On the morning of September 24, 1986, a few dozen congressmen, senators, and staff shoehorned themselves into the secure, constantly guarded conference room above the Senate chamber to hammer out a compromise defense-spending bill for 1987. The atmosphere was tense.
Barry Goldwater, retiring chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, faced his opposite number in the House, Democrat Les Aspin. Goldwater was unhappy. All of those he had selected to serve on the conference committee were from the Senate Armed Services Committee, honoring the tradition that conferees be chosen from the committee responsible for the bill. Les Aspin had discarded that tradition, passing over several eligible—but conservative—members of his own House Armed Services Committee to appoint liberal congressmen from other committees. They had no particular expertise in defense issues but plenty of interest in seeing that the positions of the Democratic-controlled House prevailed. To Goldwater, that meant a tough conference, with no chance of easy compromise.
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