The Evolution of a Congressman

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THE EVOLUTION OF A CONGRESSMAN | DALE AND THE DIAMONDBACKS | WALKING THE WALK | WRITING CONTEST WINNERS

FOR MEMBERS OF THE ALUMNI ASSOCIATION OF THE UNIVERSITY OF NEBRASKA–LINCOLN

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fter spending the past 26 years representing Nebraska on Capitol Hill, Douglas Kent Bereuter (BA ’61, Phi Beta Kappa) could have retired to a posh condo on some tropical beach, no questions asked.

Who would have blamed this indefatigable legislator – the longest-serving congressman in the history of the Cornhusker State, after all – if he’d chosen to savor his retirement while strolling along a country club golf course, or sipping mai tais on some leafy terrace overlooking Waikiki?

But it didn’t happen that way.

As usual, the veteran lawmaker from small-town Nebraska (Utica: population 800) decided to pursue the most difficult challenge on his horizon, instead of taking the easy way out.

Ask 65-year-old Doug Bereuter (pronounced BEE-writer) why he didn’t set sail on Golden Pond after resigning from the U.S. House of Representatives last August, and the recently installed president of one of the most diversified development organizations focused on Asia, The Asia Foundation, will tell you he wanted to make “a bigger contribution to America’s future” than he was making – as a mere veteran congressman, mind you, with an intimate knowledge of the workings of the federal government.

“I’ve spent more than 20 years working to improve relations between the United States and Asia,” Bereuter told Nebraska Magazine during a recent interview in Chicago, “and I became convinced a long time ago that what takes place there will be far more important to our future than what happens elsewhere in the world.

“As a longtime member (21 years) of the House International Relations Committee, and also as vice chairman of the Intelligence Committee, I’ve been a student of Asian affairs for more than two decades. And I’m convinced that although Europe will continue to have a significant impact on the United States in the years ahead,

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our relationships with countries like China and Japan and India are going to play a major role in shaping our own future.

“During my years on the International Relations Committee, I’d gotten to know the work of The Asia Foundation pretty well, and I’d come to admire the leadership and the altruism of many of the people who worked there. I remember telling my wife Louise on several occasions that if the presidency of The Asia Foundation ever opened up, I’d be very interested.”

As fate would have it, Bereuter did wind up being offered the foundation’s presidency – but several months after he’d already announced (in December of 2003) that he would resign from Congress, effective August 31, 2004. “I started at the foundation the day after my resignation took effect,” he recalls today, “but the two events weren’t actually connected. It was just my good fortune that The Asia Foundation job came along after I’d already decided to leave Washington.”

He pauses for a moment ... and then with characteristic honesty he explains that his major reason for leaving the United States House of Representatives was “quite frankly, the growing feeling that everything I was doing there had become so repetitive and so predictable ... and by 2004, there was so much emphasis on raising campaign money – both for yourself and in order to win the goodwill of your colleagues by donating to their campaigns – that I found the entire process deeply troubling.

“I was also troubled by the continuing breakdown in civility. And I don’t think there’s any doubt that congress has changed dramatically in this regard, during recent years. Throughout my 26 years in the House, I’d done my best to develop as many good relationships as I could on both sides of the aisle – and that activity doesn’t necessarily endear you to some elements in the party leadership.

“Let’s face it: The degree of partisanship in the U.S. Congress is

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Disillusioned By The “Decline Of Civility” On Capitol Hill, Doug Bereuter Relishes New Job: Running The Asia Foundation

BY TOM NUGENT

extremely high, these days, and most things are decided by the party leadership far in advance – which means that debate over issues is often lacking in meaning. Most of the votes are determined by party positions, and so you spend very little time on the (House) floor, getting to know your colleagues.”

Often described by his colleagues as “a master of diplomacy” who knew how to work both sides of the aisle in order to reach consensus, Bereuter says he has been deeply disappointed by the continuing erosion of “civility and collegiality” on Capitol Hill in recent years.

