It's no secret that Congress' approval ratings are scraping the bottom of the barrel. But some historians are now saying this Congress may very well be the worst since the Civil War, if not earlier.
Thomas Mann, senior fellow of governance studies at the Brookings Institution in Washington, is working on a book about Congress with a title that provides a succinct answer: It's Even Worse Than It Looks.
In modern history, Mann says, "there have been battles, delays, brinkmanship — but nothing quite like this."
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Mann acknowledges there have been worse times for Congress, but he reaches back a very long way for a comparison.
"There were a few really bruising periods in American congressional history, not only the run-up to the Civil War, but also around the War of 1812," he says.
Mann isn't alone. The University of Tennessee's Daniel Feller doesn't think he's seen a Congress this bad since the 1850s. For most of that decade, Congress found it hard to even elect a Speaker. That's the last time he can remember a Congress that found it hard to conduct the basic business of government.