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George H.W. Bush Policy Chronology
Issues Raised in the Kunhardt American Presidency book:
Invasion of Panama
Gulf War
Cold War End Game Diplomacy
No New Taxes Pledge
Staff who might need links/descriptions:
William Bennett, Federal Drug Czar
James Baker, Secretary of State
Brent Scowcroft, National Security Adviser
James Lilley, U.S. Ambassador to China
Clarence Thomas, Supreme Court Justice
Edward Kennedy, Democratic Senator from MA
Bill Clinton, President
Ross Perot, Presidential candidate, 1992 and 1992
Pat Buchanan, Candidate for the Republican Party’s Presidential nomination, 1992.
1989
January 20
George H.W. Bush inaugurated as the 41st
President. (GB’s inaugural address available at:
http://bushlibrary.tamu.edu/, via the links
“Research” and then “Public Papers.”)
February 6
President Bush, at a White House press conference,
introduced his bail-out plan for troubled Savings
and Loan banks. Because of bad loans, poor
management, and sometimes outright criminal
activity, over 350 S&L banks had failed by 1989 –
and some observers believed that it would cost over
$50 billion to recover the losses. During 1989, the
number of failed banks continued to grow.
President Bush’s complex plan provided for a sale
of government bonds to finance the bail-out, and
gave the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation
(FDIC) regulatory oversight over S&Ls. (GB’s
press conference announcing the plan available at:
http://bushlibrary.tamu.edu/, via the links
“Research” and then “Public Papers.”)
March 14
The Bush administration, at the urging of federal
czar William Bennett, announced a temporary ban
on the importation of semi-automatic rifles, a
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reversal of President Bush’s earlier statements that
no restriction on these firearms would be enacted.
The new rule applied to about 80% of such
weapons. On April 5, the rule was amended to add
another 24 semi-automatic weapons to the list.
Public concern about rising crime rates and the
failing war on drugs forced the President to act.
April 17
President Bush, in a speech in Hamtramck,
Michigan, offered a program of special assistance
for Poland, whose communist government had
agreed to negotiations with the opposition party
Solidarity that produced a plan for free elections.
The Bush administration’s aid plan included lower
tariffs, loans from the IMF and World Bank, and
steps that would expedite business relations
between Polish and American companies. (See
GB’s speech, “Remarks to Citizens in Hamtramck,
Michigan, April 17, 1989, at:
http://bushlibrary.tamu.edu/, via the links
“Research” and then “Public Papers.”)
June 3
The Chinese government ordered its military, the
People’s Liberation Army (PLA) to suppress a
burgeoning pro-democracy movement that had
encamped in Tiananmen Square, Beijing, China.
Estimates on the number of demonstrators killed
vary between 700 and 2,700. (Source: Mann, 309,
ftnt, 41.)
President Bush, vacationing at his home in
Kennebunkport, issued a formal statement
regretting the Chinese government’s actions.
(Source: Mann, 195.) (See the White House
Statement at: http://bushlibrary.tamu.edu/, via the
links “Research” and then “Public Papers.”)
June 5
In the wake of the Tiananmen Square massacres,
President Bush announced a number of
condemnatory actions, including the suspension of
the sale of American weapons to China. The
decision to pursue this policy was made after
consulting with Secretary of State James Baker,
National Security Adviser Brent Scowcroft, and the
U.S. Ambassador to China, James Lilley.(Source:
Mann, 197) (See GB’s comments at the Press
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Conference, June 4, at: http://bushlibrary.tamu.edu/,
via the links “Research” and then “Public Papers.”)
(Also useful here is the National Security
Archives’s briefing book on the Tiananmen crisis,
which includes some of the diplomatic traffic
between the American Embassy in China and the
State Department, especially documents 12 through
29. It is available at:
www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB16/in
dex.html.)
August 9
President Bush signed into law the Financial
Institutions Reform, Recovery, and Enforcement
Act of 1989, which arranged for the bail-out of
Savings and Loans Banks. This law differed from
President Bush’s February 6 proposal by financing
the bail-out from the Treasury Department, and not
a bond sale. It offered $166 billion worth of aid to
troubled savings and loans institutions and created a
new government body, the Resolution Trust
Company, to oversee the merger or liquidation of
troubled banks. (See GB’s comments at bill-signing
ceremony, August 9, at:
http://bushlibrary.tamu.edu/, via the links
“Research” and then “Public Papers.”)
November 17
President Bush signed the Fair Labor Standards
Amendments of 1989, which raised the minimum
wage from $3.35 an hour to $3.80 an hour on April
1, 1990 – and to $4.25 an hour on April 1, 1991.
