US Government Shutdowns: What Works?

Copyright 2013 J. Lee Lehman

In my last post, I discussed a common model for timing the general length of events astrologically, by looking at the quadruplicity of the Ascendant. This idea is used in mundane astrology, for example, in timing whether an Aries Ingress in a particular location will last 3 months, 6 months, or an entire year.* In examining the history of government shutdowns, this method does not appear to apply.

I had presented a table showing the dates of all prior government shutdowns. I had also mentioned that we should be aware of an important demarcation between the pre-1980 shutdowns and the later ones: the earlier ones had few consequences, because very little in the government shut down.

What changes was a decision that a shutdown is, well, a shutdown, and so the later one resulted in an actual change in government-as-usual. Thus, it is a long shutdown after 1980 that has potential political consequences, whereas the earlier ones were seen as merely technicalities.

Here, I examine a different situation. As has been repeated many times in the last few weeks, it is Congress, not the President, which is responsible for a shutdown, because it is Congress that must pass a budget. In a mundane chart, the legislative body is the 11th house, so it seems appropriate to consider factors relating to the 11th house. There are presented in the following table, where I have distinguished the petty from the more serious shutdowns by placing the data in blue and red.

Date	Length in Days	Angular malefics	11th House sign	Cond Ruler 11th	In 11th	House 11th Ruler
1 Oct 1976	10	Ma, Pl	Ari	Detr	Ju, SN	4th
1 Oct 1977	12	Ma, Pl, SN	Ari	Fall	Mo	1st
1 Nov 1977	8	Ur, Sa	Gem	Pere	Mo, Ju	4th
1 Dec 1977	8	Ne	Can	Pere	Mo, Ma	11th
1 Oct 1978	18	SN, Pl	Ari	Ruler	–	5th
1 Oct 1979	11	Sa	Ari	Pere	–	2nd
21 Nov 1981	2	Ur, Ne	Can	Trip	NN	2nd
1 Oct 1982	1	Sa, Pl, SN	Ari	Per	–	6th
18 Dec 1982	3	Ne, SN	Leo	Trip	PF	4th
11 Nov 1983	3	Ur, SN, Ne	Gem	Term	–	4th
1 Oct 1984	2	--	Ari	Term	NN	6th
4 Oct 1984	1	--	Tau	Det/Trip	NN	5th
17 Oct 1986	1	Sn, Pl, Ma	Tau	Det/Trip/Ret	–	5th
19 Dec 1987	1	Ur, Ne, SN	Leo	Trip	–	4th
6 Oct 1990	3	Sa, Ne	Tau	Ruler	Mo	4th
14 Nov 1995	5	Ma, Sa	Can	Pere	–	4th
6 Dec 1996	21	Ma, Sa, SN	Can	Pere	–	2nd
1 Oct 2013	16	Ur, Pl	Ari	Face	SN	2nd

The two really serious government shutdowns are the last two: the 1996 and the 2013. Although they have different 11th house rulers, they share two features: a weak 11th house ruler which was posited in the 2nd house for the beginning of the shutdown.

This is actually interesting. There have been four shutdowns in which the ruler of the 11th was in the 2nd, and three of those four were long shutdowns. That's interesting by itself.

But the weak quality of the 11th house ruler is also interesting. The absence of essential dignity may be described as vacillating, or engaged in what we might call a random walk if it's peregrine, as it was for both of the shutdowns of 1995-1996. But the shutdown this time has dignity by Face, the weakest of the essential dignities. In my book, Essential Dignities, I discuss how Face often seems correlated with a serious of negative states, like anxiety and Fear. The process is being driven by negative emotion, rather than actual progressive ideals. It was certainly interesting that the resolution of the crisis did not occur until Mars had moved out of Face and into Virgo, a sign where it has Triplicity.

While it would be helpful to have more data points, there is at least a suggestion of an idea for what characterized this shutdown. But personally, I'd rather avoid any more examples very soon!



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* For further information on this use of the quadruplicity with these charts, see my book, Astrology of Sustainability.

Beginning A Model for Predicting the Length of Government Shutdowns

Copyright 2013 J. Lee Lehman

In most of the discussions of the current government shutdown, if prior shutdowns have been mentioned at all, the it was the one presided over by then-Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich during the Clinton Administration in 1996. Actually, there have been a whole series of them. I wanted to create a table to show something about their astrology.

The reason for the particular columns is simple: there's a lot of precedence in astrology for using a predominance of cardinal meaning fast, a predominance of mutable meaning average, and a predominance of fixed being slow. Unfortunately, this table suggests that we will have to go further with our analysis.

Table One. US government shutdowns. All occur at midnight. Source: http://www.outsidethebeltway.com/a-brief-history-of-federal-government-shutdowns/. Note: source gave dates as midnight of the next day, while these have been converted to the notation as it would be put in an astrology computer program. For example, the source would give 30 September for a shutdown commencing at the midnight beginning 1 October, as in the current case

Date	Length in Days	Moon sign	Asc sign	Ruler Asc sign	Fortuna	PH Ruler sign
1 Oct 1976	10	Cap	Can	Cap	Ari	Sco
1 Oct 1977	12	Tau	Can	Tau	Sco	Leo
1 Nov 1977	8	Can	Leo	Sco	Sag	Sco
1 Dec 1977	8	Leo	Vir	Sag	Cap	Leo
1 Oct 1978	18	Vir	Can	Vir	Can	Lib
1 Oct 1979	11	Aqu	Can	Aqu	Pis	Aqu
21 Nov 1981	2	Vir	Vir	Sco	Sco	Lib
1 Oct 1982	1	Pis	Can	Pis	Aqu	Vir
18 Dec 1982	3	Cap	Vir	Cap	Leo	Sco
11 Nov 1983	3	Aqu	Leo	Sco	Gem	Sco
1 Oct 1984	2	Sag	Can	Sag	Ari	Sag
4 Oct 1984	1	Aqu	Can	Aqu	Pis	Cap
17 Oct 1986	1	Ari	Can	Aqu	Aqu	Sco
19 Dec 1987	1	Sag	Vir	Sag	Lib	Sag
6 Oct 1990	3	Tau	Can	Tau	Sag	Cap
14 Nov 1995	5	Sag	Vir	Sag	Leo	Sag
6 Dec 1996	21	Lib	Vir	Cap	Sco	Cap
1 Oct 2013	?	Leo	Can	Leo	Leo	Leo

There are several points to consider in examining these results in thinking about what factors could in fact produce a predictable result. First, we need to consider that, much like studying US electional cycles, the calendar period is constrained. Congress has rules whereby the annual budget is supposed to be passed by July 1st. Unfortunately, that often doesn't happen, resulting in continuing measures. Historically, the inability to reach agreement was met with more embarrassment than enthusiasm, and this event in 2013 seems to be only the second time in which there seemed to actually be relish in creating this crisis.

Because of this structure, it is typically only in the Autumn when such a shutdown can occur, with October 1st the earliest date. The time midnight is automatic. It should also be mentioned that shutdowns since 1980 have produced a more severe result than previously, so it's possible that the data from before 1980 may not work in the same fashion, where the length of the shutdown had a less severe impact on the government.

Over the next week or so, I hope to be able to present other facets of how we can create an astrology that productively examines these events.