Chairmen Line Up Behind Craddick: Is It The Deathknell?

Quorum Report has up a letter signed by numerous House Committee chairs pledging their support to Craddick.

The only non-signatories were Pitts, who is running for Speaker, and Talton, Ritter and Eiland, who are reportedly pledged to McCall.  The list makes up almost 20 percent of the House membership.

Is this the deathknell for the opposition? I believe it is a pretty good indicator. The 27 co-signers of the letter (which wasn’t actually signed because it is pretty hard to get that many people together over the holidays) represent a wide cross-section of the House and the state.

To many, this letter would mean nothing.

However, keep in mind that each of these House Members can probably be counted upon to bring with them as a result of their support at least one (or as many as three) House members who will support them for one (or more) of the following reasons:

(a) They view the signer as a respected colleague and feel that if the signer has pledged to Craddick, it is the wise or politically expedient thing to do under the present circumstances;

(b) They are personal friends with the signer;

(c) They are afraid that the signer will stab them in the back later in the session if they don’t.

(d) They believe their support for the same candidate as the signer is supporting will make the signer more likely to support their legislation when it gets before their committee (assuming they hold that chairmanship) in the session (and this applies to house floor votes as well, or votes on other committees the signer may end up on)

(e) They believe supporting the same candidate as the signer will help them amortize goodwill with the signer which will help them get more done down the road.

(f) They believe that supporting the same candidate as the leadership will help them amortize goodwill with the leadership which will help them get more done down the road.

This letter was a very astute move on Craddick’s part. Considering that if each of these Chairs brought with them only one other vote to the table as a result of any one or combination of (a) through (f) above, that alone is 58 votes for Craddick. If 14 signers brought one person each to the table and 15 brought two people each to the table with them, that’s a total of 73 votes and very, very close to the magic number needed to win this race.

Naysayers will say “oh, hell! That’s impossible.”

But folks: look at the composition of the House. Like a high school lunch room in Alamo Heights or Highland Park or even Tatum, it’s full of cliques. And, I don’t mean that in a bad way necessarily. You have people who form cliques and groups of common interest for various reasons, maybe even because they support a signle change in some part of state law. These cliques stick together.

A vote for speakership isn’t always a vote of love or hate for a particular candidate. It may be a vote of support for wanting to get something done.

Consider this fun little equation story scinario. So that it isn’t confused with any actual legislation, I’ve picked something off-the-wall (and unregulated by Texas law) as an example:

Perhaps Member X is going to vote for Speaker Craddick because he sees that Member Y and Member Z are. Member X realizes that both Member Y and Member Z carry a lot of legislation relating to the sale, manufacture and use of pizza boxes. Member X has a medium-sized pizza box manufacturer in his district who is getting squeezed because the Texas Pizza Box Manufacturers Association doesn’t listen to medium sized pizza box manufacturers. Member X’s constituant wants the pizza box law changed to allow intrastate shipment of unassembled pizza boxes into counties of less than 500,000 population to be able to exploit the same loopholes in the franchise and other tax codes as the shipment of assembled pizza boxes. But, the Texas Pizza Box Manufacturers Association could care less.

So, Member X believes that he can get Member Y and Member Z, who have more medium-sized, large, and giant sized pizza box manufacturers in their districts than anywhere else (not to mention the ear of the TPBMA) to carry some legislation to help out his constituant because that legislation would also help out every one of Member X and Member Y’s pizza box making constituants.

Then, Member X sees Member Y and Member Z are supporting Tom Craddick for Speaker. Member X sees this as a prime opportunity to ingratiate himself to Member Y and Member Z, and even Speaker Craddick. He’ll instantly have something in common with Member Y and Member Z, and since Member Y and Member Z are in the leadership, he’s got their ear because he’s “in line” with the wishes of the leadership.

Get the idea? This is how things happen in government. People do jump on bandwagons. And, it may not be just because they want to get things accomplished.

Consider that there are a lot of members of the House who actually do have worshipful respect for some of their colleagues. They see that colleague’s name on a list like this and their decision is made for them.

Why? Perhaps because their colleague mentored them when they first got to the house, helped them pass their first bill, helped secure funding for a water district, made sure they were protected when it came to having to cast votes for the leadership but against their district, helped them in their last tough election, and is a close personal friend. In a case like that, would someone really expect that personal loyalty would be tossed out the window? While there are instances where it might be, it isn’t likely to happen in others.
Just a few examples of why this race is both difficult to handicap and also, probably, in light of this list, as good as done.

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