Time when speakers had a lot fewer responsibilities than today. If anything, it is even more so it is the most difficult job in washington. Susan this position is named in the constitution without a lot of detail. I am wondering, when the framers created the position, what are they have in mind . Professor green they were thing thinking about the model of the speakership where it was a position that had parliamentary responsibilities. The job was to preside over the chamber and make sure the rules were being followed fairly. They also understood the position could take on other responsibilities. I think it is telling it is only mentioned once in the constitution and says the house shall choose it speaker and leaves the rest up to the house itself. Susan over time, has it evolved as the institution has changed or have the people that have been in it changed the job . Professor green i think it is a combination. The larger context in which speakers have to operate, the house itself and our government has changed. There have been new duties imposed on speakers. There have been individuals who have made a profound impact on the speakership and changed the way it governs and operates. Susan our viewers see nancy pelosi on the news every day. We thought we would learn from you about some of the powerful people of the past who have shaped the role and shaped the country through legislation. Along the way, lets start with the modern speaker. If you could give us a modern an overview, what are the tools, how large is the staff, give us some sense of what nancy pelosi oversees. Professor green to think about it in the broader context, the speaker of the house has a number of responsibilities. Part of it is presiding over the house chamber, although they rarely do that. They have someone doing that for them. Theyre technically responsible for presiding over the house. They are also the leader of their party. With that comes some expectations they will help the party pass the legislative agenda, they might help set the agenda. Raising money, these kinds of things to help their fellow partisans get elected. They also have a public role to play. Theyre expected to do interviews, to be in the public sphere and represent their party as well as the house as a whole. That is why it is such a difficult job. Susan do you have a sense of how large their staff is today or the budget of the speakers up as . Professor green i do not know offhand what the number is, but it has grown significantly over the last several decades. It has become a position with a lot of staff and a large budget. Susan what are the tools they have in order to keep their caucus or the entire congress in line . Professor green speakers have formal and informal tools at their disposal. They do have the power of recognition. They can decide who gets to speak on the house floor. They also have within their party a number of powers. The republicans and democrats differ here. They have the power to influence Committee Assignments. They can decide who is on what committee and who chairs committees. They can reward who are loyal and punish those who are disloyal and shape the legislative agenda. Susan how about their ability to raise money . Professor green that is one of the things speakers are expected to do. You will not find it in the rules of the house of representatives, but they are expected to do it. It is one of the things speakers have to do. They need to raise money. They need to do fundraisers. They go to districts when they are running for reelection or election. There are doing a lot of the Campaign Work to help members of their party. Susan there have been some organizational changes so the congress under various speakers. When is the end of earmarks. Explain what earmarks are and did that change the power of the Speakers Office . Professor green earmarks are basically putting special targeted funding into a larger spending bill. You might have a bill for transportation. In that bill, it might say or in some other related language, x amount of money might go for this road or that bridge. This was something that was traditional in congress. They grew in size and expense in the early 2000 and so, when republicans took control of the house, they banned earmarks. One of the criticisms that have been made of the ban of earmarks is it takes away a tool available to speakers who wish to build a majority for legislation. They cannot say, if you vote for this bill, you will put money into the district. It is no longer allowed under the rules to put those explicit earmarks into bills. Susan another thing that has changed is the seniority of the Committee Chairs. Tenure is the word i am looking for. In the past, Committee Chairs were every bit as powerful. Now, they have a tenure under which they can serve. Does that give more power to the speaker Professor Green . That is one of the reasons speakers are more powerful. That started under Newt Gingrich. That was something the party had done before he was speaker. With the term limits, do not have folks who are chair for 10, 20, 30 years treating their committee has some sort of personal fiefdom. They have to constantly be moved out. That weakens their constitutional authority. That has come largely their has declined their power has declined. Susan on the senate side of congress, the majority of minority leaders are the powerful ones. We see them all the time in their public roles shepherding legislation on the floor. In the house, there is the speaker and the majority leader. How does that relationship work . Professor green the easiest way to think about this is both the house and senate have a top constitutional officer. In the house, it is the speaker of the house. In a the senate, it is the Vice President. The Vice President is elected by the Electoral College and the public at large. Speakers are not. The senate did not always have a Vice President at the same party. The Majority Party point of view, giving power to the Vice President to the same degree the