“When you combine the breakdown in civility with the huge emphasis on campaign fundraising – well, that had become pretty troubling, to say the least. And at the same time, I felt increasingly that what I was doing in the House had become far too routine, far too predictable.

“My growing dissatisfaction with the whole process went on for a few years, and it wasn’t much fun – until I finally woke up one morning and realized that I was going to have to do something different.”

A Talent For ‘Building Consensus’

When Doug Bereuter announced his resignation from Congress the cries of protest could be heard all the way from Capitol Hill to the State Department, as one political heavyweight after another deplored the departure of a highly effective eminence grise with an awesome grip on the complexities of international diplomacy.

Said the former House Intelligence Committee Chairman, Porter J. Goss, now the director of the Central Intelligence Agency: “There’s no question but that Doug did an absolutely tireless, fabulous and successful job on behalf of the United States and this institution, and I think everybody needs to know that and applaud it.

Among the many services he performed (as a member of the House

Committee on International Relations) was his service for several years as president of the NATO Parliamentary Assembly.

“I’m also appreciative of his service as the vice-chairman of the Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, and particularly as the chairman of the subcommittee that tries to link up policy with our national security capabilities. That’s not an easy job, but Doug accomplished it with skill and dedication.”

Marcia J. Kamas, a Chicago-based legal assistant who spent nearly a decade working as a Capitol Hill aide to Bereuter in the 1980s, says he displayed an extraordinary talent for “building consensus” among both House members and his own independent-minded staff. “Doug is widely known for his sense of comity and his strength as a consensus-builder – across the aisle, across the Hill, across the Atlantic and the Pacific,” said Kamas, who attended her former boss’s recent foundation presentation in Chicago.

According to Kamas, Bereuter’s penchant for allowing “plenty of debate and disagreement” in any discussion flowed quite naturally out of his roots in small-town Nebraska: “I think that kind (of open-mindedness) can be found in our background as Nebraskans.

After all, Nebraska has the only unicameral, nonpartisan state legislature in the nation – so we tend to see it as natural that people from different economic, ethnic and geographical backgrounds would come together in an effort to govern themselves.

“Doug looked for consensus and compromise, but he didn’t demand agreement. He expected people to be different from himself and from one another, and that made our office a great place to work. He never berated us, and he hated (to see) the classic gaggle of staff running behind the representatives through the halls of congress.

“He avoided that at all costs. And when he was with a staff member in the elevator or committee hallway, and he spoke to a colleague, he always introduced us.”

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Disillusioned By The War In Iraq?

alliances are weakened. … Now we are immersed in a dangerous, costly mess and there is no easy and quick way to end our responsibilities in Iraq without creating bigger future problems in the region and, in general, in the Muslim world.”

Although Bereuter insists that the current war in Iraq “played no part” in his decision to resign from Congress, there’s no doubt that this “fiscally conservative, mainstream Republican” (his definition) was also greatly troubled by the failure to locate any weapons of mass destruction (WMD) in post-Saddam Hussein Iraq. So disapBorn and raised within an hour’s drive of Lincoln, Doug Bereuter pointed was Bereuter by the WMD fiasco (and also by the continusaid good-bye to his hometown of Utica and headed for a ing Iraqi resistance to the American presence in the wake of University of Nebraska dorm room late in the summer of 1957.

President George W. Bush’s decision to invade the country in the Within a month spring of 2003), of his arrival in that he decided to Lincoln, the front send out a letter page of the Journal detailing his opposiStar was announction to the war to ing that the several constituents Russians had just who’d asked him launched the about it. world’s first space The letter went satellite – an event off like a bombthat would soon shell, only two trigger massive weeks before changes in the U.S. Bereuter resigned educational system. late last summer.

