It is free. It is easily accessible. It is all there at cspan. Org. Matthew green, John Nance Garner, who was speaker of the house from 1931 to 1933 and president s vice said the speaker of the house drop is the hardest job in washington. Do you agree . When the framers created the position, what were they thinking about . A kind of model of the speakership where it was a position that had some parliamentary responsibilities, so its job was to preside over the chamber and make sure the rules were being followed fairly, but they also understood could take onion other responsibilities. It is telling it is mentioned only once in the constitution and says the house shall choose it speaker and leaves the rest up to the house to determine what the speaker responsibilities will be. Over time, has it evolved as the institution changed or a combination . I think it is a combination. Certainly the larger context with which speakers have to operate, the house itself, national governments, the larger political context have changed. With that, there have been new response abilities and duties imposed on speakers. But at the same time, there have been individuals who have made a profound impact on the speakership and changed the way it governs and operates. Our viewers see nancy pelosi on the news every day and on cspan. We thought we would learn from you about some of the powerful people of the past who have shaped the role and also shaped the country through legislation. But along the way, lets start with the modern speaker. If you can give us an overview of how the Speakers Office is organized today, what are the tools . How large is the staff . Give us some sense of what nancy pelosi really oversees in congress. Sure. To think about it in the broader context, the speaker of the house has a number of possibilities. Part of it is just presiding over the house chamber, although they really do that. They have someone who is doing that for them, but they are technically responsible for making sure the rules are followed. They are also the leader of the party. With that comes expectations they will help their party past legislative agenda. They might help set the agenda. They are expected to help with campaigns, raising money, these kinds of things to help their fellow partisans get elected. They also have a public role to play, so they are expected to do interviews, to be in the public sphere, and to represent their party as well as the house as a whole. Those are some of the many response abilities they have, which is why it is such a difficult job. Do you have a sense of how large the staff is or how large the budget of the speaker has . Professor green i do not know offhand what the number is, but it has grown significantly over the last several decades. It has become a position with a lot of staff and a large budget. Susan what are the tools they have in order to keep their caucus or the entire congress in line . Professor green speakers have formal and informal tools at their disposal. They do have the power of recognition. They can decide who gets to speak on the house floor. They also have within their party a number of powers. The republicans and democrats differ here. They usually have the power to influence Committee Assignments. They can decide who is on what committee to some degree and who also who chairs committees. That way, they can reward who are loyal and punish those who are disloyal and shape the legislative agenda. Susan how about their ability to raise money . Professor green that is one of the things speakers are expected to do. It is not a formal job. You will not find it in the rules of the house of representatives, but they are expected to do it. It is one of the things speakers simply have to do. They need to go out and raise money. They need to do fundraisers. They go to member districts when they are running for reelection or election. There are doing a lot of the Campaign Work to help members of their party. Susan in recent years there have been some organizational changes to the congress under various speakers. One of those is the end of earmarks. Off, explain what earmarks are, and did that change the power of the Speakers Office . Professor green earmarks are basically putting special targeted funding into a larger spending bill. You might have a bill for transportation, for example, that allocates x billions of dollars for roads. In that bill, it might say or in some other related language, x amount of money might go for this road or that bridge. Those are targeted to districts. This was something that was traditional in congress. Members would do this. They grew in size and expense in late 1990s, early 2000s. So when republicans took control of the house, they banned earmarks. One of the criticisms that have been made of the ban of earmarks is it takes away a tool available to speakers who wish to build a majority for legislation. They cannot say anymore if you , both for this bill, you will put in some money for something in the district. There are informal and indirect ways to do that but it is no longer allowed under the rules to put those explicit earmarks into bills. Susan another thing that has changed in somewhat recent congresses is the seniority of the Committee Chairs. Tenure is the word i am looking for. Sorry. The tenure of Committee Chairs. In past congresses, Committee Chairs were every bit as powerful. Now, they have a tenure under which they can serve. Does that give more power to the speaker . Professor green that is one of the reasons speakers are more powerful. That started under speaker Newt Gingrich, imposed limits. That was something the party had done before he became speaker and they maintain that rule. With the term limits, do not have folks who are chair for 10, 20, 30 years treating their committee as some sort of personal fiefdom. They have to constantly be moved out. That weakens their institutional authority. That has come, i would argue, largely that their power has declined. Susan on the senate side of congress, the majority of minority leaders are the powerful ones. We see them all the time in their public roles shepherding legislation on the floor. In the house, there is the both the speaker and the majority