As minority leader, Mr. Boehner, of Ohio, is in line to become speaker if his party captures control of the House, and in his speech Thursday, he set out specific ways in which he would overhaul the legislative process, from upending the appropriations system to giving rank-and-file members more power and requiring that the enactment of any new program be accompanied by at least an equivalent cutback in another program.
Mr. Boehner placed Republicans and Democrats alike in the cross hairs, arguing that both parties had engaged in the sins of earmarking, overreaching and partisan pettiness. Mr. Boehner was perhaps trying to appeal to an electorate weary of partisan bickering and legislative inaction and to respond directly to the calls for “changing the system” that have fueled many Tea Party candidates this year and President Obama’s campaign in 2008.
“Republicans should not start from the assumption that all government is bad,” he said, “nor should Democrats start from the assumption that all government is good.”
He added: “Instead of clamping down even further, it’s my view that we should open this process up and let the battle of ideas help break down the scar tissue between the two parties.”
Mr. Boehner, in prepared remarks of his speech at the American Enterprise Institute, a conservative policy group, proposed a series of largely procedural measures that he said would make government both more responsive and more transparent.
Mr. Boehner called for rewriting the budget act; ceasing the appropriations practice in budget bills of cobbling together spending across vast agencies; ending leadership-driven legislation that freezes out the vast majority of members; and instituting a cut-as-you-go requirement in which any member offering a new program must “terminate or reduce spending on an existing government program of equal or greater size — in the very same bill.”
In a final smack to members, who are fond of spending hours on the floor discussing things like the virtues of handcrafted beers and accompanying resolutions to honor them, Mr. Boehner said Congress ought to “consider taking all these commemorative moments and special honors, and handle them during special orders and one-minute speeches.”
Mr. Boehner was among a group of Republicans first elected to the House in 1990 known as the Gang of Seven who set their sights on ethics scandals and Congressional perks that tainted members of both parties. In his speech Thursday, Mr. Boehner seemed to put his own party on notice for a reform-minded agenda that he imagines under his tutelage, but framed it as an antidote to the practices of the current Democratic majority.
“It’s hard to guarantee a fair debate,” he said, “when the majority has the ability to change bills in the dark of night and literally drop them into the laps of the minority just hours before debate is set to start.”
How popular such proposals will be among even the Republican caucus is very much in question. Earmarks remain popular with many lawmakers, and watering down the appropriations process would fundamentally alter the power structure in the House by siphoning power from the appropriators.
But, Mr. Boehner lamented, “instead of tallying up a final flurry of legislative output, observers and constituents are asking, ‘What went wrong?’ ”
