correction
A previous version of this article incorrectly referred to Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) as the House minority leader. That position is held by Rep. Hakeem Jeffries (D-N.Y.). The article also incorrectly said that the House speaker is third in line to the presidency. The speaker is second in line, after the vice president. The article has been corrected.
One of the most powerful positions in Congress is the House speaker, and without someone elected to the job, scholars say the House can’t do much.
The Constitution mentions the need for a speaker but doesn’t say much more about their duties. But over time, the role of the speaker has grown to be a vast one: They call the House to order; they allow members of Congress to deliver remarks in one-minute floor speeches; they decide whether there’s a quorum to allow business to be conducted; they decide what bills get voted on; they appoint key House staff members, such as the parliamentarian and the historian. Most recently, the past two House speakers have announced an impeachment inquiry into the sitting president.
None of that can be done by the representative sitting in place of Rep. Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.), Speaker Pro Tempore Patrick T. McHenry (R-N.C.). “His position is temporary by the very name of it,” said Ray Smock, the historian for the House of Representatives in the 1980s and ’90s.
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The search for the next House speaker
Rep. Mike Johnson (R-La.) was elected speaker Wednesday by the full House on a first vote. See how each House member voted.
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Congress firmed up the role of the temporary speaker after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks. They approved new contingency plans in case of a catastrophic event. Now, when the speaker is elected, he or she hands the House clerk a secret list of names to temporarily replace them if they have to leave office for whatever reason. (McHenry was apparently top of the list for McCarthy.) Under those rules, the temporary speaker can only preside over floor debate and voting about the election of a new speaker, said Charles Johnson, the former parliamentarian for the House during the attacks.
Everything McHenry does now is precedent-setting, because there has never been a situation like this in House history, said Matthew Green, a professor of politics at Catholic University and co-author of a book about Newt Gingrich.
McHenry appears to be playing it safe. After McCarthy was ousted by a handful of hard-right Republicans and all Democrats, one of his first acts as temporary speaker was to call a recess.
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“In the opinion of the chair, before proceeding to the election of a speaker, it would be prudent to first recess, for the relative caucus and conferences to meet and discuss the path forward,” he said, before slamming the speaker’s gavel on the dais.
On Wednesday morning, he ordered the House into another recess while Republican Party members debate among themselves about whom to nominate for speaker. “I think he’s doing the right thing” by keeping his role narrow, said Johnson, the former House parliamentarian.
One thing McHenry did do that’s getting attention: He ordered Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) out of her office in the Capitol that she had held on to from when she was speaker. In a statement to the media, Pelosi mocked McHenry for dealing with “this important matter.”
Committees can probably continue holding hearings and votes without a speaker. But if they move legislation, there’s no one to bring it to the floor.
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The speaker is also second in the line for president after the vice president. A temporary speaker does not fall in the line of succession, scholars say. So next up would be the acting president of the Senate, who is Sen. Patty Murray (D-Wash.). (Her title is technically president pro tempore, because she is performing the duties of Vice President Harris, who is the actual president of the Senate.)
There have been times in the House’s history when the chamber has gone weeks without a speaker, but those were pre-Civil War times, when the speaker was less powerful, historians say. At the turn of the 20th century, House speakers amassed power quickly. “Several speakers were called czars because they ran the House like Russian autocrats,” said Smock, the former House historian.
Their power loosened up a bit after internal revolts — including the only other attempt to oust a speaker, back in 1910.
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That 1910 effort failed. Now that a similar attempt has succeeded, even the scholars aren’t sure what’s next, especially because Republicans seem unable to come to a consensus on a new speaker. McCarthy’s situation is only the most recent and most dramatic in a growing list of House Republican speakers to effectively be booted by the party. Others were pressured to step down after tensions with hard-right members of their conference.
“We’re in uncharted waters,” Smock said. “Usually we can figure out a way to get out of things, but it’s going to be tricky getting out of this one.”