leader. How does that relationship work . Between the two . Professor green the easiest way to think about this is both the house and senate have a top constitutional officer. In the house, it is the speaker of the house. In a the senate, it is the Vice President. The key difference is that the Vice President s are elected by the Electoral College and the public at large. Speakers are not. The senate did not always have a Vice President who was of the same party. From the Majority Partys view, giving power to the Vice President to the same degree the Majority Party in the house my give to the speaker could cause a lot of problems if the Vice President was of the other party. In the senate, each party established their Top Party Leader whom they elect as effectively the most powerful person in the senate. In the house, the speaker , because the speaker is chosen by the whole house but effectively by the Majority Party, the majority felt more comfortable giving the speaker more authority. There is a majority leader. The top leader of the Majority Party in the house is the speaker of the house. Susan before we delve into history, i want our audience to know who they are listening to. You are teaching now at catholic university. What kind of courses do you teach . Professor green i teach introduction to american politics. I also teach a number of courses on political institutions. I teach classes on the u. S. Congress. I teach a class called power in american politics. We talk about the executive how power is exercised in the executive branch and the legislative branch and interest groups. We talk about trumps election, why that happened, and the politics that surround the trump presidency. Susan how did you get into teaching and join the academy . Professor green my father was a professor actually a history , professor. I ended up after College Going to capitol hill and working as a legislative aid for a number of years. I ended up combining my interest in academia with my fascination and love for legislative politics into the job i have now. Susan what period of time were you on the hill . Professor green i was there from 1993 to 1998. How close were you to witness leadership . Whet yourwhat you interest . Professor green i do not know how close i got. I was not working for a leader. I was there for the 1994 election, which was a phenomenal experience because the democrats had lost control of the house for the first time in four years. You really got a sense of how consequential elections can be when you see a switch in power. Which i saw. I tell the story of walking down the Office Building hallway and the next day. You could tell who was a democrat and who was a republican by the looks on their faces. The democrats looked like death had passed over them. The republicans were jubilant. It was a phenomenal experience. And then being there for Newt Gingrichs early months as speaker made a big impression on me about the power of the speaker. Susan he is on our list. So we are going to talk more about him in our conversation later on. As people search for you, they will find you are a participant in a blog called mischief of faction, which is all college professors, political scientists. What do you do in that blog . Professor green it is about Political Parties. That is what unifies the group of contributors. What we write about are everything from the Majority Party in congress and leadership in congress to the democratic primaries. We write about the power of the president. There are also contributions about parties in other countries like in south america. How do other parties work in Different Countries . To the subject from a different perspective. We are writing about Political Parties went large in contemporary politics. Susan where does the name come from . Professor green i believe it comes from the federalist papers. I believe. It was alexander hamilton. Im pretty sure that is it. Susan we will send people in that direction. They can find more about its origin. There have been 54 people who have served as speaker of the house over time. How many of them are history making percentage wise . Professor green percentagewise . I would say depending on how you count it, maybe 10 to 15 . Susan what makes for a successful or powerful speaker . Professor green from my perspective, i think several things make for a powerful or important speaker. One is, it could be any combination of these things. One is exercising significant influence on major legislation. Helping get major bills passed in your chamber. Another is bringing about significant institutional change in the house of representatives. Changing the way the house works or the structure. Another is finding new ways to use the powers you already have to get things through. Maybe in terms of how you appoint folks to committees. , for example. Those are some of the ways speakers have distinguished themselves from others. Susan are important speakers always significant parliamentary tacticians . Professor green not necessarily. Others defer to their staff or the parliamentarian and instead are more effective at influencing politics through their relationships with other members. , for example. Susan to get started, this is peaking my interest. I thought it would be interesting to start with speakers the house itself considered were so important that they named major Office Buildings after them. Canon come alon cannon, longworth, and rayburn. We are going to start with joe cannon. He served from 1903 to 1911. He had a nickname, uncle joe. Tell me about him. Professor green uncle joe cannon was a character. He had a white beard, a stovepipe hat. Always had a cigar in his mouth. He was quite a distinguished character on the hill. But what really made him stand out was his use of power. I would say he represented the apex of power in the house of speakership in the house of representatives. He was the chair of the rules committee, which is the committee that decides what can come to the house floor. And what terms can come to the floor. There were only three members on the committee. He effectively could decide what bills came to the floor and what did not. It was entirely up to him. He was also not afraid to