As the Texas Legislature gets ready to open its biennial regular session next Tuesday, the big story is that two House members are mounting serious challenges to House Speaker Tom Craddick's attempt to return as Speaker for a third term.

Austin has not seen a challenge to a sitting Speaker in a long time. True, Mr. Craddick challenged and replaced Speaker Pete Laney in 2003, but that was only after redistricting shifted the partisan balance and gave Republicans a strong majority in the House. Laney, a Democrat, had no real chance after the election results were in.

This time, it's two Republicans who are challenging a Republican speaker. Rep. Brian McCall, of Plano, and Rep. Jim Pitts, of Waxahachie, are both trying to get the necessary votes to topple Craddick.

A battle for Speaker is a big deal, because the Speaker of the Texas House has enormous power.

First, the Speaker controls almost all committee assignments, and appoints all committee chairs. On some committees, members with senority can try to reserve their positions, but by and large the Speaker calls the shots. That goes not only for the members of the Speaker's own party, but also for committee assignments for minority party members. The Speaker even decides how many Republicans and how many Democrats each committee will have.

The Speaker also decides which legislation comes to the floor for a vote and how House debates are conducted. The House as a whole adopts the operating rules, but it is the Speaker who interprets those rules on a day to day basis.

And, the Speaker chooses which House members serve on each House-Senate conference committee, where the final details of legislation are ironed out. Only five House members serve on each conference committee, so those positions are coveted.

Obviously, a House member has a lot to lose by challenging the Speaker. But it's not only the challenger who is at risk, but every member who supports the challenger. A committee chair who ends up on the losing side of a Speaker's race will not likely keep his/her gavel.

That's because since the early 1970s, all votes for Speaker have been recorded votes. The winning candidate immediately knows who was disloyal. So, to some extent, members vote for who they think will win, instead of who they think is the best candidate, to try to avoid getting caught on the losing side.

It's probably also no coincidence that Speakers have generally kept their position much longer since the House stopped using secret ballots in Speaker elections. It's just not worth the risk to members to be on the wrong side of a challenge. Before the votes went public, secrecy was so important that the ballots were routinely ordered to be "completely destroyed by fire" after the votes were counted.

There's no rule that says whether next Tuesday's election of Speaker will be by secret ballot or by publicly recorded vote. In fact, there are no rules at all about how the election will be conducted. The rules for each Speaker's election are adopted by the House shortly after the members are sworn in. There has been some talk about using a secret ballot this time to allow members to vote for their preferred candidate without fear of retribution.

In the past, the House has generally required a candidate to get more than half of the votes to win when more than two candidates were competing. If all candidates fall short on the first ballot, a runoff has been held between the top two. Again, while that's the way it's been done in the past, there is no requirement that it be done that way this time so the House could decide on a different process.

House members will be sworn in beginning at Noon on Tuesday, Jan. 9. The election of the Speaker is the first order of business once the members have been sworn. Until a Speaker is elected, the House is chaired by the Secretary of State.

Stay tuned.

Scott Hochberg
State Representative
District 137 - Southwest Houston