IF THE HALLMARK of the Senate is the ability of the minority to have its say or even to block action, the nature of the House of Representatives is the reverse: The majority can reduce the minority party to pesky irrelevance, choking off its opportunity to offer amendments or engage in debate. That was the legitimate gripe of House Republicans during their long years out of power. As Republicans on the House Rules Committee put it in a 1993 report, "While the majority party always has the right to establish the rules and legislative agenda for the House, it should recognize the need to place responsible limits on those powers which permit all members to fully participate in the truly deliberative process. . . . "
When they took back the House in 1994, Republicans vowed to act differently. Indeed, they have -- they have been even worse. Their behavior is that of a majority more interested in jamming through legislation than in providing for considered, open debate. The chief, most disturbing technique for doing this is to conduct floor debate under a "closed rule" -- permitting only an up-or-down vote on the measure, with no amendments allowed -- or a rule so restrictive that the only alternative vote would be on a single Democratic substitute. According to a new analysis by Rules Committee Democrats, the number of closed rules doubled -- to 36 -- between the 103rd Congress, the last with Democrats in control, and the most recent Congress.
_____Today's Post Editorials_____
|
| |
|
For example, when the House took up a medical malpractice liability bill in 2003, Democrats were not allowed to offer a substitute measure. The same was true for the 2003 tax cut package and last year's corporate tax bill. On the Medicare prescription drug bill, perhaps the most important legislation of the last Congress, only a single vote on a Democratic substitute was permitted -- and total debate was limited to four hours. This kind of take-it-or-leave-it legislating is unhealthy for democracy. As Rep. David Dreier (R-Calif.), who has overseen the GOP clampdown as chairman of the Rules Committee, put it in 1993, "[W]ith more floor votes on more clear issues, members will be forced to take clear positions with their votes." The paucity of real debate is exacerbated by the GOP practice of unloading complicated legislative packages and then failing to give members adequate time to figure out what they're voting on. House rules supposedly require that members be given three days to consider a conference report, but that is regularly ignored; 24 of the 28 rules on conferences provided that they were "emergency" measures and therefore not subject to the three-day layover. Thus, members had 12 hours to consider the 1,507-page 2003 omnibus spending bill, and a scant seven hours to consider last year's 1,645-page version.
House leaders are "making an enormous strategic mistake," former speaker Newt Gingrich said in January. We agree.
