Pelosi Walks Tightrope Enforcing Rules

So she called Pelosi. Several times. "Her people told me: 'She's very busy, Karen. Call back after the leadership elections,' " Carter recalled. So she did. Several times.

The result: "She's very busy, Karen."

Carter eventually got through to Pelosi's chief of staff, John Lawrence, but she never heard from Pelosi. She also made several calls to Emanuel but only heard back from his political director, Sean Sweeney.

"You know, this isn't my first rodeo. I understand they had a sitting congressman who hadn't been indicted," Carter said. "But they had run around the country saying they were going to end the 'culture of corruption.' I thought they might, at least, return my calls."

In fact, Democratic leaders never really considered helping Carter. "We're an incumbent-protection organization," said Sarah Feinberg, DCCC spokeswoman. The leaders privately rooted for Carter to unseat their most notorious albatross, but they did not want to alienate the Black Caucus or scare every Democratic incumbent with a potential primary opponent.

"Obviously, having Jefferson around complicates our message," said one leadership aide. "But taking him on would have created so many more problems." DCCC officials also thought that helping Carter would make her look like the candidate of Washington, and of whites.

But Carter was eager for the help. It would have bolstered her message that Jefferson was a Hill pariah and would have undercut Jefferson's message that he was a victim of a GOP plot.

In the end, although she was supported by several prominent Louisiana political figures such as former senator John Breaux (D), Carter did not receive a single endorsement from incumbent House members.

Meanwhile, the Black Caucus -- as well as individual legislators such as incoming House Majority Whip James E. Clyburn (D-S.C.) -- poured money into Jefferson's campaign. Watt taped a radio ad for him, and Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee (D-Tex.) campaigned for him. Their calculations were simple. "Jefferson, over time, has supported me, and I've supported him," Clyburn explained.

Ultimately, Jefferson won handily enough that even Carter does not blame her defeat on national Democrats. But she does wonder about their commitment to reform.

"I kept saying: 'This is the culture of corruption, and you can help stop it,' " Carter said. "They chose to ignore me. If the leadership had made a clear statement that this kind of behavior was unacceptable, maybe they wouldn't have to deal with him anymore."

Pelosi has kept Jefferson off the Ways and Means Committee in the 110th Congress. She did grant him a spot on the Small Business Committee, but even clean-government advocates said that she has done all that could be expected.

The advocates are less impressed by her handling of Mollohan, who will lead the House Appropriations subcommittee that funds the FBI while its agents investigate him. Pelosi also raised eyebrows with her support for Murtha, whose candidacy for majority leader was doomed by ethical controversies from the 1980s. And after she backed off her plan to woo the Black Caucus by giving the intelligence committee to Hastings, who had lost his judgeship over bribery allegations, she reached out to the Hispanic caucus by turning to Rep. Silvestre Reyes (D-Tex.), who was embroiled in his own ethical controversy over funding for a border-security firm.

Ultimately, Pelosi thinks she will be judged by the record of the Democratic majority, and by the ethics overhaul it will begin today. Members would be barred from accepting -- from lobbyists or their clients -- gifts, meals, flights on corporate jets or trips that last longer than a day. They would also have to disclose all of their earmarks and certify that the provisions will not benefit them personally. The goal is to end K Street's reign over Capitol Hill -- or, as Clyburn puts it, to "cut the umbilical cord between lobbyists and legislation."

"She takes ethics really seriously," said George Crawford, a former Pelosi aide who is now a lobbyist. "She's not just going to bow to the politics of the moment."

But it is true that Pelosi's $90,000-in-the-freezer standard is not a real standard at all. She has handled Jefferson, Mollohan, Murtha and Hastings on a case-by-case basis, evaluating the seriousness of the allegations, as well as the potential fallout inside and outside the caucus. She is now the leader of the House, but she is still the leader of House Democrats.

"In the end, she's going to do what she thinks is in the best interests of the caucus," Crawford said.