The Speaker of the Wyoming House has refused to make his committee appointments until the Wyoming Senate discloses its appointments. According to a Nov. 23 Cowboy State Daily story, incoming House Speaker Chip Neiman said he’ll take a wait-and-see approach to how the leadership in the Senate operates and won’t announce his committee selections until the other chamber announces its own.
“I think that only makes sense,” Neiman said.
The Speaker is ignoring the wisdom of our Founding Fathers.
After the Revolutionary War, keen minds gave great thought to the structure of our government.
The framers of the U.S. Constitution understood the value of separation and independence within a bicameral legislature. James Madison, writing in The Federalist No. 51, emphasized the necessity of distinct branches of government and legislative chambers to safeguard liberty:
"In order to lay a due foundation for that separate and distinct exercise of the different powers of government, which to a certain extent is admitted being essential to the preservation of liberty, it is evident that each department should have a will of its own."
Thomas Jefferson cautioned against the concentration of power, writing in his Notes on the State of Virginia: "The concentrating [of power] in the same hands is precisely the definition of despotic government. It will be no alleviation that these powers will be exercised by a plurality of hands, and not by a single one."
At the North Carolina Ratifying Convention on July 24, 1788, William R. Davie spoke of the advantages of a bicameral legislature, stating: “In order to form some balance, the departments of government were separated, and as a necessary check, the legislative body was composed of two branches.
Steadiness and wisdom are better insured when there is a second branch, to balance and check the first. The stability of the laws will be greater when the popular branch, which might be influenced by local views, or the violence of party, is checked by another, whose longer continuance in office will render them more experienced, more temperate, and more competent to decide rightly.”
“[I]f the Legislative authority be not restrained, there can be no liberty nor stability,” James Wilson warned at the Constitutional Convention, “Legislative power can only be restrained by dividing it within itself, into distinct and independent branches. In a single house there is no check, but the inadequate one, of the virtue [and] good sense of those who compose it.”
Wyoming’s rules of legislative procedure, as cited in Mason’s Manual of Legislative Procedure §127.4, agree, “It is a breach of order to notice what has been said on the same subject in the other house, or the particular votes or majorities on it there, because the opinion of each house should be independent and not influence by the proceedings of the other, and because referring or quoting the proceedings in one house might cause reflections leading to a misunderstanding between the two houses.”
The Framers designed a system where two bodies, working wholly independently of each other, worked to put together the best legislation the body could create.
History has shown that when two legislative bodies do not act independently, ill-conceived and dangerous legislation becomes law.
When the Wyoming House of Representatives demands to know the committee appointments of the Wyoming Senate prior to making its own appointments, the legislative body cedes its independence to the other body.
The House should just appoint the best people for the job, independent of what happens in the Senate. The Speaker should present a slate of the best committee members suited for each committee. His decisions should not be dependent on what the other body does.
Our Founding Fathers knew the importance of political independence in a bicameral body. Separate bodies considering the same matter makes us stronger.
Waging some sort of fifth-grade pissing contest only makes us weaker. The Speaker of the House should appoint committees based on the strengths of his members, not some perceived fear of what the Senate might do. The Senate is going to do what the Senate does, and they don’t give a damn what the House thinks.
The first official act of the Speaker should have been appointing committees so his members could prepare for the session. With the legislature embroiled in gamesmanship, the quality of legislation suffers.
Perhaps, the Speaker will develop the humility to follow the wisdom of the Framers.
Tom Lubnau served in the Wyoming Legislature from 2004 - 2015 and is a former Speaker of the House. He can be reached at: YourInputAppreciated@gmail.com
