By Jonathan Weisman
Washington Post Staff Writer
Monday, January 22, 2007
Beneath the resounding Democratic victories of the past two weeks, tensions have been growing between House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and many new committee chairmen and other members over her aggressive management style and her approach to the war, according to lawmakers and advisers.
Powerful committee chairmen have bridled at the California Democrat's decision to impose six-year term limits on them. Liberal Democrats say she is being too cautious in confronting President Bush on the war in Iraq. Rank-and-file Democrats say she erred in denying Republicans more say in the early legislation, making the speaker appear autocratic.
And many Democrats complain that Pelosi is relying too heavily on a coterie of liberal allies from her home state and Massachusetts to the exclusion of more conservative lawmakers from the Midwest and the South.
The friction will present a growing challenge as Democrats move from the poll-tested, popular items that breezed through the House this month to more difficult legislative ventures, such as efforts to stem global warming, overhaul the nation's immigration laws, shrink the budget deficit and resolve the war in Iraq. It could also hand Republicans a powerful political weapon as they seek to regain power in 2008 by challenging the crop of new Democrats hailing from Republican-leaning districts.
Rep. Marcy Kaptur (D-Ohio) praised Pelosi for guiding through so many popular legislative items so quickly but pleaded for her to develop a more inclusive leadership style.
"If I had any advice, it would be 'Don't isolate yourself inside the territory you're most familiar with,' " Kaptur said last week. "I guess I would say to her, 'Don't be isolated by your California experience.' "
Pelosi aides and allies say she is doing her best to be inclusive, and to consult with the strong-willed old bull chairmen, but she must also make room for the new voices that helped the Democrats win back the majority. They said that although that will not be easy, most Democrats will be patient as the new majority settles in.
"I think we suffered the last time the Democrats were in power from too much chairman autonomy," said Rep. Barney Frank (D-Mass.), a Pelosi ally and the chairman of the House Financial Services Committee. "Accusing the speaker of trying to manage public policy is like accusing the fire department of trying to fight fire."
Pelosi took over the speakership this month after a messy leadership fight in which she backed the losing candidate, Rep. John P. Murtha (D-Pa.), for House majority leader. She then threw herself into her "hundred-hour" blitz.
In 2 1/2 weeks, the House adopted new rules to curtail the influence of lobbyists and control deficit spending, then passed half a dozen bills to increase the minimum wage, bolster homeland security, fund stem cell research, order the federal government to negotiate lower drug prices for Medicare, cut some student-loan interest rates, and eliminate tax breaks for oil companies to finance alternative-energy research. On virtually every vote, Republicans joined united Democrats in droves.
But backstage, the firm -- some say heavy-handed -- style Pelosi used to ensure passage of those bills and deal with committee chairmen began to chafe.
Pelosi angered her chairmen and much of the Congressional Black Caucus with her decision to maintain a Republican rule limiting committee chairmanships to six years. Those chairmen and black members have waited years, even decades, to wield power as they patiently abided by the seniority system.
Now, some of the most powerful Democratic chairmen, such as Energy and Commerce's John D. Dingell (Mich.), Appropriations' David R. Obey (Wis.), and even ideological allies such as Oversight and Government Reform's Henry A. Waxman (Calif.), are openly questioning her decision.
They point to Republican experiences with term limits, when candidates for vacated chairmanships competed with one another to raise political cash for GOP candidates and offered legislative fealty to their leaders to win appointments.
That competition strengthened the hand of the leadership and introduced politics -- even the taint of corruption -- to a process that once ran on simple seniority, some Democrats note.
But Pelosi has stood her ground, arguing that fresh blood needs to circulate through the committees. Rep. Rahm Emanuel (Ill.), chairman of the House Democratic Caucus, said the excesses of those competitions were the products of the Republican Party, not the process.
"Tom DeLay created that culture," he said, referring to the Republican former House majority leader. "That's not us."
Some Democrats were frustrated with her decision not to give Republicans a chance to offer even one amendment on the six bills that passed in the initial spate. Pelosi promised the Republicans that they will have more input on other matters, but some Democrats say she has unnecessarily ceded the moral high ground.
"As we try to move forward, we have to make sure transparency and cooperation is part of the legislative process," said Rep. Jim Costa (D-Calif.), an advocate of more comity in the House.
Some rank-and-file members see bias toward "bicoastal liberals" in Pelosi's inner circle -- particularly Reps. George Miller (D-Calif.) and Edward J. Markey (D-Mass.) -- and short shrift given to the views of Midwesterners and more conservative Southern Democrats.
On the war front, two Democratic camps have developed. Liberals and antiwar stalwarts such as Murtha, one of Pelosi's closest allies, want to aggressively use the power of the purse to affect policy, possibly by denying funds for increased troop strength in Iraq. But some senior Democrats and members of the leadership, such as Emanuel and House Majority Leader Steny H. Hoyer (D-Md.), counsel a go-slow approach, in which Democrats start with a nonbinding resolution against the president's policies, use hearings to build up public support for more dramatic action, and gauge voter feelings before legislative action to stop a military buildup in Iraq.
In the most public breach, Pelosi created a special committee dedicated to global warming, infuriating Dingell, whose committee would inevitably lose jurisdiction. Dingell fumed: "These kinds of committees are as useful in relevance as feathers on a fish."
The move crystallized fears among some moderate Democrats that Pelosi would "policy shop" to produce the legislative outcome she wants, even if that outcome goes against the grain of the moderates' constituents, several House members said.
At a rancorous closed-door meeting of the Energy and Commerce Committee last week, members of all political stripes backed Dingell and threatened to subject the proposed committee to a public execution on the House floor. One conservative Democrat said Friday that the issue could turn even nastier than the race between Hoyer and Murtha for majority leader.
"These are very major blunders on her part," said a senior Democratic adviser who served for years in the House and spoke on the condition of anonymity for fear of breaching his ongoing relationships. "The general feeling is that she keeps her own political counsel. She doesn't have any staff who are her eyes and ears and can tell her what's really going on in the caucus."
Emanuel conceded some missteps and miscommunication, but he said they are not indicative of larger issues. Committee chairmen can abide term limits, Emanuel said, but they should have been informed of her thinking on the subject. "Nobody likes being caught by surprise," he said.
The fears created by the new panel on global climate change stem largely from concerns that the committee will be permanent, amassing influence at the expense of other panels, Emanuel said. Pelosi will put in writing that it will be disbanded at the end of the 110th Congress.
Pelosi spokeswoman Jennifer Crider said that the speaker has confidence and trust in her committee chairmen but that Pelosi also wants to create new platforms from which fresh voices can be heard. New task forces have been created to get the pulse of members in their 30s, veterans and rural representatives. There is a new black working group to supplement the long-standing Congressional Black Caucus and a faith working group to give a voice to the religious.
Such groups may compete with traditional power centers, but Pelosi will stand by her efforts, aides to the speaker say.
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