use his power to block legislation even if a lot of members wanted it. He was also not afraid to punish members of his party who were he felt were insufficiently loyal. He famously punished some insurgents in his party who were causing trouble, kicking them off committees, moving them to bad committees. He moved one member to the committee of ventilation and which is probably one of the worst committees you could be on in the house. Susan it does not exist today. Professor green it does not exist today. It is a there is a story about a member of congress who got a letter from a constituent saying, could you please send me the rules of the house of representatives . The congressman sent back a picture of joe cannon. He was the rules of the house. Susan just so people who do not follow closely, today, the rules committee is not presided over by the speaker of the house. Professor green correct. The speaker does not serve on the rules committee or chair the rules committee. Susan this description of how he wanted power sounds counterintuitive to someone called uncle joe. Do you know how we got the nickname . Professor green i dont. I dont actually. Susan it was someone who was affable rather than someone cutting off people at the knees. To achieve legislative means. Professor green he was not disliked. Slikableot a thidi person. What was the problem from members was his use of power. Particularly, the insurgents. The democrats were not happy either, but most members of his party were perfectly happy with him and his use of power. Susan the time in which he was served was also the time of theodore roosevelt. You know about their relationship . Professor green there was certainly conflict between the roosevelt was advocating for two. More progressive legislation than joe cannon wanted. There were times when roosevelt would be writing letters to joe cannon saying, could you please let this bill come to the floor . There was no sense that the speaker should just do what the president said. There was an understanding the speaker had the power and the president just needed to ask. Cannon often said no. He said i do not agree with the progressive legislation. It is not coming to the floor. I dont care what you have to say. It is not going to happen. They often did not see eye to eye on policy. It was very frustrating for roosevelt and the progressive insurgents in the republican conference. Susan what legislative achievements did he accomplish . Professor green i would put him more in the category of what things that he prevent from passing . There was a lot of progressive legislation that simply did not get to the floor. Did not move its way through. Some things did. But it was often because of his great reluctance or some other means that progressives managed to get things to the floor. I think what cannon is most famous for is inadvertently being the last speaker to have that much power because of a rebellion that took place against his authority in 1910. Susan it was also the age of muckraking newspapers. So how did they treat him and vice versa . Professor green certainly cannon got a lot of criticism from the press. Democrats in particular had a field day with that and would he is as a czar, dictator. Put us in charge and we will not govern the way joe cannon does. Some of that muckraking journalism was useful for the progressives because they would bring up things like unsanitary food conditions or canning facilities. This would create pressure on congress to enact progressive legislation, regulating food supply for example. Cared howink cannon people saw him. He saw his role as being leader of his party in the house. Susan it came to a head with a revolt inside the house on march 17, 1910. That is st. Patricks day. Is that at all significant to the story . Professor green i do not really think of it in terms of st. Patricks day. I think of it more in terms of how procedure happened to be used that particular day. This was a group of insurgents who were plotting with democrats to try to weaken the speakers power. Susan were they generally the progressives . Professor green the progressives in the Republican Party working with democrats. What they wanted to do is change the rules so that cannon could not control the house floor through the rules committee. To make a long story short, they managed to bring to the floor a privileged motion that would take the speaker off the rules committee and expand the rules committee from three members to 15. Cannon fought it vehemently from the chair. He spent hours trying to get absent republicans to show up to defeat this motion. He ultimately failed. A coalition of democrats and republicans were able to pass this and effectively strip the speaker of one of his most important tools of power. Susan did he stay in the congress after he lost that power . Professor green he did actually, interestingly enough. There was an election and republicans lost the house. But as memory serves, he did in fact stay in the house. You had former uncle joe cannon, the most powerful speaker ever, now just a regular member of Congress Like everybody else. Susan next on our list is the longworth building, named after nicholas longworth. Also a republican who served from 1925 to 1931. Wheres his home state . Professor green ohio. Susan what should we know about him . Professor green so longworth was an interesting character. I think of him as a quintessential 1920s leader. He is dapper. He and his wife, Alice Longworth, formerly alice roosevelt, daughter of former president roosevelt, would have these social events. There was certainly a lot of drinking going on despite prohibition. If you see a picture of him, he looks like a quintessential 1920s character. He was a speaker who, like joe cannon, believed in strong party government. The problem is, he came later than cannon. The speakership did not have the formal tools that cannon did. Longworth especially hated what he called block government, which is when a group of the Majority Party works with the Minority Party to do what it wants against what the majority wants. He had to find ways to be powerful without the tools that joe cannon had. Susan lets go back to alice roosevelt, daughter of the