Trying to remember: When was the last time that anything the House Rules Committee did merited any coverage at all, much less the live broadcast of one of its markups on all three cable news networks?
The word "powerful" is always attached to the Rules Committee. It does indeed have a lot of power, but it does not exercise it independently. Not since the 1970s has it operated as anything other than a tool of the Speaker. Here's how it evolved: republicans-rules.house.gov/history-rules-…
During the civil rights movement, the Rules Committee was an independent power base, from which southern chairmen kept anti-discrimination bottled up in the 1950s and early 1960s: archives.gov/exhibits/treas…
Richard Bolling, the Missouri Democrat who chaired the Rules Committee starting in 1979, championed reforms that made it more responsive to the will of the majority party: washingtonpost.com/archive/local/…
anti-discrimination *legislation*
And that's a quick Twittorial on the House Rules Committee.
And yes, if you are wondering, the Rules Committee room is as small and cramped as it appears to be on television.
