House Pressed to Debate Election Finance Reform

WASHINGTON — When the bells rang, Rep. David Dreier (R-San Dimas) was giving a speech. Rep. Tim Roemer (D-Ind.) was holding a staff meeting while feeding his three young children. Rep. Michael N. Castle (R-Del.) was at a hearing on electronic transfer of government funds. Rep. Gary A. Condit (D-Ceres) was meeting with Merced County’s public works director about flood prevention projects back home.

But as the signals sounded for a roll-call vote in the House one recent morning--only seconds after the opening prayer and pledge of allegiance--all members had to drop everything and go to the floor to vote.

The issue? Whether to adjourn for the day.

Throughout the day, the bell rang again and again, mostly for the same reason. And each time, the outcome was the same: an overwhelming vote against adjournment.

Welcome to a new and second front in the mounting war in Congress over whether to revamp the election financing laws of the nation.

Even though the GOP-controlled Senate has finally begun to debate the issue, House Democrats, led by George Miller (D-Martinez), are continuing to strafe the lower chamber with harassing tactics in hopes of persuading the reluctant House Republican majority to follow suit.

But amid fresh signs that the Democratic legislative guerrilla warfare may well elicit a desired response, such tactics also are coming under fire for disrupting a wide array of public business--and fraying tempers all around.

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“It’s hurting our ability to get our jobs done on a number of issues,” said Rep. Dana Rohrabacher (R-Huntington Beach). One day last week, he added, such schedule-busting votes on adjournment caused him to miss meetings on trade and U.S. involvement with the Russian space station Mir.

But Miller was unapologetic.

“Most of that’s overblown,” he said in an interview in the Speaker’s Lobby just off the House floor during one of the many procedural votes he and his allies instigated Thursday.

“The fact is, there is no more important public business than campaign finance reform,” Miller said.

In the latest indication that the House may well take up the issue in the coming weeks, Speaker Newt Gingrich (R-Ga.) told reporters at a breakfast meeting Thursday that campaign finance reform deserves a full debate and vote before the House adjourns for the year, perhaps by early November.

But Gingrich disparaged the leading reform proposal co-written by Sens. John McCain (R-Ariz.) and Russell D. Feingold (D-Wis.) under discussion in the Senate and indicated that a debate would expose its flaws.

“At some point, McCain-Feingold or something like it is going to deserve discussion because I think it’s so totally impractical,” he said.

House Minority Leader Richard A. Gephardt (D-Mo.) said Democrats “shall not treat these overtures as serious and will continue to force action on the daily floor proceedings” until Gingrich agrees to “a fair and timely consideration” of the issue.

Behind the scenes, meanwhile, Rep. Vic Fazio (D-West Sacramento), the Democratic caucus chairman, is trying to persuade all House Democrats to coalesce around one reform proposal. On Friday, a bipartisan group of members independently announced it was uniting behind the McCain-Feingold measure.

“If the Senate votes for campaign finance reform,” said Rep. John M. Spratt Jr. (D-S.C.), “the House can’t fail to follow suit.”

That Miller and his allies are resorting to disruptive tactics can be explained by the different rules under which the House and Senate operate.

House members simply do not have the procedural ability to bring up matters for consideration in the way senators do.

McCain and Feingold, for instance, could have forced something of a floor debate, though limited, on the issue just by offering their bill as an amendment to an unrelated piece of legislation. But House members cannot do that.

Thus, Miller said, “we have no other avenue available to us” but to use procedural disruptions.

House Democrats may be united behind Miller, but that doesn’t mean they like the disruptions.

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Indeed, when Gephardt referred to Miller and his tactics during a caucus meeting late last week, mock groans resounded.

Later, Spratt readily acknowledged the inconveniences caused by the time-consuming but meaningless votes, and said: “We understand the purpose. This brings attention to the topic, and it nettles the Republican leadership. It also lets them know that they can’t just stiff-arm us and that we have some means at our disposal.”

Republicans, not surprisingly, are less tolerant, although many conceded the Democrats’ right to such behavior. After all, it was the Republicans who pioneered these techniques during their long years in the minority.

“Now we just have to grin and bear it,” Rohrabacher said.

But Rep. Joe Barton (R-Texas) warned: “We’re right at the end of the good-natured, making-fun-of-it stage.”

He expressed great annoyance at having to leave a meeting of the House Commerce Committee, where members were drafting legislation to reform the Food and Drug Administration, when the first of Thursday’s many roll-call votes on adjournment beckoned.

Rep. Henry A. Waxman (D-Los Angeles) also was at that meeting. After several such consecutive votes, he slumped into a chair in the ornate Speaker’s Lobby and said with a sigh: “As weary and frustrating as these votes are, it’s the only recourse Democrats have. It’s the only thing we can do.”

Recalling his days as a Vietnam War protester, Waxman struck a philosophical note as the bells rang once more. “That was necessary. But it was also fun,” he said of his antiwar activities. “Maybe it’s my age. This is necessary, but it’s a lot less fun.”