president. Did that enhance his relationship with the white house . How did that play in the larger washington scene . Professor green roosevelt was not president when he was speaker. Susan but he tried to come back. 1912. Professor green that is true. I did not really know if it helped him or hurt him. I mean Alice Longworth herself , was quite a character. We could spend a lot of time talking about her. Susan she would represent the progressives, right . Theodore roosevelt was more of a progressive. I assume she was aligned with her father. Professor green i do not really know about her politics. I dont think of her in that respect. I think of her as someone who had strong views about personal behavior and was not afraid to express herself. She was a very strong, independent minded woman. That certainly came from teddy roosevelt, who was himself an independentminded president and raised his children to be similarly inclined. Susan the aforementioned John Nance Garner was around. During some time in this congress. I read about something that the two of them created the board of education where they brought members together. How did that function . Professor green this was an interesting example of how you can be both a partisan leader you say bipartisan or more emphasis on cooperation. Even though longworth believed strongly in the party but he was not afraid to open his door to democrats and work with the democratic leadership, including John Nance Garner. So they would get together in this board of education and it was kind of a social scene. It was a way for them to socialize, interact with each other, communicate so there were not misunderstandings about what each party was going to do. The kind of idea that in order for politics to work, you have need to communicate, even with those you disagree with. I believe that alcohol was also served at the board of education meetings, which might have helped lubricate the discussions between the folks who were there. This was a tradition that actually continued, i dont think the drinking did, but continued with sam rayburn. This idea you sit down with members and it can be members of the other party as well, to just talk and communicate about what is going on and what you expect is going to happen in the agenda. Susan does anything like that exist informally in Todays Congress . Professor green not to my knowledge. Susan is that a loss for the susan is that a loss for the institution . Professor green i think it is a loss for the institution. There could B Communications happening behind the scenes and with modern technology. For all i know, nancy pelosi and Kevin Mccarthy could be texting each other. This idea of a social place where you could go without the scrutiny of the media or others i do not think we see that in congress today. Susan given his tenure, that would have put him in the speakers chair during the crash of the stock market. So what happened in the congress and how did the house respond to the devastation that was happening in the economy . Professor green there was an unusual period, a period of transition. At one point, during the 1930 election, it was unclear which party was going to be in the majority. There were some members who had passed away. Longworth himself died unexpectedly. That created a leadership vacuum. In terms of dealing with the recession, because you did not have you did not have fdr until 1933. Both parties were trying to deal with this economic downturn using older techniques and an older agenda. This idea the government should spend a lot of money and go into debt to improve the economy was not something many members agreed with. You had democrats saying that we should cut spending because that is how you get out of a deficit. You reduce spending and have a Budget Surplus and then things improve. Neither party had the tools to figure out how to deal with the great recession. Susan the third building the house of representatives honored after a former speaker is the rayburn building, named after sam rayburn. Tell me about him. Professor green sam rayburn with the longestserving speaker in house history. He served until 1961 with a couple of breaks when the republicans took over the house. A former speaker of the statehouse in texas. In many ways, he personified and helped implement a way of governing that was that characterized the house of representatives from the 1930s to the 1970s. It was a system in which you deferred to committees. Committee chairs were powerful. It was a system in which seniority was the most important thing. You became a chair if you were the most senior in your committee. It was a system in which you had a careful balance between the two wings of your party. In his case, it was the northern and southern conservatives. It was a small sea conservative house. You did not see the house doing a lot of major legislation. They would take the lead of the president particularly on foreign affairs. Because rayburn was there for so long and helped enforce the system, it put his imprint on the house for many decades. Susan what was the key to his longevity . Professor green there were a number of things. One of them was he was a master at bargaining. There was the middleman theory where speakers have to be the median member of their party. He was very good at balancing those two wings. He had the automatic support of southerners because he was from texas. He also had his door open to liberals. They were a Smaller Group in the party, but he did not shut them out or try to defeat them. The other thing is that he recognized it was an ideological balance and a regional one chain, so he set up the boston connection. You always have two people from leadership. One from the south texas area and one from the north boston area. His majority leader was from boston. When mccormick became speaker, the majority leader was carl albert from oklahoma. By keeping the regional balance in leadership, you have both sides more or less satisfied. That allows you to maintain power. Susan he had a famous protege, Lyndon Johnson. Do you know how that relationship started . Professor green Lyndon Johnson was elected to the house when rayburn was speaker, if i recall. Two texans. Lyndon