Not always, but all too often. The Reagan administration truly did scale back federal power in a number of categories (though not of course spending). Sadly, both of the Bush administrations exemplified your point qiute a lot -- and 43 was way worse than 41. In fact, to find a series of Right Wing administrations that didn't you pretty well have to go back to Harding/Coolidge (and they had the advantage of the boom of the 1920s and resurgent US isolationism/downsize the military to work with).
Is the same pattern true in the UK as well?
Bookmarks