An Early Disappointment

It does not come as much of a shock to learn this, but perhaps that fact alone is proof of how far quality has slipped at Capitol Hill. Reported in yesterday's Washington Post (free login may be required) by Lyndsey Layton and Juliet Eilperin (who wrote about the collapse of civility and quality in Capitol Hill in Fight Club Politics), the Democrats will begin the 110th Congress tomorrow afternoon by taking some pages out of the previous Republican playbooks. As the new majority settles into their new role with new legislation, they are preparing to sideline the Republican Party in Congress, reminiscent of the strategy employed by the Republican leadership, especially in recent years.

This is the stategy to be employed by Democrats as they seek to install new laws in the first 100 hours of their majority. Although many of these laws, such as raising the federal minimum wage, new ethics regulations, and cutting interest rates on student loans, will have support from much of the country and perhaps quite a few Republican lawmakers, the Democrats seek to claim quick legislative and political victories and prevent the Republicans from engaging in prolonged debate as well as proposing amendments that would make the Democratic proposals less appealing.

From the Post:

But instead of allowing Republicans to fully participate in deliberations, as promised after the Democratic victory in the Nov. 7 midterm elections, Democrats now say they will use House rules to prevent the opposition from offering alternative measures, assuring speedy passage of the bills and allowing their party to trumpet early victories.

Nancy Pelosi, the Californian who will become House speaker, and Steny H. Hoyer of Maryland, who will become majority leader, finalized the strategy over the holiday recess in a flurry of conference calls and meetings with other party leaders. A few Democrats, worried that the party would be criticized for reneging on an important pledge, argued unsuccessfully that they should grant the Republicans greater latitude when the Congress convenes on Thursday.

The episode illustrates the dilemma facing the new party in power. The Democrats must demonstrate that they can break legislative gridlock and govern after 12 years in the minority, while honoring their pledge to make the 110th Congress a civil era in which Democrats and Republicans work together to solve the nation's problems. Yet in attempting to pass laws key to their prospects for winning reelection and expanding their majority, the Democrats may have to resort to some of the same tough tactics Republicans used the past several years.

Democratic leaders say they are torn between giving Republicans a say in legislation and shutting them out to prevent them from derailing Democratic bills.

"There is a going to be a tension there," said Rep. Chris Van Hollen (Md.), the new chairman of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee. "My sense is there's going to be a testing period to gauge to what extent the Republicans want to join us in a constructive effort or whether they intend to be disruptive. It's going to be a work in progress."

House Republicans have begun to complain that Democrats are backing away from their promise to work cooperatively. They are working on their own strategy for the first 100 hours, and part of it is built on the idea that they might be able to break the Democrats' slender majority by wooing away some conservative Democrats.

Congressman Van Hollen is asserting that a constructive effort on the part of the Republicans is a "my way or the highway" proposal. Congressman, isn't that exactly the same argument Republican leaders used to stifle the Democrats in recent years?

This is clearly a pre-emptive move to try to preserve the momentum of the new majority Democrats and to demonstrate that they have the power to accomplish their goals. But, are goals accomplished by any and all means possible truly the best route? It did not seem to work for the previous Congress.

Democratic leaders said they are not going to allow Republican input into the ethics package and other early legislation, because several of the bills have already been debated and dissected, including the proposal to raise the minimum wage, which passed the House Appropriations Committee in the 109th Congress, said Brendan Daly, a spokesman for Pelosi.

"We've talked about these things for more than a year," he said. "The members and the public know what we're voting on. So in the first 100 hours, we're going to pass these bills."

I'll grant them the benefit of the doubt that these bills have been debated to death and the time for action is now.

However:

But because the details of the Democratic proposals have not been released, some language could be new. Daly said Democrats are still committed to sharing power with the minority down the line. "The test is not the first 100 hours," he said. "The test is the first six months or the first year. We will do what we promised to do."

Obviously, all the hype surrounding the "first 100 hours" was for campaigning. However, just like Eliot Spitzer's "Day One" mantra, the expectation is that the way business is conducted is changed now, not six months from now, without any kind of foolproof guarantee that the "test" won't suddenly change to the first year instead of the first six months.

Things are looking better in the Senate, where the Democrats hold a slimmer lead and because the Senate grants more powers to individual members than does the House. That and the Republicans can use the good old filibuster in the Senate and not in the House.

Luckily, new Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) will allow Republican input and amendments right from the start, with the first measures seeking ethics and lobbying reform.

This does not mean that the House of the 110th Congress will be like that of the 109th. House Democrats, including New York Representative Louise Slaughter, incoming chairwoman of the Rules Committee, are seeking ways to be more inclusive. Whether those wishes extend to the leaders atop the House of Representatives remains to be seen.

In the House, Louise M. Slaughter (D-N.Y.), who will chair the Rules Committee, said she intends to bring openness to a committee that used to meet in the middle of the night. In the new Congress, the panel -- which sets the terms of debate on the House floor -- will convene at 10 a.m. before a roomful of reporters.

"It's going to be open," Slaughter said of the process. "Everybody will have an opportunity to participate."

At the same time, she added, the majority would grant Republicans every possible chance to alter legislation once it reaches the floor. "We intend to allow some of their amendments, not all of them," Slaughter said.

For several reasons, House Democrats are assiduously trying to avoid some of the heavy-handed tactics they resented under GOP rule. They say they want to prove to voters they are setting a new tone on Capitol Hill. But they are also convinced that Republicans lost the midterms in part because they were perceived as arrogant and divisive.

"We're going to make an impression one way or the other," said one Democratic leadership aide. "If it's not positive, we'll be out in two years."

Tactics like those proposed for the first 100 hours may well win the Democrats another term as the majority party in the House, as bills will be passed and Republicans could be plastered as "obstructionists" (hey, where have we heard that term before?), but the voters are growing weary of the trench warfare on the Hill. If the Democrats want to retain the majority past 2010, they will have to show that they deserve it.

Democrats acknowledge that if they appear too extreme in blocking the opposing party, their party is sure to come under fire from the Republicans, who are already charging they are being left out of the legislative process.

"If you're talking about 100 hours, you're talking about no obstruction whatsoever, no amendments offered other than those approved by the majority," said Rutgers's Baker. "I would like to think after 100 hours are over, the Democrats will adhere to their promise to make the system a little more equitable. But experience tells me it's really going to be casting against type."

"The temptations to rule the roost with an iron hand are very, very strong," he added. "It would take a majority party of uncommon sensitivity and a firm sense of its own agenda to open up the process in any significant degree to minority. But hope springs eternal."

Hope does spring eternal.