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Democrats Backtrack on Bipartisanship
Democrats who control the House have reneged on vows to encourage minority participation in the legislative process and have instead muscled through their agenda with little debate.
Of nine major bills passed by the House during this session, Republicans have been permitted to make amendments to only one, a measure concerning biofuels, the Washington Post reports.
Last week, Democrats initially said they would allow GOP members of the House to offer an alternative to a resolution denouncing President Bush’s plans for a troop surge in Iraq. But in the end they did not allow the Republicans to offer alternatives and passed the resolution by a vote of 246 to 182.
"It’s hypocritical because they campaigned on openness and bipartisanship,” Rep. Patrick McHenry, R-N.C., told the Post. "It stifles debate and ideas and also manipulates the outcome.”
Story Continues Below
In May, before the Democrats won control of Congress, current House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said bills should come to the floor under a procedure allowing "open, full and fair debate consisting of a full amendment process.” After the November election, Pelosi said "respect for minority participation in this House” is "the right thing to do.”
But thus far Democrats have largely bypassed the usual legislative committees and brought their agenda straight to the floor for passage.
According to the Post, "some say Democrats risk being accused of the same abuse of power that Republicans were charged with when they were running Capitol Hill.”
And Norman J. Ornstein, a congressional scholar at the American Enterprise Institute, said: "I’m getting uneasy about this lack of amendments.
"They’re getting to the point where you’re past the initial period where you’ve got an excuse to operate with a firm hand. It’s going to be increasingly difficult to rationalize.”
© NewsMax 2007. All rights reserved.
Editor's note:
Read more on this subject in related Hot Topics: Inside Cover Stories
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