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On the social issues, Reagan might not do much more than talk aggressively; he once accurately if indiscreetly called them "peripheral" to his main concerns of limiting taxes, spending and regulation and generally shrinking the size of Government. But advisers think that he will mount a much stronger attack on the growth of spending for such "entitlement" programs as Social Security and Medicare. As an example of what to expect, those who served on his staff in California point to a conference he held at the start of his second term as Governor: he demanded immediate action to shape a program that would check the growth of state welfare spending. Of course, even a second-term President has to compromise, as Reagan did as a second-term Governor: in exchange for tighter requirements for getting or staying on the Golden State's welfare rolls, he agreed to higher benefits for those who did meet the test. In another four years as President, he would face irresistible demands for higher tax revenues to reduce the deficit, but his principles would not let him agree to a general increase in rates; he said in the State of the Union speech that he would propose a "reform" program, trading still lower rates for elimination of deductions and exemptions. It would be a hard battle.
On foreign policy, Reagan might actually be less hard-line in a second term, for the same reason that he would be very tough on domestic issues: it would be his final chance to leave his mark on history. Aides insist that he wants to be remembered as the President who achieved a major, verifiable weapons-reduction deal with the Soviets, and would press hard for one. That assumes that Moscow would cooperate, a very large assumption.
A second term would entail major changes in personnel as well as policy, and for a President as heavily dependent on his staff as Reagan is, the reshuffle would be extremely consequential. Presidential Counsellor Edwin Meese, a staunch conservative, is already leaving the White House; Reagan formally nominated him last week to be Attorney General in the wake of the resignation of William French Smith, once the President's personal lawyer. The other two members of the "troika" that constituted a kind of inner Government are expected to depart soon after Election Day: White House Chief of Staff James Baker, a pragmatist and tactician, to another post in the Government, and Deputy Chief Michael Deaver, one of Reagan's oldest and closest friends, to private life.