WASHINGTON - For years, Bill Clinton tried to negotiate an arms control treaty for the post-cold-war era. He and Boris N. Yeltsin even agreed on a framework for a new Start treaty in Helsinki. But it never came to be. So the New Start treaty President Obama has negotiated with Russia will culminate Mr. Clinton’s unfulfilled aspiration.

Nine years after Mr. Clinton left office, Mr. Obama has in some ways picked up his Democratic predecessor’s mantle. While they are very different presidents and not personally close, at least some of the unfinished agenda items left from the Clinton administration have found their way to the top of the Obama priority list. And the 44th president is arguably profiting from the work, and the setbacks, of the 42nd president.

The treaty and the health care overhaul represent the most obvious examples. But Mr. Obama also pushed through an economic stimulus package last year, which Mr. Clinton tried unsuccessfully to do in his first year. Mr. Obama has drawn bipartisan support for lifting the ban on gay men and lesbians’ serving openly in the military, an idea that backfired on Mr. Clinton. And where Mr. Clinton never submitted the Kyoto treaty to a hostile Senate, Mr. Obama is pushing forward with climate change legislation that has a shot at passing.

Other presidents have built on the policy agendas of predecessors. George W. Bush fashioned his presidency as an extension of Ronald Reagan’s, especially in cutting taxes. And Franklin D. Roosevelt completed the legacy of Woodrow Wilson, particularly in building a lasting international organization with American participation.

“Every great progressive era, if you look at history, begins with somebody hitting the barricades first and the other person establishing that progressive agenda and coalition,” said Rahm Emanuel, who was a senior adviser to Mr. Clinton and is now Mr. Obama’s White House chief of staff.

Such was the case with health care, 16 years after Mr. Clinton’s effort collapsed, he said. “Without ‘94 creating some space and some knowledge, the truth is 2010 could not have happened.”

Of course, the comparisons are imprecise and the times in which the two men governed are radically different. In the calm after the cold war, Mr. Clinton was trying to pull his party back to the political center after years in the wilderness, while Mr. Obama campaigned as a more liberal figure in a time of war, terrorism and economic crisis.

And there are areas where Mr. Clinton’s agenda has no need for continuation. Mr. Clinton’s success in reshaping welfare, pushing through free trade policies and enacting a tougher approach to crime arguably took those issues off the table for Mr. Obama.
“Clinton’s problem was trying to change the system during a time of peace and prosperity,” said H. W. Brands, a presidential historian who has written books on Wilson and F.D.R. “Americans are status quo friendly; if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it. Obama’s opportunity was to arrive when the status quo had been jolted and, in the eyes of many, discredited.”

Still, Republicans are confident that Mr. Obama has learned the wrong lessons from Mr. Clinton, and that he will ultimately see his party suffer at the polls as well.

“Certainly he achieved a legislative success that Clinton was unable to reach and that has given them confidence and momentum,” said Robert Walker, a former Republican representative from Pennsylvania. “But the problem they’ve got is the only momentum is with their own base. For independents, the real issues are the debt and deficit. And some of the programs he’s putting forward are exacerbating the problem.”

The danger, naturally, is to draw too much from the Clinton experience.

“You have to be careful not to overlearn old lessons,” said Joel P. Johnson, a former senior adviser to Mr. Clinton. “The times and circumstances have changed dramatically. But certain fundamentals remain the same, and past mistakes provide present insights. It’s the rough equivalent of studying game films in the N.F.L.”


PETER BAKER ESSAY


LUKE SHARRETT/THE NEW YORK TIMES
President Obama has had success with agenda items started by President Clinton, above, speaking at a rally in 1994, most notably health care and arms control.