johnson was a master of figuring out who had power and how to get into their good graces. Through his charm and whatever tools he had at his disposal, he managed to win over rayburn. If memory serves, i think he was the only person who would rub rayburns head. I think that was johnsons form of affection. I do not know what other people thought of that. Bringing himself closer, i think that helped. The other thing johnson did, he served the party. He helped members get reelected by raising money from wealthy Oil Interests in his district in the state of texas and doing that service to the party is something that can win over other members including leadership. Susan i ask because we have a clip we want to show about sam rayburn. It comes from Lyndon Johnsons biographer. This was taped in april of 2012. Lets listen to him talk about sam rayburn. [video clip] power does not always corrupt. Power can cleanse. It cleanses in the case of sam rayburn who had to keep quiet as a representative until he became first a powerful Committee Chairman and then you see him moving the senate, the house of representatives to populist legislation. Susan as he gained power, he became more visible and vocal. He also said nobody could buy sam rayburn. Could you use those observations to tell us more about sam rayburn and how he approached the house . Professor green one of his most noteworthy characteristics was he was seen as a very upstanding and moral individual. There was no sense he had that he was trying to benefit any special interest other than the interest of his own district. There was no sense that he there was no believe he lacked any principal. It wasnt that he could be persuaded to take one position or another. As robert caro points out, even though rayburn may have been more upfront when he became speaker, he was still fairly quiet. That is an important tool to have as a leader, you keep your cards close to your vest. There were instances where he helped liberals. He did it very quietly behind the scenes so it would not alienate a wing up his party. It also makes it hard to study rayburn. I have visited the rayburn papers in austin. He did not write very much down. He did not put a lot to paper. So it was hard to know many times what he was thinking. I think that extended to the way he governed as a speaker. Susan he said earlier one tool a speaker has is seeing the public face of the institution. Would the public at the time have seen very much of sam rayburn . Professor green they would not. He was famously resistant to any kind of electronics in the chamber in terms of voting machines, cameras, radios. He did not want it there. I think a lot of people might have known what he looked like from a picture in the newspaper, but it would not be the same as seeing a speaker at a press conference. Susan in my research i found two major legislative things i wanted to ask you about. The first major crisis was world war ii after he came into office. He shepherded through a victory in the draft. Do you know about that . Professor green it shows how even though he did not have the formal tools joe cannon had, he had informal ways of influencing the legislative process. To make a long story short, there is a temporary draft. It is going to expire and president roosevelt wants it to extend another six months. There is a war going on and it is possible the u. S. Will get involved. A lot of people do not want this. They either are being drafted or have sons who have been conscripted. It is an unpopular bill. Rayburn agrees with roosevelt this needs to happen. He talks to the president and they craft a bill they think and get a majority. He starts lobbying members of congress, a lot of them. At one point, he does not have enough votes, so he delays for proceedings for a day so he can get more votes. It comes to the floor. He still does not have the votes. He is lobbying on the four while it is being debated. The vote count start and he presides over the chamber. At one point, it is narrowly passing by three votes. A member gets up and changes his vote. Now it is only passing by one vote and there are other members of Congress Asking to be recognized. He slams the gavel down. It was past. It is a great example of how critical he was in getting major legislation passed. Without rayburn, we may not have extended the draft. Susan the third time he came back as the speaker, by this time, Lyndon Johnson has moved to the senate. We have a republican president , eisenhower. How did that work . Professor green the best way to describe that is you had a combination of inherent deference that rayburn would give president s of either party because he believed it was important to give the president a chance to succeed, coupled with political skills of rayburn and Lyndon Johnson. Johnson believed in winning. He believed in understanding what you can achieve. Going up against an opponent for the sake of it would not be smart politics. If it can get you something, that would be smart politics. A lot of times, eisenhower, johnson and rayburn did not disagree all that much on major legislation. Eisenhower was not that conservative of a president. Rayburn was not that liberal of a speaker. The idea you cannot get things done because a divided government would not have made lot of sense during that time. Susan only Seven Members of congress at the time he was speaker, including the majority leader, were aware of the manhattan project, which developed the atomic bomb, and yet he has to find funding for it. How did he do that . Professor green that is not a story im familiar with. Because rayburn fully believed in working with the white house and doing things a highly scenes. If memory serves, he basically worked with the Appropriations Committee and said, this is what we need and lets get it. With the understanding that National Security was at stake, it was not that hard to do. He also had less scrutiny about what congress was doing back then. You could find ways to get money and spending bills without having people blog about it. Susan interesting point versus today. Im going to dip into history because this piece of videotape is interesting. I want to talk about henry clay. We found on the internet