Majority Party in the house my give to the speaker could cause a lot of problems if the Vice President was of the other party. They established their Top Party Leader as effectively the most powerful person in the senate. In the house, the speaker because the speaker is chosen by the whole house effectively by the Majority Party, the majority felt more comfortable giving the speaker more authority. There is a majority leader. The top leader of the Majority Party in the house is the speaker of the house. Susan before we delve into history, i want our audience to know who they are listening to. You are teaching at catholic university. What courses do you teach . Professor green i teach introduction to american politics. I also teach courses on political institutions. I teach a class on american congress. I teach a class called power in american politics. We talk about the executive branch and the legislative branch. We talk about trumps election, why that happened and the politics that surround the trump presidency. Susan how did you get into teaching and join the academy . Professor green my father was a history professor. I ended up after College Going to capitol hill and working as a legislative aid for a number of years. I ended up combining my interest in academia with my fascination and love for legislative politics into the job i have now. Susan what period of time were you on the hill . Professor green 1993 to 1988. 1998. I do not know how close i got. I was not working for a leader. I was there for the 1994 election, which was a phenomenal experience because the democrats had lost control of the house for the first time in four years. You got a sense of how consequential elections can be when you see a switch of power. I tell the story of walking down the Office Building hallway and next day. You could tell who was a democrat who was a republican by the looks on their faces. The democrats look like death had passed over them. The republicans were jubilant. It was a really phenomenal experience. And then, being there for Newt Gingrichs early months as speaker made a big impression on me. Susan we are going to talk more about him later on. As people search for you, they will find you are a participant in a blog called mischief of faction, which is all college professors. What do you do in that blog . Professor green it is about Political Parties. That is what unifies the group of contributors. What we write about are everything from the Majority Party in congress and leadership in congress to the democratic primaries, we write about the power of the president. There is also about contributions of parties in other countries like south america. How do other parties work in other countries . Well come to the subject from a different perspective. We are writing about Political Parties went large in contemporary politics. Professor green what is the name come from . Where does the name come from . Professor green i believe it comes from the federalist papers. It was alexander hamilton. Im pretty sure that is it. Susan we will send people in that direction. There have been 54 people who have served as speaker of the house. How many of them are history making percentage wise . Professor green i would say depending on how you count it, maybe 10 to 15 . Susan what makes for a successful or powerful speaker . Professor green i think several things make for a powerful or important speaker. It could be any combination of these things. One is exercising significant influence on major legislation. Helping get major bills passed in your chamber. Another is bringing about significant institutional change in the house of representatives. Changing the way the house works or the structure. Another is finding new ways to use the powers you already have to get things through. Maybe in terms of how you appoint folks to committees. Those are some of the ways speakers have distinguished themselves from others. Susan are important speakers always parliamentary tacticians . Professor green not necessarily. Others defer to their staff or the parliamentarian and instead are more effective at influencing politics through their relationships with other members. Susan to get started, this is peaking my interest. I thought it would be interesting to start with speakers house itself considered were so important that they named major Office Buildings after them. We are going to start with joe cannon. He served from 1903 to 1911. Republican from illinois. He had a nickname, uncle joe. Tell me about him. Professor green uncle joe cannon was a character. He had a white beard, a stovepipe hat. He always had a cigar in his mouth. He was quite a distinguished character on the hill. What made him stand out was his use of power. He was he represented the apex of power in the house of representatives. He was the chair of the rules committee, which is the committee that decides what can come to the house floor. There were only three members on the committee. He effectively could decide what bills came to the floor and what did not. It was entirely up to him. He was also not afraid to use his power to block legislation even if a lot of members wanted it. He was also not afraid to punish members of his party who were insufficiently loyal. For example, he famously punished some insurgents in his party who were causing trouble, kicking them off committees. He moved one member to the committee of ventilation and acoustics, which is one of the worst committees you could have been on. It does not exist today. It is a there is a story about a member of congress who got a letter from a constituent saying, could you please send me the rules of the house of representatives . The congressman sent back a picture of joe cannon. He was the rules of the house. Susan today, the rules committee is not presided over by the speaker of the house. Professor green correct. Susan this description of how he wanted power sounds counterintuitive to someone called uncle joe. You know how we got the nickname . Professor green i do