The education of John Boehner

It may have looked like chaos at times, but House Speaker John Boehner got what he wanted from a five-day debate on a bill that would cut $61 billion from this year's budget and set up a showdown with President Barack Obama and Majority Leader Harry Reid in the two weeks before the government runs out of money March 4.

The new speaker turned loose his legion of tea-party freshmen for an epic spending fight and gave Republicans free rein to go after all aspects of government operations. The new GOP majority responded by targeting dozens of federal programs for cuts, including Planned Parenthood, the new health care law, and even an engine for the military's Joint Strike Fighter that benefits Boehner's home region in Ohio. Democrats joined in the action, too, with members of both parties combining to write 583 amendments.

It wasn't pretty, it wasn't on schedule and it wasn't the least bit predictable.

But it was pure Boehner.

Long before he took the reins of the House Jan. 5, Boehner began promising that he would bring the House back to its more freewheeling roots. Over five days, there was confusion — even mayhem — on the floor as freshmen learned the legislative process and veterans dusted off their debating skills. Republicans were divided at moments and factions emerged on some amendments — like one that would cut $22 billion more than GOP leaders wanted.

"I'm proud of this moment," a relaxed and confident Boehner said late Friday. "This is diving off the 50-foot diving board your first dive."

Of course, this could all backfire down the road on other issues if GOP factions break away or freshmen take their taste of freedom too far and kill a bill, embarrassing a party that's trying to project an image of unity to the American public.

But Boehner insists that the experience would prove a boon for his 87 freshmen, more than 40 of whom have never served in public office before.

"Allowing them to participate in this will speed up their development as legislators," Boehner said late Friday night, holding court with a handful of reporters just outside the House chamber. "Just putting together an amendment that is in order, as a freshman, that's a pretty difficult task to get through."

The Ohio Republican described this past week as the opening act in a drive to decentralize power in the House, to shift it from the speaker's office and leadership after decades of creeping control of the chamber in fewer hands.

"We'll continue to feel our way through, but I'm committed to as open a process as we can have while considering we have 435 members, and we have to do our business," Boehner said.

Even some veteran Democrats praised what was the most open and sprawling floor fight the House had seen in years.

"After as little openness as we've had, it's a very big change. It's refreshing, and I think it's a good thing," said Rep. John Dingell (D-Mich.), the dean of the House and a member of Congress since 1955. "We'll see whether the members like it."

The debate dragged on for more than four days, surprising even Boehner, who had promised a more open and inclusive House when he took the speaker's gavel from Democrat Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.). There were dozens of votes — more than 80 by Friday night with more to come, including final passage of the legislation in the pre-dawn hours Saturday.

After all that, the bill isn't expected to ever become law, thanks to opposition from Obama and Reid (D-Nev).

But to Boehner, that wasn't the point.

"There's no example of the people's House better than what we've seen the last few days," Boehner declared in his impromptu, 20-minute press conference.

"If we're able to continue with as open a process as we can have, it will drive major change throughout the institution. Driving work back into the committees, members working together. We're still going to have our debates, but I would argue that an open process that respects the work of committees, you'll see more members working together across the aisle, and you'll see healthier debates out here."

Boehner refused to declare what his intentions were if the Senate, as expected, declines to take up the House-approved funding resolution. Without a new funding measure, the federal government will shut down on March 4. Congress is adjourning for the weeklong Presidents Day recess as soon as the House completes work on the continuing resolution, and both sides have upped the partisan rhetoric over who would be responsible for such a shutdown. Boehner expressed no concern over the tight deadline during Friday's session with reporters.

"You'll know soon enough," Boehner said.

But Boehner said the "only people talking about a shutdown are Harry Reid and Nancy Pelosi."

Pelosi introduced a resolution Friday to keep the government open at current funding levels through March 31, POLITICO reported.

As much as anything, the wide-open consideration of this spending bill reflected the institutional values of Boehner, who is delivering on a promise to restructure the House to favor spending cuts, empower the rank and file rather than party leaders to drive policy, and give the public clearer insight into the priorities of their elected officials.

It also will help Boehner build up political chits with his junior lawmakers and earn their trust, something critical in dealing with the mammoth tea party inspired freshman class. By giving more freedom to anxious Republicans to push these amendments, Boehner may be able to go to these lawmakers down the road and cajole a vote from them when it's really time to compromise, the kind of horsetrading that the Ohio Republican has learned to do well during his time in the House.

"It was just watching 20 years of watching leaders tighten down the process, tighten down the process, tighten down the process, trying to reconfigure all the rules in order for them to pass the leaders' agenda," Boehner said. "That is not my job."

Boehner also opined it wasn't his job to run the House with a tight fist, after the leadership style of Pelosi or his GOP predecessors, Speaker Dennis Hastert of Illinois and Newt Gingrich of Georgia.

"My job is to kind of look out over the horizon, make sure we know where we're going, make sure the team is working together," Boehner said.

Not everyone loved the outcome: Pelosi and other top Democrats say the cuts envisioned by Boehner and his House Republican allies would cripple services that are important to the powerless in American society and hamper the nation's economic recovery.

One Republican, Rep. Steve King of Iowa, was furious that his leadership wouldn't grant him a waiver to offer an out-of-order amendment that would have annihilated all elements of the health care law. He enlisted Gingrich's help in lobbying GOP leaders for a break that they were unwilling to grant. Gingrich later backed off in his support for King, following complaints from Boehner's office, Republican insiders said.

The tension between fostering an open process, a Boehner priority, and keeping the House on a tight schedule, the domain of House Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-Va.), could become a point of contention between the top two GOP leaders.

"I think everyone recognized that allowing all the members to go through this exercise, this debate, was more important than hitting some time schedule, Boehner said.

Since he was booted from leadership following the 1998 election, Boehner's strength has been his ability to map out a strategy and methodically execute it. He slowly built a a new reputation as a legislator, empowered during the early days of George W. Bush's administration to shepherd the education law known as No Child Left Behind and later as the pivotal player in rewriting pension laws.

During the rise of former House Majority Leader Tom DeLay (R-Texas), the man who forced Boehner off the leadership ladder, the Ohio Republican constructed a base of friends and allies who also chafed under DeLay's authoritarian rule.

For years, Boehner studied the institution and the ways in which its power could be decentralized. He was steady when another set of GOP leaders overreached, exercising levels of authority that frustrated the goals of their own members and of then-minority Democrats. As minority leader in the last Congress, Boehner developed and held firm to the message that Democratic leaders were ignoring joblessness and exploding deficits in the interest of promoting an ideological agenda.

Fellow Republicans quietly mocked his "Where are the jobs?" mantra as insufficient. But as the unemployment continued at its high levels, Boehner's message started to resonate with the rank and file.

Now, having been empowered to implement his own vision for running the House, Boehner is leading on the theory that both the nation, his party and his own fortunes will prosper if the House is allowed, for the most part, to work its will.

"I have a vision for what I think the role of the federal government should or shouldn't be, and I can exercise that role in terms of what comes to the floor," he said. "Once it comes to the floor, the members ought to be able to have that debate, make those decisions on their own. It's not about achieving my will."