a Transylvania College seminar in kentucky in 2011. They invited three people who had been speaker of the house to talk about henry clay. I want to get your reaction to it. [video clip] it took you 12 years to become speaker of the house. It took you 20 years, took you 20 years. When you hear about henry clay becoming speaker on the very first day, does it make you feel let kind of a loser . A slow learner. If you look at the period to 1860, there was no one person in the United States more responsible for holding our union together then henry clay. Right outside of what used to be the Speakers Office, exactly right outside the door in statuary hall, henry clay. He is looking very distinguished and dapper. He is looking into the distance. You try to imagine as statesman leader, where is he looking . At the time henry clay served in the u. S. Congress, both in the senate and as speaker was an amazing time in the United States. Kentucky, this was the frontier. Going back to the missouri compromise, the treaty of ghent that he signed, which takes us back to the war of 1812, you had have some amazing influences. Susan lots to talk about with that one clip. Henry clay served in a number of Important Roles including famously, secretary of state in the socalled corrupt bargain. Why did he belong on our impact of speakers list . Professor green there is a political scientist named ron peters who said that clay was our first strong speaker. The reason why, which another political scientist said, said he drew on all of the possible sources of power. He was the first to use that effectively. He was an assertive proletarian. He was very strategic in Committee Assignments to get legislation through, particularly tariff legislation. He oversaw dramatic expansion of the Committee System in the house of representatives. He was a forceful individual. I believe he had been speaker in the statehouse before. In some ways, the fact he was the first freshman to be chosen and the only freshman to be chosen speaker other than frederick muilenburg in the first congress, really speaks to the assets he had coming into the office. He used them very effectively. Susan would you say a quick word on the two former speakers . Both republicans, john boehner and dennis hastert. Professor green both hastert and i have written about hastert the conventional wisdom is he was not that important a speaker because his majority leader, tom delay, had much more influence. Tom delay was a very powerful majority leader. That understates the Important Role hastert plays in winning over votes. He thought of himself as the coach. His job was to bring the party together. You have to do the and not use whipping or threats or promises. You have to have a sense of unity. He was good at bringing members in and persuading them to do things. Susan the first line of his biography will also be the personal problems that sent him to prison afterwards. Professor green that came out after he was speaker. That is one of the things that when you are trying to analyze the contribution of a speaker, you have to think, what is it they did before, when they were speaker, and after and determine how you are going to evaluate them. As a political scientist thinking about his leadership in the house is one thing. Thinking about the personal issues and the ethics and criminal problems he had is another set of issues to consider when evaluating him. Susan john boehner, one sentence or two because im going to run out of time. What do you have to say about his tenure . Professor green i have written that john boehner was a rayburn speaker in a gingrich house. He wanted to negotiate. He wanted to make deals. His party and the larger political context made that too difficult for him. He had to deal with factions like the House Freedom caucus that really caused him trouble and ultimately, he resigned from the house. Susan we are going to talk about another speaker who had a nickname which was cvzar read. Professor green when he was rising up in leadership in the 1870s and 1880s, the house was becoming paralyzed by filibustering and dilatory tactics. The reason why was because the rules of the house made it easy for individual members to slow things down. You had what was called the disappearing quorum. The house requires a quorum to do business which is usually a majority, but you could choose not to participate in a vote, even if you are on the floor. If less than a quorum dissipated in the vote, there was no quorum. The idea was that it is very easy to slow things down that way. This contested elections bill was coming to the house floor. Democrats were in the minority they chose not to participate. There were enough republicans absent that there was no quorum. He started counting the members who were in the chamber and decided not to participate. They were furious. The democrats said this is an outrage. Reed had these funny lines. Someone said i do not want to be counted. He said Something Like the gentleman protests the speaker counting him. Does he deny he is here . Once that died down, he brought about a change in the rules that are known as reed rules. They stopped the disappearing coring and made other changes that effectively made the house a majoritarian chamber. The Majority Party gets to run the show. Susan he resigned from congress over a point of principle. Professor green he was a big believer in party loyalty, but he was also a believer in the party agenda. What was happening with president mckinley was the country was moving towards war. What would become the spanishamerican war. He felt strongly that was not appropriate. This was a war of imperialism or of expanding territory, which was not the proper role of government as he saw it. He tried to use his powers of speaker to prevent issues related to going to war to come to the floor. He eventually felt it was not tenable for him to remain speaker. Susan our next speaker brought television to the house of representatives. Thomas p tip oneill. He served from 1977 to 1987. Longest uninterrupted tenure. Elected five times. What was his leadership style like . Professor green oneill was the first partisan speaker since longworth and definitely since cannon. What had