IN THE end, it wasn’t even close. Immigration reform cleared the Senate by 68 votes to 32. Fourteen Republicans cast ayes along with all the members of the Democratic caucus. Although not quite the 70-vote landslide some proponents had called for, it was still a bipartisan show of force. The vote brings America’s simultaneously forbidding and flouted immigration system as close to a much-needed overhaul as it has been in a generation. But even as support for the measure was solidifying in the Senate, it was evaporating in the House. John Boehner, the speaker (pictured above), says he will not put the Senate bill to a vote. Instead, the House leadership proposes breaking the subject of immigration reform into smaller, more digestible chunks, and voting on them as a series of free-standing measures. It is unclear whether any of these lesser bills would include a “path to citizenship” for America’s 11m-odd illegal immigrants—the centerpiece of the Senate’s effort in the eyes of many Democrats. Even if one does, a majority of Republicans in the House may well oppose it, on the grounds that it would reward people who deliberately broke the law.

That is why reform advocates tried so doggedly to drum up a big majority in the Senate. If their bill could be shown to have overwhelming bipartisan support, the argument ran, it would be hard for the House to ignore it. That thesis, in turn, is a variant on the theory that Republican congressmen, in spite of their distaste for immigration reform, might vote for it to ingratiate themselves with Latino voters. As Lindsey Graham, a Republican senator from South Carolina, pointed out this week, it will be difficult for the party to win any more presidential elections without putting the issue to rest.

But few Republican representatives (except perhaps Paul Ryan?) will ever run for president. Instead most of them will run for re-election next year, in bone-white districts where hostility to immigration reform, if not immigrants, is strong. In fact, thanks to ongoing gerrymandering, Republican districts are getting whiter even as the rest of the country gets browner. Republican representatives are in effect being asked to take a hit for the team—to offend the primary voters on whom their reelection depends for the sake of the party, or at least for the sake of Republican candidates in national and state-wide races, and in the few remaining swing seats.

For that reason, despite his bluster, Mr Boehner may yet allow the Senate bill, or a close variant on it, to come to a vote. In fact, Republicans can have their cake and eat it, allowing the bill to pass without putting their fingerprints on it. The overwhelming majority of Democrats in the House would vote in favour, so it could clear the chamber with minimal Republican support. The issue would go away, and Republicans could set about wooing Latino voters again.

That only works if the recalcitrant Republican representatives are pragmatists, who will go along with a politically convenient compromise. In fact, many of them seem genuinely offended by the prospect of “amnesty” for illegal immigrants. Others, with reason, fear that any leniency towards illegal immigration will simply cause it to increase. They want the path to citizenship completely walled off until the southern border is. The way forward for immigration reform, in short, depends on whether Republican opposition is principled or posturing. Anyone have a whip count on that?

(Picture credit: AFP)