“About four Within a matter weeks after I hit the of days, the controcampus, Sputnik versial missive from went up,” he recalls, the congressman to “and higher educahis constituents Bereuter honored as UNL Commencement speaker and honorary degree recipient in May. tion began to change would appear in the rapidly in this country. All at once, the federal government was offerpages of the Lincoln Journal Star, and would trigger a major flap ing scholarships in science and engineering. It was hard to believe, back in Washington, where several of the congressman’s former colback then, that the Russians had sent up a satellite (Oct. 4, 1957) leagues blasted him for his suddenly announced opposition to the that was actually circling the world. That event made a real differwar. Describing the attack on Iraq as both a “mistake” and a “masence in our lives, and many of us began to take our studies very sive failure” (although he had voted in favor of the original congresseriously, indeed. sional resolution in support of the invasion, he says, on the basis of “Before Sputnik, I’m told, they were still doing ‘panty raids’ on the now-discredited intelligence estimates of Saddam’s alleged campus during the weekends!”

WMDs), Bereuter didn’t pull any punches in explaining his reasons Bereuter, who had been an avid stamp collector in childhood, for denouncing the decision to invade.

“The first and most basic conclusion,” he wrote at the start of the opted for a major in geography. “The adjustment from Utica wasn’t easy for me,” he remembers, “but I was fortunate, because I wound Lincoln Journal Star letter, “is that it appears there was a massive up studying under several great professors as a first-semester freshfailure or misinterpretation of intelligence concerning the weapons man. I took introduction to logic with O.K. Bouwsma, the chairof mass destruction programs and supply stocks of Saddam, both man of the philosophy department, and he was a terrific teacher by the U.S. agencies and leading decision-makers, but also on the because he had such a keen interest in his students. part of allies and other leading countries. … ” “I also remember taking a course in Latin American politics – After deploring the failure at length, Bereuter went on to ask a Alexander Edelmann’s course in political science – and it had a big very disturbing question, especially coming from a 26-year veteran impact on my life. It was in that class that I began to realize how congressman whose party controlled both the White House and complex and fascinating political science could really be. Lectures U.S. Congress at his departure: “Was the pre-emptive military strike with my geography professor, Charles McIntosh, were also inspiring to remove Saddam in America’s best interest? for me at the time and led to my eventual degree in urban planning.”

“I’ve reached the conclusion, retrospectively, now that the inadeAfter graduating as a Phi Beta Kappa in 1961, Bereuter would go quate intelligence and faulty conclusions are being revealed, that all on to earn two different master’s degrees (in city planning and pubthings being considered, it was a mistake to launch that military lic administration) at Harvard University. During the next few years, action, especially without a broad and engaged international coalihe would hold down several administrative jobs in state and federal tion. The cost in casualties is already large and growing, and the government ... while rising rapidly to become the director of the immediate and long-term financial costs are incredible. Our counNebraska State Office of Planning and Programming in the late try’s reputation around the world has never been lower and our 1960s.

After Sputnik, No More ‘Panty Raids’

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James Lemonds, now 73 and retired, remembers working closely with Bereuter during those years, and recalls the young planner as being “very knowledgeable and very articulate, and with an unusual ability to challenge your point of view in a meeting without putting you down.”

Adds Lemonds, then the deputy director of the Nebraska State Health Department: “Even though he was still pretty young, you could see that Doug was going places. He knew how to run a meeting, and he knew how to build consensus by making sure that all points of view were heard and respected. I wasn’t surprised, later, when he wound up serving 13 terms in congress.”

Those terms began in the fall of 1978, when the 39-year-old Bereuter – after a four-year hitch in the Nebraska Unicameral – was first elected to the U.S. House from the First District, which includes Lincoln and most of eastern Nebraska.

During his 26-year odyssey in the House, the tireless Bereuter would never win re-election by less than 60 percent. Meanwhile, he would earn widespread praise for such legislative accomplishments as designing a highly successful program to provide home-ownership loan guarantees in small towns and rural areas (including many in Nebraska); for helping to pass legislation aimed at helping farmers; for drafting new laws to reduce flood insurance premiums under the National Flood Insurance Program, which now bears his name; and for initiating or assisting on a wide variety of infrastructure, human resources and conservation projects and programs in eastern Nebraska and nationally.

These were solid, lasting contributions ... but most veteran observers of Capitol Hill will tell you that Bereuter’s greatest contribution to America’s future was his groundbreaking work in international relations.