happened in the 1970s as the Democratic Party in the house was becoming more liberal in the southern wing was shrinking. There were changes to the rules that weakened committees and gave more power to the speaker and the party as a whole. The speaker at the time was not interested in governing in a partisan way. His successor, carl albert, still not comfortable being highly partisan. Oneill was the first to embrace these tools and encourage more rules changes to give the Majority Party and the speaker more power. During this time, he saw an increased number of restrictive rules. The bill would come to the floor and the rule that went with it would limit the number of amendments that were allowed or limit the debate time that was permitted. That was usually more harmful to the Minority Party, to republicans. Gradually, you see more power being centralized at the leadership. Having said that, tip oneill was also very likable. He was a social person. He was known for sitting on the house floor while things were going on to get a sense of what was happening. Any member who had any problems could come to him. That was one of the reasons that he had some degree of popularity with members of both parties. Susan both he and his republican counterpart led caucuses in the house that were the post vietnam era of politicians and younger more technology oriented. Where their leadership styles are akin to the people they were trying to oversee . Professor green yes and no. Yes in that they were more so than their white assessors had been. Albert did start using radio and television for the first time. They were generally more comfortable than their predecessors had been. But they also found themselves challenged by some of those members. On the democratic side, folks like Dick Gephardt and on the republican side, Newt Gingrich, these members who focused on television and media to cultivate not only their districts but also their national representations, that was a new phenomenon michael and oneill had to learn to adjust to. Susan we have a piece of video that is classic for cspans history. It is from 1984. The republicans who were tired of that 40 years in the minority began to use television as a tool to make their case. Lets watch the interaction with the speaker on the house floor. [video clip] very interesting. You deliberately stood there before an empty house and challenged these people and challenged their americanism. It is the lowest thing ive ever seen in my 32 years in congress. Mr. Speaker, let me say first of all i move we take the speakers words down. [applause] susan people will not understand what it means to take the speakers words down. How significant was that . Professor green at the time, it was highly significant. The rules of the house require all members followed the quorum. Follow decorum. You cannot insult people. You cannot accuse people of things. You cannot question their motives. For the speaker of the house of representatives, who is supposed to be in charge of the decorum of the house, to break that rule was significant. His words were taken down. The punishment the republicans graciously said we will not impose the punishment. It was unprecedented for a speaker to have their words taken down. What that showed is a couple things. I said that oneill was a likable person. He also had a temper. Newt gingrich found a way to get oneill upset. Not knowing what might happen. By getting him upset, he ended up losing his cool and saying things on the floor that ended up getting him in trouble. Susan the group Newt Gingrich was aligned with ultimately did take power in the house in 1995. You were there during that time. Newt gingrich becomes speaker of the house, displacing bob michael who had been the longterm leader of the republicans in congress what. Kind of speaker was Newt Gingrich . Professor green his first year and first few months, he was undoubtedly the most powerful speaker the house had seen in decades. He was he decided he was willing to ignore seniority in choosing some Committee Chairs. This person was next in line, but they do not have my vision, so we will go down the rank and seniority list and find someone who will. He and the republicans had drafted this contract with america, this Campaign Document about the things they would do if elected. That became the agenda of the house Republican Party. That agenda and those items were being moved through leadership. Certainly, the majority leader and also Newt Gingrich they would determine what was in the legislation. They would determine the procedures under which it would come to the floor. They did framing and they figured out how to sell it. A lot of these things went through task forces appointed by gingrich. He could control all the members who reviewed the legislation. It was a remarkable period in which the house was the center of policymaking. Gingrich was at the center. Susan what brought him down . Professor green a series of things ended up bringing down Newt Gingrich. The precipitating factor was the end of 1995 when there was a pair of government shutdowns that had to do with a showdown of republicans in the house and president clinton. The idea is, we need clinton to sign our legislation. If you want, the government will shut down because he didnt sign the legislation we want. Clinton called their bluff. People were upset about the shutdown. They were suffering. Ended up blaming gingrich and the republicans for it. From that point on, there was considerable doubt in the republican conference that gingrich was able to outsmart president clinton and help their party avoid electoral and political problems. It was ultimately not until there was a coup attempt in 1997 with disgruntled republicans. It was ultimately after the 1998 elections, the republicans in the house lost seats. The first time a party that does not control the white house but does control the house lost seats since 1934. Many republicans had finally had it. They have to blame somebody for this. Gingrich should go. He left. Susan how many of the major changes he brought to the institution because he came in with a package of changes how many of those became permanent . Professor green a number of them are still