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employer mandates as well as philosophical opposition to government intervention was
overwhelming, according to Josten. Interestingly, these accounts of the changed
testimony both agree on one point: ideological factors (either reverse lobbying or small
businesses inherent distrust of government) seemed to play a role in the changed
preferences for national health reform that were expressed by the Chamber during the
legislative stage of reform.
After this episode, Robert Patricelli voluntarily stepped down from his role as the
chair of the Chamber’s health benefits committee. Chamber President Richard Lesher
said, “There is no question that he was ahead of the membership” (MacDonald, 1994, p.
A5). In a phone interview with the Hartford Courant, Patricelli stated that, “I just felt
that policy was moving more in a conservative direction and they’d be better off with a
different spokesman” (MacDonald, 1994, p. A5). The Chamber’s chief lobbyist,
William Archey, was dismissed in the months after the changed testimony. Bruce Josten
noted that William Archey believed that working with Clinton on a certain issues was in
the Chamber’s best interest. Bruce Josten, who was promoted to higher position in the
Chamber in 1994, did not believe that working with Clinton was in the Chamber’s best
interests.
In the months after these turbulent events, the Chamber became increasingly
opposed to the Clinton plan. For instance, in March 1994 the U.S. Chamber of
Commerce backed off its previous support for universal coverage (Priest 1994b). In
April 1994, the Washington Post reported the following, “Saying its members
overwhelmingly prefer ‘free markets over big government’ the Chamber said it would be
better to enhance the current health insurance system through voluntary actions of the
Convention