The contest for the Republican nomination for Speaker of the Tennessee House of Representatives has officially winnowed down to two candidates, Glen Casada (R-Franklin)-who is the current House GOP Caucus Chair-and former State Republican Chairman Rep. Beth Harwell (R-Nashville). Harwell has gone to great length to reassure her fellow Republicans and conservatives that as Speaker, she believes the GOP should aggressively pursue a conservative agenda and that she would lead the push for that agenda. Harwell has responded with vigor after an article in this space quoted an unnamed Republican legislator saying that the Nashville Representative would be willing to enter into a coalition arrangement with Democrats and her GOP allies in order to become Speaker if she is not nominated by the caucus . Harwell has repeatedly denied that allegation since the story ran November 4th and says not only that she remains a loyal Republican, but that she will support the Republican Caucus and its nominee whether or not that happens to be her. 

 

Judging by the reaction of some, those assurances don't seem to be good enough. The Tennessee Firearms Association has called Beth Harwell's understanding of (or allegiance to) the Constitution into question because of her vote against the law that allows concealed carry permit holders to carry in establishments that serve alcohol. According to one legislator who doesn't wish to be named who supports both the gun bill as well as Beth Harwell for Speaker, Harwell was coming under intense pressure in her Nashville district because of the controversial legislation. "There was a popular Democrat over there who threatened to run against her if she had voted for the bill, and she was getting a lot of phone calls from constituents against it. She said to several of us 'if you need my vote to pass this, you will have it, but if you don't need it, I'm going to vote no.'" This writer doesn't agree with Harwell's vote, and would have made the argument that a vote yes was the right thing to do regardless because of the reality that this involved a constitutional right. Constituent backlash is a powerful thing, however, for any legislator. "At the time, Beth had no way of knowing her seat would be safe and she knew that bill was going to pass without her vote," said our source, a Republican with one of the most conservative voting records (and some of the most obviously right-wing politics) in the Tennessee House, "we didn't think we could afford to lose her seat at the time, either."

 

Whether Beth Harwell acted rightly in the case of the so-called "guns in bars" bill is very much debatable, but it seems hardly fair to act as though the Tennessee House of Representatives would take some sort of wild left turn if Beth Harwell became Speaker of the House. Some of our conservative colleagues have literally given way to paranoia regarding the Speaker's race in the House Republican Caucus, with radio talk host Steve Gill going so far as to say that GOP Caucus members should declare their preferences for Speaker openly prior to the caucus vote next month. 

 

Meanwhile, those of us in the land of political reality recall that on Election Night we were told that the Republicans had gained 14 seats in the Tennessee House of Representatives and that instead of having 50 seats, the GOP now has 64. [I believe my first reaction standing in the hallway outside the ballroom of the Crowne Plaza Hotel in Knoxville was something along the lines of "Holy Mary Mother of God...How many did you say?"] In a 99-seat chamber, that means that the power of the Republican Caucus will be so absolute that its members can overturn the Speaker, no matter who that person is, on almost any matter. Further, it means that the absense of even one Democrat from the chamber on any given legislative day gives the Republicans the ability to call up anything they want to pass, repeal, or amend-or they can cut off debate on any measure immediately because they will then have a 2/3rds vote.

 

Say it with me, Republicans "we have 64 seats-count 'em, 64 in the Tennessee House, we control State government in every way from top to bottom." East Tennessee Republicans especially need to get that through their collective stubborn Scots-Irish thick skulls because this kind of power is something we as a party are not used to. It was not long ago that the Republicans themselves comprised roughly a third of the Membership of the House-only a third of the State was solidly Republican at the time. Republicans have always had a minority mentality because, well, they were always in the minority-and so much so that nothing was done for their districts without Democratic approval. This led to some members becoming overly chummy with the Democratic Leadership over the years, with many members voting for Democrat Jimmy Naifeh for Speaker in recent times so that, in the words of several of the "Naifeh Boys," they could "actually do something for our districts." For other Republicans, being not only the opposition but having numbers that often made that opposition irrelevant often led them to engage in what we might call backbench antics in order to get attention for their bills (which usually died a quick death) or causes (which, though often important, were usually dismissed as not worth the Legislature's time). The Republican members who refused to sell out had to be seen to be doing something for their constituents, who were usually blissfully unaware that their legislators would be cast into the political abyss were it not for such maneuvering.

 

That has all changed in the space of a single election. In the 107th General Assembly, it is the Democrats who will have only 35 seats and-with a couple of notable exceptions-are now a largely backbench urban rump. The Black Caucus, once the mighty right arm of the Democratic Speaker, won't have the votes to appropriate coffee and doughnuts in the coming session. As my friend Frank Cagle has rightly pointed out, this is not a situation the Republicans are used to, and that goes for Republicans both in and out of the General Assembly in our State. While our party has traditionally been one of top-down control until recently, Republicans-especially those from East Tennessee-are not people who march in lockstep, so party leadership elections need to be conducted with great care. Constituents absolutely have the right to voice to their members a prefence on leadership positions for the offices of the House (this writer has done so in the past and certainly will do so in the future), but members should be under no obligation to publicly reveal their votes in a caucus election for any leadership position until after the caucus vote is taken. Why? Because in their newly-fragile state, the Democrats will look for any advantage they can, and open division in the House Republican Caucus is a recipe for disaster. If you want the conservative agenda to move forward, you can't add arsenic to the winning potion.

 

Glen Casada would make a great Speaker of the House, but there is no reason at all to believe that Beth Harwell wouldn't be a great Speaker as well, especially with a 64 seat majority caucus that can have their way regardless. If she does win the caucus nomination, the idea that somehow the General Assembly will cease to be conservative is a bit ludicrous. The Republican Caucus can, and likely will pass whatever it pleases regardless of who has the gavel.

 

The Republicans are now the majority party in Tennessee. If the GOP wants to be the natural governing party-the way the Democrats were all those years-it needs to begin to function the way a natural governing party functions-and that includes keeping the opposition out of your family fights.