permanent. Some of the changes he made to the system, getting rid of some committees. The office of Technology Assessment i believe he abolished. He also instituted this idea of term limits for Committee Chairs and also for the speaker. That one did not last. This idea of term limits remained a potent one in the house. Susan he started experimenting with televising the speakers press conference. That did not last long. Professor green it did not. That was a difficult environment to control your message. Reporters would ask him things and sometimes gingrich would say the wrong thing. Suddenly it is on camera and you cannot undo it. Besides the idea of the speaker should be at the center of policymaking, which in many ways, we see today, i think the most important changes was changing how the house operated. They did an audit of the house of representatives and found there were a lot of financial irregularities, things that were not done professionally. They streamlined the process and made it more professional. That was one of the most they streamlined the process and made it more professional. That was one of the most important and longlasting changes gingrich and fellow republicans brought to congress. Susan we have about five minutes. I want to spend those on nancy pelosi. She is the first woman to lead the house of representatives. A third speaker to preside over a president ial impeachment in our history. When historians begin to assess her term even as it is still unfolding, what are the kind of things will be looking for . Prof. Green they will be looking at a number of things. One of them is her legislative leadership. She has been very much involved in some major legislation that has been passed through the house of representatives. Exhibit a would be obamacare. The Affordable Care act. Her involvement in crafting legislation, negotiating with different factions in her party, figuring out how to get a bill through the house, especially when the democrats lost their filibuster proof majority, negotiating that with them in the white house, she was a major player in that. I think they will also note her incredible and dogged determination for campaign politics. Her ability to raise money and visit districts. Its phenomenal. I do not know where she gets the energy to do that. She has been doing that consistently as speaker. Related to that is her ability to keep the party together. There have been differences, divisions, but she manages to find a way to keep the different factions in the caucus together when it really matters. Is ability to count whether it is her ability to count votes and do favors for members, those kinds of things set her apart from a lot of speakers of the house. Susan our last video is recent, february 6. This is the state of the union night. Lets watch. Speaker pelosi i tore up a manifesto of miss truth. Of mistruth. It is very hard for us to get you to talk about the issues we are working on. Necessary to get the attention of the American People to say, this is not true. And this is how it affects you. President trump they are vicious and mean. These people are vicious. Nancy pelosi is a horrible person. And she wanted to impeach a long time ago, when she said, i pray for the president. I pray for the president. She may pray, but she prays for the opposite. [laughter] but i doubt she prays at all. Susan the morning after the state of the union, the image of the speaker at the end of the speech, tearing the president s speech apart. The copy that she had apart. I am wondering, in history, the animosity between these two leaders. Has there ever been anything like this . Prof. Green we have come a long way from sam rayburn and dwight eisenhower. This idea that you Work Together even if you are in separate elected institutions. The idea the speaker should be deferential to the president. That is just not what we are seeing now. There is a way in which that is a sign of healthy, vigorous partisan differences. If you disagree, you should not be afraid to say so. But i think my and this is what troubles me, i have written there are certain ways in which are elected officials, we expect to share some common agreement on issues or a sense they have these important institutional roles to play that should rise above their policy differences. I think what happened at the state of the Union Address, how each of the players reacted, shows that things like the state of the Union Address are not serving the purpose they used to. It is not a way for the republic to see the officials are coming together. But more of an avenue for each of these players to say, i am right, the other side is wrong. What i say are the gestures i use. That kind of thing i do not think is healthy for the republic. Susan matthew green, the author of a number of books. I read you are working on a biography of Newt Gingrich ishs tenure. New greenwichs tenure. Thank you for taking us on a walkthrough history. I think we can spend an hour on each one of these people. Susan thank you for taking us on a walkthrough history. I think we can spend an hour on each one of these people. Thank you for giving us the top line on these powerful speakers and how they affected our country and the institution. Prof. Green it was my pleasure. Thank you. [captions Copyright National cable satellite corp. 2020] [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is responsible for its caption content and accuracy. Visit ncicap. Org] announcer all q a programs are available on our website or as a podcast that cspan. Org. Announcer cspans washington journal, live every day with news and policy issues that impact you. Coming up tuesday morning, Mark Hugo Lopez will discuss the role of a latino vote in democratic primary the democratic primary and general election this fall. And the International Organization cofounded by activists and u2 lead singer bono, discussing global poverty and disease. Cspans washington journal live at 7 00 eastern tuesday morning. Join the discussion. Announcer President Trump is overseas in india, where he addressed a large crowd gathered at the Worlds Largest cricket stadium. The event also included indias Prime Minister, Prime Minister modi. [cheers and applause]