House Rules Committee -- Distributed Responsibility

Two nice articles were written this weekend about the way the House Rules Committee is functioning this session. Bob Bernick writes in the D-News, "Urquhart's actions 'gives every member here some real power,' said committee member Rep. Jackie Biskupski, D-Salt Lake. 'It is much easier to get Democrats' bills out now' for a hearing."

Scott Johnson writes in The Spectrum, "And as the powerful House Rules chairman, Urquhart has given committee members the authority to add bills to the Rules agenda, once set largely by the chairman. 'I'm turning the keys over to the kids,' he said. 'If I can get them to help me think about how to distribute bills in the best way and how to keep the members happy, then, of course, I'm just going to use their great skills to get this job done.'"

By distributing the opportunity, I've simply distributed the workload and the responsibility. Because each member knows that his/her nominations can be yanked off the list if the nominations don't have the support of half the committee, committee members are doing a great job of communicating and collaborating while the list is being compiled.

No one should mistake this for benevolence. Anyone at all familiar with politics has to know in an instant that I wouldn't have set up the committee to run this way if I didn't have great confidence in each of the committee members.