Who Listens When The PresidentSpeaks? The Role of the State of the Union Address in the PolicyProcess.

As a politician, the president enjoys tremendous access to the media in order to advance his political agenda. In his role as America’s chief public administrator, the president is responsible for creating, advocating, and implementing policy, despite the fact that the policy agenda is largely the exclusive realm of Congress. This paper provides an empirical test of Kingdon’s multiple streams theory. I examine the role of the State of the Union address in the legislative policy process by looking at congressional responses to the president’s policy proposals. Presidential proposals made during State of the Union addresses of eight presidents from 1960 to 2003 are examined with respect to the effects of issue salience, policy areas, and contextual influences on the number of bills that survive the committee stage of the policy process. The results indicate that (1) presidents are able to use the State of the Union address to increase the level of issue salience for their policy proposals, (2) presidents are able to use rhetorical strategies to make public appeals for their policy proposals by calling on Congress and the mass public to act, (3) the policy area pertaining to the president’s policy proposal affects the level of salience toward the proposal, and (4) the policy area and the level of salience may also affect the likelihood that bills will make it out of committee. Overall, the findings suggest that the State of the Union address plays an important role in the policy process by providing the president an opportunity to influence the national policy agenda. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]