The law also established a “training wage” of $3.35
an hour for 16-19 year olds in their first three
months of employment. The law represented a
significant victory for Bush over congressional
Democrats, who in the Spring of 1989 passed a bill
that raised the minimum wage to $4.55 – which
President Bush vetoed on June 13. (For GB’s veto
message of June 13 and his comments at the
November 17 signature ceremony, see
http://bushlibrary.tamu.edu/, via the links
“Research” and then “Public Papers.”)
November 21
President Bush signed a new anti-drug law that
provided over 3 billion dollars for expanded antidrug programs, including treatment facilities,
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federal prison expansion, education, and law
enforcement.
December 2-3
President Bush and Soviet President Mikhail
Gorbachev hold their first meeting of Bush's
presidency in the harbor of Valetta, Malta to
discuss relations between the two superpowers,
and specifically military, economic, and political
issues.
December 20
President George Bush ordered American armed
forces to invade Panama and capture Manuel
Antonio Noriega, that country’s military dictator
who had been indicted in the United States on
drug trafficking charges. Noriega surrendered
on January 3, 1990, and was flown to the United
States to stand trial. On April 9, 1992, Noriega
was convicted on drug charges and sent to
prison.
1990
June 1
At a summit meeting in Washington, DC, President
Bush and Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev met
to discuss trade issues, arms reduction, and the
future of Germany. Although few concrete
agreements resulted, the summit was a success
because of the warm personal relations that
appeared to develop between Bush and Gorbachev.
June 26
President Bush, in a written statement released
to the press, reneged on his pledge from the 1988
presidential campaign of “no new taxes” by
stating that in order to solve the "deficit
problem," "tax revenue increases" may be
necessary in the Federal budget for the 1991
fiscal year. (A copy of the statement is available
via the Bush Library at:
http://bushlibrary.tamu.edu/ )
July 26
President Bush signed legislation to protect the
rights of disabled Americans. The Americans with
Disabilities Act affected over 43 million Americans,
and forbade discrimination in employment, public
accommodations, and transportation.
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August 2
Iraq invaded Kuwait and took control of that
nation in a number of hours. President Bush
"strongly" condemned Iraq's actions, setting the
stage for an American response.
October 22
President Bush vetoed the Civil Rights Act of 1990,
a measure sponsored by Senator Edward Kennedy
(D-MA). Bush stated in his veto message,
“[D]espite the use of the term “civil rights'' in the
title…the bill actually employs a maze of highly
legalistic language to introduce the destructive force
of quotas into our Nation's employment system.”
(The entire veto message is available via the Bush
Library at: http://bushlibrary.tamu.edu/.)
November 5
President Bush signed a budget law intended to
reduce the federal budget by almost $500 billion
over the next five years. The law included $140
billion dollars in new taxes – which broke Bush’s
campaign promise of “no new taxes.”
November 6
In congressional elections, the Democrats gained
one seat in the Senate for a 56-44 advantage. In the
House of Representatives, they gained eight seats,
for a 267-167 advantage.
November 8
President Bush increased the number of American
troops in Saudi Arabia to 400,000.
November 15
President Bush signed the Clean Air Act of 1990,
which tightened air pollution standards, with the
goals of reducing urban smog, cutting acid rain
pollution by one-half, and eliminating industrial
emissions of toxic chemicals by the end of the
century. It was the first law since 1977 that
tightened air pollution standards.
November 19
The United States, the Soviet Union and twenty
other European nations, signed the Conventional
Forces in Europe Treaty (CFE) in Paris. The CFE
reduced conventional land armies in Europe and
limited the American troop presence in Central
Europe to no more than 195,000.
November 29
President Bush signed the Immigration Act of 1990,
which allowed for the admission of 700,000 aliens
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each year. Of these 465,000 were to be relatives of
American citizens or permanent resident aliens.
140,000 places were reserved for skilled workers.
1991
January 15
The Persian Gulf War began with a massive,
American-led, air attack on Iraq. The operation
is titled “Desert Storm.”
February 24
Ground troops, including a large contingent of
American soldiers, began operations in
Operation Desert Storm.
February 27
Having liberated Kuwait, coalition troops advanced
rapidly into Iraqi territory, encountering no
resistance. President George Bush, deciding that
the war’s objectives had been met, called off the
ground offensive.
July 10
President Bush lifted the American sanctions
against the Republic of South Africa, saying that the
movement to end apartheid was now “irreversible.”
(For Bush’s comments at a press conference, go to
http://bushlibrary.tamu.edu.)
July 29 - August 1
President Bush and Mikhail Gorbachev met in
Moscow to sign a nuclear arms reduction treaty
(START-I) that calls for both nations to make
significant reductions in the number of nuclear
warheads in their respective arsenals.
