Republicans backed away from their ethics gambit, but as Ryan made clear, they are intent on acting swiftly on an ambitious policy agenda to dismantle key parts of the Obama presidency and replace them with long-sought conservative reforms. “We have a lot to do—and a lot to undo,” House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy wrote in a message to lawmakers over the weekend. GOP leaders plan to devote the next two weeks to teeing up legislation that Trump can sign in his first weeks in office. The House will vote this week on bills to prevent Obama from issuing a slew of new regulations on his way out of office and to ensure Congress has a say in major new regulations going forward. The first day in the Senate brought the introduction of a budget resolution that will lay the groundwork for repealing core pieces of the Affordable Care Act. The two chambers hope to send the actual repeal bill—sans an Obamacare replacement—to Trump’s desk in the next month or so.

“The people have given us unified government,” Ryan said in his call-to-arms opening address. “And it wasn’t because they were feeling generous. It’s because they wanted results. How could we live with ourselves if we let them down? How could we let ourselves down?”

If Republicans are feeling pressure to deliver results for their voters, so too are Democrats under pressure to deliver a fight for theirs. The beginning of a new Congress usually brings a brief respite from the usual partisanship. Young children clog the Capitol halls as lawmakers bring their families to their swearing-in, the two chambers gavel in with rituals of pomp and circumstance, and newly-elected members learn the way to their offices (and to the bathrooms).

But on this opening day, Democrats in both the House and the Senate were digging in for battle. In a mini-protest of Republican rules designed to punish actual member protests, Democratic House members embellished their speaker votes for Nancy Pelosi by adding the preamble, “Because the people’s House should be ethical, accountable, and open to free debate...” During her ceremonial introduction of Ryan upon his election as speaker, Pelosi digressed to warn Republicans that if they tried to repeal the Affordable Care Act, cut Medicare, or otherwise roll back Obama’s legacy, “Democrats will stand our ground.” And in the Senate, the new Democratic leader, Charles Schumer of New York, used his own opening remarks to warn both Trump and the Republican majorities that Democrats would hold them accountable across the full range of promises that they made during the campaign. “We will hold Trump accountable to the values that truly make America great,” Schumer said. “But we’ll fight him tooth and nail when he appeals to the baser instincts that diminish America and its greatness—instincts that have too often plagued this country and his campaign.”