not actually. He was not disliked. He was not a dislikable person. What was the problem from members was his use of power. Particularly, the insurgents. The democrats were not happy either, but most members of his party were perfectly happy with him and his use of power. Susan the time in which he served was also the time of theodore roosevelt. You know about their relationship . Professor green roosevelt was advocating for more progressive legislation then joe cannon wanted. There were times when roosevelt would be writing letters to joe cannon saying, could you please let this bill will come to the floor . There was no sense that the speaker should just do what the president said. It was understanding that the speaker had the power and the president just had to ask. Cannon often said no. He said i do not agree with the progressive legislation. It is not coming to the floor. They often did not see eye to eye. It was very frustrating for roosevelt and the progressive insurgents in the republican conference. Susan what legislative achievements did he accomplish . Professor green i would put him in the category of what things that he prevent from passing . There was a lot of progressive legislation that did not get to the floor. Some things did. It was often because of his great reluctance or some other means. What he is most famous for his inadvertently being the last speaker to have that much power because of a rebellion that took place against his authority in 1910. Susan there was also the age of muckraking newspapers. How did they treat him and vice versa . Professor green cannon got a lot of criticism from the press. Democrats had a field day with that and would say he is a dictator. Put us in charge and we will not govern the way joe cannon does. Some of that journalism was useful for the progressives because they would bring up things like unsanitary food conditions or canning facilities. This would create pressure on congress to enact progressive regulation. He saw his role as being leader of his party in the house. Susan it came to a head with a revolt inside the house on march 17, 1910. That is st. Patricks day. Is that significant to the story . Professor green i do not really think about in terms of st. Patricks day. I think a bit more about how procedure was used that day. This was a group of insurgents who were plotting with democrats to try to weaken the speakers power. Susan where they generally progressive . Professor green the progressives in the Republican Party working with democrats. They wanted to change the rules so that cannon could not control the house for through the commit the house for through the committee. They managed to bring forward a motion that would take the speaker off the rules committee and expand it to 15 members. Cannon fought it vehemently from the chair. He spent hours trying to get absent republicans to show up to defeat this motion. He ultimately failed. A coalition of democrats and republicans were able to pass this and effectively strip the speaker of one of his most important tools in power. Susan did he stay in the congress . Professor green he did. He did in fight stay in the house. You had former uncle joe cannon, the most powerful speaker ever, now just a regular member of congress. Susan next on our list is the longworth building, named after nicholas longworth. Served from 1925 to 1931. Wheres his home state . Professor green ohio. Susan what should we know about him . Professor green longworth was an interesting character. I think of him as a quintessential 1920s leader. He is dapper. He and his wife, daughter of former president roosevelt, would have these social events. It was drinking going on display prohibition. If you see a picture of him, he looks like a quintessential 1920s character. He was a speaker who like joe cannon believed in strong party government. He came later than cannon. The speakership did not have the former tools that cannon did. Longworth hated what he called block government, which is when a group of the Majority Party works with the Minority Party to do what it wants against what the majority wants. He had to find ways to be powerful without the tools that joe cannon had. Susan did the daughter of roosevelt and hence his enhance his relationship . How did it play in the larger washington scene . Professor green roosevelt was not president when he was speaker. Susan but he tried to come back. Professor green that is true. I did not really know if it helped him or heard him. Alice herself is quite a character. We could spend a lot of time talking about her. Susan she would represent the progressives, right . Theodore roosevelt was more of a progressive. I assume she was aligned with her father. Professor green i do not really know about her politics. I think of her as someone who had strong views of personal behavior and was not afraid to express herself. She was a strong, independent minded woman. That certainly came from Teddy Roosevelt who was an independentminded president and raised his children to be similarly inclined. Susan the aforementioned John Nance Garner was around. I read that the two of them created the board of education where they brought members together. How did that function . Professor green this was an interesting example of how you can be both a partisan leader you say bipartisan or more emphasis on cooperation. He was not afraid to open his door to democrats and work with the democratic leadership, including John Nance Garner. They would get together in this board of education and it was kind of a social scene. It was a way for them to communicate so there were not misunderstandings about what each party was going to do. The kind of idea that in order for politics to work, you have to communicate, even with those you disagree with. I believe alcohol was also served at the board of education meetings, which might have helped with the discussions. This was a tradition that continued with sam rayburn. This idea you sit down with members and eight can be members of