The story of the development of the budgetary process in the House between the Civil War and World War I is in many ways a stripped down version of the story of the development of the budgetary process in the House, and in Congress more generally, since 1921. The names and contexts have changed, but the basic processes and themes of reform have remained quite similar over the years. In the last few pages here, I want to revisit the basic theoretical points I outlined at the end of Chapter 1, examine how they expose certain themes in the development of budget reform politics between 1865 and 1921, and, finally, suggest ways that the events of this period can be used to elucidate reform politics during the past two generations.

One general point needs to be reiterated, however, before moving on to conclusions about specific themes of reform politics. That point is this: In order to understand the congressional budgetary system and the politics of its reform, one must begin with a clear definition of what constitutes this system. The analysis in the preceding chapters reinforces the need to define the budgetary system in terms of the relationships among the four major sets of actors that are involved in determining the dynamics of congressional politics – the rank-and-file, party leaders, committee members, and presidents.