Hastert says violation of namesake rule threatens GOP's ability to lead

The Hill ^

[Sub-Driver]

Hastert says violation of namesake rule threatens GOP's ability to lead By Justin Sink - 01/03/13 11:48 AM ET

Former House Speaker Dennis Hastert (R-Ill.) said Thursday that current Speaker John Boehner's (R-Ohio) decision to pass the "fiscal cliff" compromise bill without a majority Republican support threatened the party's "ability to lead" on future votes.

Under the so-called "Hastert Rule," Republican Speakers of the House customarily do not allow a vote on the House floor unless a majority of the GOP majority supports a bill. Tuesday's vote on the fiscal cliff compromise deal passed the House 257-167, but Republicans voted 151-85 against.

"Here is the problem," Hastert said during an interview on the "Kilmeade and Friends" radio program. "Maybe you can do it once, maybe you can do it twice, but when start making deals when you have to get Democrats to pass the legislation, you are not in power anymore."

The former Illinois lawmaker said Boehner risked allowing Democrats in the minority — and the White House — to drive House votes by not insisting on majority Republican support.

"When you start passing stuff that your members are not in line with, all of a sudden, your ability to lead is in jeopardy because somebody else is making decisions," Hastert said. "The president is making decisions, [House Minority Leader Nancy] Pelosi [(D-Calif.)] is making decisions, or they are making the decisions in the Senate."

Hastert also warned that Boehner risked abdicating the House's traditional and constitutional authority to dictate spending bills with the deal, which was negotiated primarily in the Senate.

"All tax bills and all spending bills under the Constitution start in the house, when you give up that responsibility you really give up your responsibility to govern, and that is the problem," Hastert said.

Hastert had previously said that on some issues, he could see allowing a Speaker violating his namesake rule, although again cautioned against doing so.

"On occasion, a particular issue might excite a majority made up mostly of the minority," Hastert told the Washington Post in 2004. "Campaign finance is a particularly good example of this phenomenon. The job of speaker is not to expedite legislation that runs counter to the wishes of the majority of his majority."

[mrsmith]

The bill, H.R. 8, originated inthe House.

[mrsmith]

He voted for it himself, hardly sticking “the Democrats with responsibility for it”.

The conservatives got to vote against it and have nice voting records to show their constituency. But they have no results to show them, no accomplishments.
Their votes meant nothing.
They were the sheep.

[Secret Agent Man]

Thanks for the correction, the way this has been portrayed it’s like it was created in the Senate.

Did they even put anything in it in the House? Or did they leave it as an empty shell that the senate then filled in?

[mrsmith]

I believe this was the well-thought-out House bill to deal with the Fiscal Cliff passed last summer.

The Senate ignored it and at the last minute completely replaced everything in it by amendment.

[Wuli]

Boehner’s breaking of that unwritten rule says he has few political principles other than simply to be in politics and as such he cares 10 times more about his personal power than he does about true majority power of his own party in the House of Representatives, when it has it.

If he had any true ethics as a party “leader” he would not have ran again for speaker of the House after he could not hold his own party with him on the dubious not-a-fiscal-remedy “fiscal cliff” deal.

The true interest rate (when actual inflation is considered) that the Fed is now charging banks is less than zero, and though I never thought my respect for Boehner could fall to below zero, it has now.