stand still - and neither will I. So wherever and whenever I can take steps without legislation to expand opportunity for more American families, that's what I'm going to do."
The president's appearance at the Capitol, with all the traditional pomp and anticipation punctuated by partisan jockeying, came at a critical juncture for Obama as he seeks to define his remaining time in office. He touched on foreign policy, asserting that "American diplomacy backed by the threat of force" had forced Syria to give up chemical weapons and that "American diplomacy backed by pressure" had brought Iran to the negotiating table. And he repeated his plan to pull troops out of Afghanistan this year and threatened again to veto sanctions on Iran that disrupt his diplomatic efforts.
But the main thrust of Obama's message was the wide gap between the wealthiest and the rest of Americans, and he used the speech to position himself as a champion of those left behind in the modern economy. "Those at the top have never done better," he said. "But average wages have barely budged. Inequality has deepened. Upward mobility has stalled.
"The cold, hard fact is that even in the midst of recovery, too many Americans are working more than ever just to get by, let alone to get ahead," he added. "And too many still aren't working at all. So our job is to reverse these trends."
To do so, the president announced an executive order raising the minimum wage to $10.10 an hour for future federal contract workers and the creation of a new Treasury bond for workers without access to traditional retirement options. He proposed incentives for trucks running on alternative fuels and higher efficiency standards for those running on gasoline. And he announced a meeting on working families and a review of federal job training programs.
Obama was gambling that a series of ideas that seemed small-bore on their own would add up to a larger collective vision of an America with expanded opportunity. But the moderate ambitions were a stark contrast to past years when Obama proposed sweeping legislation to remake the nation's health care system, regulate Wall Street, curb climate change and restrict access to high-powered firearms.
Republicans planned to fire back by blaming Obama for the country's economic problems, but the party's leaders avoided the language of last year's government shutdown and hoped to present what Rep. Cathy McMorris Rodgers of Washington called "a more hopeful, Republican vision."
In advance excerpts from her party's official response, Rodgers denounced Obama's health care program, spending record and regulations. "Too many people are falling further and further behind because, right now, the president's policies are making people's lives harder," she planned to say. "Republicans have plans to close the gap."
But in a sign of the continued divisions within the Republican Party, some of its conservative leaders were planning their own separate responses. Sen. Mike Lee of Utah was set to deliver a speech on behalf of Tea Party activists, and Sen. Rand Paul of Kentucky was distributing his own remarks on Facebook, YouTube and other social media.
In his address, Obama said he was not giving up on Congress altogether and his speech recycled calls for many of his past legislative priorities, including extending unemployment insurance, raising the minimum wage across the board and banning employment discrimination against gay men and lesbians. He also called for expanding the earned-income tax credit for low-wage workers without children.
"Let's see where else we can make progress together," he said.
But after a year in which most of his legislative priorities, like gun control, went nowhere, Obama has made it clear that he has restrained expectations about his ability to compromise with Republicans who control the House, although immigration is one major area where both sides see compromise as possible.
Given the stalemate, Obama's minimum wage plan provided an example of the new approach he plans. He called on Congress during last year's State of the Union address to raise the minimum wage for workers across the board, only to watch the proposal languish on Capitol Hill. With prospects for congressional action still slim, Obama wants to use the executive order covering new federal contractors to go as far as he can on his own.
But the order will also illustrate the limits of that approach. An increase in the minimum wage passed by Congress to $10.10 from $7.25 would mean a raise for 17 million Americans and possibly help an additional 11 million indirectly as wage ladders were adjusted, according to the Economic Policy Institute, a liberal research organization.
Obama's executive order, by contrast, will affect relatively few workers at first because it will apply only to new or renewed contracts. Eventually it might affect several hundred thousand workers at most, according to some estimates.
White House officials said they hoped the order would put pressure on Congress to follow through with legislation sponsored by two Democrats, Sen. Tom Harkin of Iowa and Rep. George Miller of California. They argued that even without success in Congress, the president's decision to raise the issue over the past year had already helped encourage several states to raise the minimum wage within their borders.
Some of the president's liberal supporters said that he did not go far enough and should have applied the wage increase to existing federal contract employees. "This action, while a step forward, suggests he may still be unwilling to take the fighting stance necessary to deliver the big wins over growing inequality that our country desperately needs," said Jim Dean, chairman of Democracy for America, an advocacy group founded by his brother, former Gov. Howard Dean of Vermont.
Yet Obama's vow to use his executive authority more robustly drew criticism from Republicans who say he has already stretched and, in some cases, exceeded the bounds of his power, much as Democrats accused President George W. Bush of doing the same thing.
"Choosing to circumvent our legislative process and govern through executive power not only violates our constitutional system of checks and balances, but it poses a direct threat to our liberty," Scott Pruitt, the attorney general of Oklahoma, said in a statement accompanying a video posted by the Republican Attorneys General Association.
By the numbers, Obama has so far been restrained in his use of executive power. He has signed just 168 executive orders so far, and the 147 he issued in his first term were the fewest of any president over a similar period going back at least a century. In their first terms, George W. Bush signed 173 executive orders, Bill Clinton signed 200 and Ronald Reagan signed 213.
But the numbers matter less than the scope of the ones that are signed. Some presidents have used executive authority to dramatic effect, like the Emancipation Proclamation, the internment of Japanese-Americans and the reservation of wide stretches of land to be national monuments.
For his part, Obama has unilaterally deferred deportation of many younger illegal immigrants, delayed enforcement of several aspects of his hotly disputed health care law and declined to defend legal challenges against the Defense of Marriage Act, a law barring federal recognition of same-sex marriages.
Looking ahead to three more years in office with Republicans likely to remain in charge of one or both houses of Congress, Obama has sought other ways of enacting his agenda. Perhaps the most far-reaching are the regulations being developed by the Environmental Protection Agency to limit carbon emissions at the nation's power plants.
© 2014, The New York Times News Service