Can GOP Get Speaker to Pull Double-Cross?

We’re learning a lot about new Assembly Speaker Doris Allen. We’ve learned she can duck and that she can be daunting. We already knew she was dauntless.

We do not know how durable she’ll be politically. One week ago, she was elected to lead a warring, mean-spirited legislative house as an outcast of her own party.

But given the power to reward and punish vested in her by Democrats, and based on her first few days on the job, this renegade Republican would seem to have at least an even chance of surviving as Speaker until she’s booted by term limits late next year.

The question is whether she survives in misery with the support of chortling Democrats and a few cowed Republicans while other GOP colleagues watch for their chance to pounce. Or, whether she survives as a double-crosser of Democrats with the solid backing of her own party.

She’ll obviously try to please both sides--striving to honor her deal with Democrats while being a good Republican. But it’s doubtful this high-wire act could be performed even by her fabled predecessor, Willie Brown.

Missed in all the Allen-Brown analogies-- if Willie did it why can’t Doris? --is her degree of party sin.

When Brown was elected Speaker in 1980, he received 23 votes from his party--as many as his opponent. Allen received no votes from her party, other than her own. Most of Brown’s votes came from the opposition party. All of Allen’s votes did, except hers. In Brown’s election, Democrats were evenly split between two candidates. In Allen’s, all other Republicans were united--for GOP leader Jim Brulte.

Democrats alone chose the first Republican Speaker in 25 years. And that deep wound to GOP pride will be difficult to heal.

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Republicans tried to accelerate the healing process at a tense private caucus last Thursday. They offered Allen their unanimous support if she would double-cross Democrats. “I’ll lead the charge for you,” Brulte pledged.

Allen was asked to help Republicans make two significant changes in new house rules rammed through by Democrats. She had cast the decisive vote for the rules in exchange for the Democrats’ backing of her Speaker candidacy.

The GOP is demanding an immediate one-vote advantage on every Assembly committee. The justification is that Republicans now are the majority party, by 40-39, after a special election last Tuesday. But the new rules lock in an even party split on the three most powerful committees-- Appropriations, Budget and Rules. For the other committees, a future one-vote GOP majority is permitted if a 41st Republican is elected, as expected, in September.

The second rules change would allow the GOP caucus to select the Republican members of the Rules Committee. The current rules--aimed not only at enabling Democrats to kill Republican bills, but giving Allen the power to reward friends and punish enemies--authorize her to appoint all GOP committee members and chairs.

Gov. Pete Wilson is so incensed at the Democrat-Allen rules he spent most of a 45-minute get-acquainted meeting complaining about them to the new Speaker. He noted that they make it virtually impossible to advance his legislative proposals, such as tax cuts. “This is the moment we’ve been waiting for,” he told her. “Let’s not let it slip.”

Allen clearly sold out Republicans to get elected Speaker. (She said they had been mistreating her for years.) Now, Republicans are demanding that Allen sell out Democrats to gain their loyalty.

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The new Speaker has enough street-smarts to know when to duck. The GOP had planned last Thursday to bombard her on the Assembly floor with motions designed to show whether she’s a real Republican or a Willie Brown puppet. They sought to break a Democratic logjam on their bills.

“Have a ball,” she told Republicans in caucus. “If you want to jam me, that’s fine. It won’t scare me.”

Allen faced them down, but she also ducked. She avoided the showdown, at least temporarily, by agreeing to consider the proposed rules changes. Still, Republicans winced when she told them, “I’ll have to check with Willie.”

After the day’s crisis had passed, Allen indicated to reporters that she won’t be double-crossing Democrats. “You don’t just give your word and walk away. Ever. I don’t,” she said. “You’re not worth your salt, you’re not worth anything, if you don’t keep your word.”

If she won’t double-cross Democrats, Allen will need to strong-arm Republicans to solidify her speakership. She already is starting to reward and punish with committee shifts and staff purges.

“I think she’s going to do just dandy,” says Tony Quinn, a legislative historian and former top GOP aide. “The Republicans are like spent trout. There’s not much more they can do.”