October 15
Clarence Thomas, President Bush’s choice to
succeed the retiring Thurgood Marshall on the
Supreme Court, narrowly won confirmation in the
Senate, by a 4-vote margin. The Thomas
nomination, and his subsequent confirmation
hearings, became some of the most contentious in
American history after a former employee accused
the nominee of sexual misconduct.
November 14
President Bush signed a law that extended
unemployment benefits. Costing $5 billion, the law
paid additional benefits to those who had used up
the standard 26 weeks of benefits.
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November 21
President Bush signed the Civil Rights Act of 1991,
which made it easier for employees to sue
employers on grounds of discrimination. The Act,
however, also exempted employers from charges of
discrimination if they could demonstrate that racial
disparities in the workplace resulted from a
“business necessity.” (For Bush’s comments upon
signing the CRA of 1991, see
http://bushlibrary.tamu.edu.)
December 18
President Bush signed a transportation bill
providing $151 billion for highways and mass
transit systems, to be spent over the coming six
years. At the signing ceremony for the bill, Bush
asserted that the bill would improve the nation’s
faltering economy, saying, “it is summed up by
three words: jobs, jobs, jobs. And that's the
priority.” (For the text of Bush’s comments, see
http://bushlibrary.tamu.edu.)
1992
January 10
The Labor Department announced that
unemployment rose to 7.1 percent in December, its
highest mark in over five years. One observer
commented, “What it tells you is that the economy
is stagnant…There’s no sense of improvement.”
(The Department of Labor has a very useful
collection of labor statistics available at
http://data.bls.gov/cgi-bin/surveymost?lf.)
February 1
At the presidential retreat at Camp David,
Maryland, President George Bush and Russian
President Boris Yeltsin met to discuss AmericanSoviet relations. In a joint declaration, they
announced that “the relationship will be
characterized by friendship and partnership.”
February 18
President Bush won the New Hampshire primary,
but faced a strong challenge from conservative
media personality Patrick Buchanan, who garnered
thirty-four percent of the vote. The conservative
wing of the Republican Party supported Buchanan,
revealing a division in the party that Bush would
have to overcome before the 1992 election.
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April 1
President Bush and German Chancellor Helmut
Kohl announced an aid plan of $24 billion to help
the development of democracy and a free market
economy in Russia. The US share was nearly $4.5
billion.
May 23
The United States signed agreements with Russia,
Belarus, Ukraine, and Kazakhstan that ensured
these nations’ participation in the nuclear arms
reduction treaties singed by the U.S.S.R. before its
collapse in late 1991.
June 12
Speaking at the Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro,
Brazil, President Bush announced that the United
States would not sign a treaty designed to protect
rare and endangered animals and plants, saying that
it would retard the development of technology and
the protection of ideas.
June 16
President Bush and President Yeltsin, the latter on
his first state visit to Washington, D.C., announced
an agreement by which the United States and Russia
would reduce their nuclear warheads to between
3,000 and 3,500 by the year 2003.
June 22
President Bush signed a supplemental
appropriations act that provided aid to inner cities,
specifically Los Angeles, which was trying to
recover from the riots of April, 1992.
July 3
President Bush signed a law that extended coverage
for the unemployed for another 26 weeks, after their
initial 26 weeks of benefits had expired. The Labor
Department had announced on July 2 that the June
unemployment rate had reached 7.8%, its highest
level since 1984. Bush, in part, signed the law to
improve his political position entering the late
summer and fall presidential campaign.
August 19-20
The Republican Party nominated President George
Bush for a second term as President. The party also
re-nominated Vice-President Dan Quayle, but not
before Bush had considered replacing him. (For a
transcript of Bush’s speech accepting the
nomination, see http://bushlibrary.tamu.edu.)
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November 3
Arkansas Governor Bill Clinton, a Democrat,
elected President after defeating President Bush and
Ross Perot, an independent from Texas. Clinton
won 43% of the vote and 370 Electoral College
votes, to Bush’s 38% and 168, and to Perot’s 19%
and 0.
December 9
American troops led an invasion of Somalia as part
of the UN-sponsored Operation Restore Hope.
Somalia had been wracked starvation, drought, and
violence, and the humanitarian mission’s first goal
was to ensure the distribution of food and medical
aid and supplies to suffering Somalis. President
Bush toured Somalia at the end of December.
1993
January 20
Bill Clinton inaugurated as the forty-second
President of the United States.
President Bush and his wife Barbara flew home to
Houston, Texas.
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Sources:
Carruth, Gorton. The Encyclopedia of American Facts and Dates. Tenth Edition. 1997.
Greene, John Robert. The Presidency of George Bush. 2000.
Levy, Peter. Encyclopedia of the Reagan-Bush Years. 1996.
Mann, James. About Face. 1998.