As a leading member of the House International Relations Committee – and as the chairman of the Asia-Pacific Subcommittee for six years – the Nebraska geography major labored mightily to find ways to improve relations between the U.S. and China, Japan, Hong Kong, Australia and a dozen other countries in the increasingly important world of Asia.

At the end of the day, it was Bereuter’s formidable reputation as an expert on the countries and cultures of Asia – along with his reputation as a diplomatic bridge-builder – that would lead to his selection as president of The Asia Foundation in 2004.

In his new role, he travels the globe frequently as an ambassador for the far-flung, nonprofit and non-governmental foundation, which seeks to assist in the development of a “peaceful, prosperous and open Asia-Pacific region” by working to support improvements in governance and law, women’s empowerment, economic reform and other areas of public life.

“In many ways, I regard this latest challenge as simply a continuation of my work in public service,” says Bereuter, who raised two sons with wife Louise, ’67, ’79, and now lives in San Francisco where the foundation makes its headquarters. “I spent a lot of years in the House of Representatives, doing my best to help improve relations between the United States and Asia, and that’s still my focus today.

“I really do think I’m fortunate, because I love learning about all these different countries and cultures, and because I’m convinced that the work we’re doing at the foundation will one day help our children and grandchildren build a better world for everybody on the planet.” ■

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Dispelling Asian Stereotypes

Eight months after willingly surrendering his longtime seat in the House, Doug Bereuter visited Chicago as the last stop on a twoweek Asia Foundation nationwide tour aimed at educating Americans about a crucially important topic: the complex relationship between Islam and the emerging democracies of Southeast Asia.

Accompanied by The Asia Foundation’s “country representatives” from Indonesia, Thailand and the Philippines and Pacific island nations, the brand-new president of the 50-year-old, San Francisco-based foundation would deliver a high-octane presentation to the Chicago Council on Foreign Relations, in which he described a dozen different foundation initiatives designed to “help improve governance and law, women’s empowerment, economic reform and development and international relations.”

While ticking off some of the foundation’s major accomplishments in recent years (including $72 million for program support and the donation of more than 800,000 books written in English during 2004, alone), the endlessly upbeat Bereuter spent the rainy Chicago evening as the moderator of a fascinating panel discussion: “Blending Islam and Democracy: Southeast Asia’s Unique Experience.”

Presented to an audience of about 50 that included university professors, international business executives and Asian-Americans who live in the Chicago area, the Council on Foreign Relations panel discussion was designed to explore a little-known aspect of contemporary life in Southeast Asia: the growing contributions by Muslims to rapidly emerging democracies throughout the region.

As the discussion unfolded and the foundation panelists answered a flurry of questions from the audience, an excited and enthusiastic Doug Bereuter hammered hard at such little understood – by Americans – phenomena as “the huge Muslim contribution to developing new forms of democratic government in Indonesia during recent years.”

Again and again, Bereuter emphasized the bottom-line message from the foundation’s education extravaganza, which had already played in Seattle, Los Angeles, Washington and New York City: “In the wake of the tragic events that took place on 9/11, we need to understand that ‘radical Islam’ includes only a tiny minority of Muslim thinkers – and that this is especially true in Southeast Asia, where local Muslim leaders and theologians often practice a very different form of religion than the religion found among Islamic worshippers in the Middle East.

“Gaining a deeper and more sophisticated understanding of how Muslim societies in Asia are often at the forefront of leadership, when it comes to promoting democratic reforms and ethnic tolerance is absolutely essential,” said the peripatetic Bereuter, who frequently travels the globe in order to promote The Asia Foundation’s far-flung agenda.

“If we’re going to get past the stereotypes and the over-simplifications that so often tempt Americans to see Muslims as bomb-throwing terrorists, the first thing we have to do is educate ourselves about the realities of the Islamic world, rather than being misled by simplistic cartoons.

“At The Asia Foundation, providing this kind of ground-breaking education – for Americans as well as for Asians – is what we’re all about.” ■