Lack of Decorum a Long Capitol Tradition

The Capitol building is a spit-and-polish place where the paint is fresh and white, the tulips stand in soldierly rows and an army of workers makes sure the ambience oozes nothing but decorum. The only thing they have yet to spruce up is the rhetoric that occasionally spews from inside, a sort of verbal graffiti that, in the public eye, besmirch this stately place as sure as a can of spray paint.

Lately, members of Congress seem to be dishing up the ugly talk more often than ever, prompting some to wonder whether this esteemed body is about as refined as “Beavis & Butt-head.” And Californians--Democrats and Republicans alike--seem to be making more than their share of regrettable contributions.

We began the 104th Congress in January with Rep. Robert K. Dornan (R-Garden Grove) stripped of his non-voting privileges and banned from the House floor for 24 hours for essentially calling President Clinton a traitor. It was the first time in 21 years such action was taken in the House.

Then Rep. Pete Stark (D-Hayward) suggested that Connecticut Republican Nancy Johnson had acquired her health care knowledge from “pillow talk” with her physician husband. Stark had scarcely apologized for that unfortunate remark when, in a closed-door committee hearing, he was heard to call her “a whore” for the insurance industry.

Just last week, Randy (Duke) Cunningham, Republican from San Diego, referred to gays as “homos” during House floor debate. (He later apologized.)

And so bitter is the warfare between parties that Rep. Brian Bilbray, a San Diego freshman, says he has been scolded by fellow Republicans for merely speaking to his cross-town colleague, Bob Filner, a liberal San Diego Democrat.

“The hassle with Filner isn’t just that he’s a Democrat, but he is perceived as being on the extreme left and a lot of people resent my association with that aspect,” said Bilbray. He chooses to ignore his colleagues’ admonitions, Bilbray says jokingly, “because Bob’s a human being--even if he is a pinko Commie.”

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That Californians seem to be taking a lead in this erosion of decorum could be a function of the state’s political complexity, from conservative Orange County to liberal Los Angeles. The result is that a Bob Dornan and a Maxine Waters (the Los Angeles Democrat who last year told a colleague to “shut up”) hail from the same unpredictable state. Others say it just seems like Californians pop off a lot because there are so many of them--54, the largest delegation in Washington.

Anyway, such behavior is not at all peculiar to the Golden State; a Virginia Democrat just last week threatened to punch one of his colleagues in the nose. Some pundits say the root of all this hostility is 40 years of pent-up resentment in a House dominated by Democrats who treated Republicans “like dirt.” Others say the center has dropped out of politics, leaving the two parties hatefully polarized.

But historians who take the longer view contend that the only thing out of whack about today’s Congress is the public’s expectation that it ought to behave better. A look at history tells us lawmakers heretofore have sunk not only as low as this, but lower.

In the Senate chamber in 1850, a Mississippi senator pulled a gun on a Missouri senator and had to be forcibly disarmed. In 1856, a miffed member of the House took a cane and beat Sen. Charles Sumner of Massachusetts almost to death.

In 1859, a California Democratic senator and abolitionist was shot to death in an illegal duel by none other than the state’s chief justice. Indeed, they lost so many lawmakers to duels that Congress finally wised up and passed a law against it.

Even as late as 1960, Sen. Strom Thurmond (R-S.C.) got in a wrestling match with a senator from Texas outside the Commerce Committee hearing room and pinned him to the marble floor, where he remained until the chairman hollered at them to get up.

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“It’s not new. We just don’t know our history,” said Richard A. Baker, the Senate historian. “In the early 19th Century, blood was in the air.”

Anticipating as much, one of the Senate’s first actions in 1789 was to pass a code of 20 rules, many dealing with decorum. One of them requires even today that members directly address not one another, but the presiding officer, to defuse explosive tempers. And they are never to employ the pronoun “you.” Hence all of the references to “the esteemed gentleman from California” and “my good friend from Iowa.”

“It sounds oily and it is,” said former Sen. John Danforth (R-Mo.). “But it is the oil that lubricates the political machines.”

It’s just that lately, the political machines have been screeching and they are not likely to soon stop.

“There is a shrillness that has not been a part of the traditional process as I have experienced it,” said Rep. Jerry Lewis, (R-Redlands), a nine-term congressman who is well regarded by members of both parties. “Confrontational politics is alive and well, and I am not sure it’s good for the institution.”

Still, if the historians have it right, there is much for these rowdy--and sometimes tasteless--Californians to be thankful for. “We’ve seen lots of violence on the floor over 200 years,” said former House historian Ray Stark. “Now it is more verbal than physical. At least they’re not banging each other in the head with a fireplace poker.”