WASHINGTON - Despite a general public perception that Congress failed to get much done this year, 2007 actually ranks as a fairly productive legislative session, congressional scholars say.

The gains were overshadowed by stalemate on Iraq war policy and by the bickering and division often on display in Washington, they said.

This year's session was "definitely not a 'do-nothing' Congress," said congressional expert Thomas Mann of the Brookings Institution, a Washington think tank.

In fact, the new Democratic Congress was more active than its predecessor looking at the amount of time in session, committee meetings, oversight of the executive branch, votes and measures passed, he said.

"In terms of new laws enacted, it compares favorably with the 104th Republican Congress which took office following the 1994 elections," he said. "The latter failed to enact all but one provision of the 'Contract With America' during its first year. By contrast, most of the items on the Democratic new direction agenda found their way into law."

But the Democrats' promise and failure to change course on Iraq eclipsed all their other gains, Mann added. President Bush kept Republicans on his side by launching the surge strategy and suggesting he would reduce troop levels after it worked, he said.

"Given their narrow majorities in Congress and facing a president with little interest in negotiating with them, the Democrats did a respectable job in changing he agenda, aggressively overseeing the executive, and harvesting a modest but significant set of new laws," Mann said.

Congress's record this year "looked worse than it was," said another congressional expert, Norman Ornstein of the American Enterprise Institute. He gives the 2007 session a passing record for legislative accomplishments.

Although the Brookings Institution is seen as moderate to left-leaning and AEI as conservative, Mann and Ornstein have long been widely respected as nonpartisan congressional experts. They each have written books and numerous scholarly articles, serve as commentators for a variety of media and lecture on American politics and policy at home and abroad.

Bickering

Although voters many not necessarily notice, Ornstein said, there was a very significant change in oversight.

"We saw a Congress that went from being completely supine, turning a blind eye to any abuses out there by the executive branch, to one that's been extraordinarily active on that front," he said.

He noted that Congress raised the minimum wage, made a significant change to college loan programs, implemented recommendations of the Sept. 11 commission and raised fuel efficiency standards.

But Congress didn't reach success on a number of areas where there's a strong public demand, including economic security and Iraq, he said.

"Also, the image that people would get out of Washington," he said, "was far more bickering and division than any sense someone was trying to transcend differences and trying to achieve for the good of the nation."

The blame for that can be spread widely, Ornstein said. The Democrats were so eager to pass certain legislation as promised within the first 100 hours of retaking Congress that they put the regular processes aside, starting off on bad footing. Republicans also exploited every opening and sometimes tried to embarrass the Democrats with "gotcha" amendments.

In the fairly evenly divided Senate, Republicans used filibusters and objections more than ever seen before on routine issues, he said. The GOP remained united but also wanted to "throw molasses in the road" to make Democrats look bad, he said.

Bush started the year with the expectation of making compromises, Ornstein said. But when a potential compromise on his No. 1 priority of immigration failed in early summer, he added, the president abandoned that strategy and began threatening vetoes of all legislation he didn't like.

And the Democratic Party was "so obsessed with doing something about the war that they took their eye off the other balls for many months," he said. With American troops in the field, who could be endangered by a cut in funding, and a commander-in-chief determined to stay the course, "there's no way the legislature is going to change the policy," he said.

"Democrats spent time and energy trying to find a way to do something that couldn't be done," he said.

'More of the same'

As for 2008, Ornstein predicted "it's likely to be more of the same than anything else." Democrats have a chance to regroup now, and some Republicans may become more nervous about standing with an unpopular president as the election approaches, he said. But he doesn't see much chance of Bush changing course.

"It's hard to imagine things will alter dramatically in the course of a year," he said. "But things that don't go through the first year (of a congressional session) often go through the second."

Because of congressional action, the minimum wage rose 70 cents to $5.85 an hour this summer, the first increase in a decade, and will increase 70 cents each summer up to $7.25 an hour in 2009. Democrats attached the increase, along with billions of dollars in tax breaks for small businesses, to a must-pass Iraq war spending bill.

Congress also passed an energy bill that will raise fuel efficiency standards to an average of 35 miles per gallon by 2020 and also will greatly increase production of biofuels. But to get those measures through, Democrats had to drop a major provision requiring utilities to produce 15 percent of their electricity from renewable sources and a nearly $22 billion tax package that would have extended existing renewable incentives and rolled back nearly $14 billion in tax breaks for large oil companies.

Instead of passing each of the 12 separate spending bills, Congress rolled 11 of them into one giant $555 billion measure that Bush signed. But that was more than in 2006, when Congress didn't pass spending measures and instead left the work to this session, which extended the previous year's levels.

Congress approved a one-year fix to keep the Alternative Minimum Tax from hitting millions more families, but passed it so late that more than 3 million people will have to wait until February to get their tax refunds.

Although Congress passed an expansion of the State Children's Health Insurance Program, Bush vetoed it. Before adjourning for the year, lawmakers passed an extension keeping the program running through March 2009. House Democrats will try again to overcome the veto after they return in January but are expected to fail. Negotiations on a longer-term compromise will continue.

Congress faces a host of other issues in 2008. The House and Senate each passed a version of the Farm Bill, but those two versions must still be reconciled. The final bill likely will continue the current farm payment programs and tighten subsidy eligibility requirements somewhat, although Bush believes not far enough. He has also threatened a veto because he does not like the revenue measures used to pay for the increased spending.

Action also is expected to renew the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, which is set to expire early next year. A dispute remains over whether to give retroactive immunity to companies that cooperated with the government's warrantless wiretapping program.

Bills addressing global climate chance also have been working their way through committees, although the final outcome remains uncertain. The debate over Iraq war spending will continue, and Democrats have said they are putting together an economic stimulus package.