Madigan Continues Political War With Blagojevich

February 13th, 2008 at 06:21pm Andrea Zimmermann

The feud between Gov. Rod Blagojevich and House Speaker Michael Madigan all but consumed state government last year, dragging out consideration of major initiatives from the state budget to a bailout for mass transit systems.

If action on Wednesday was any indication, when Madigan opened a new front in the political war, posturing and gridlock will continue well into this year too.

Madigan on Wednesday spread word to House committee chairs that certain bills will not advance unless they include a provision effectively pre-empting the governor’s authority to craft rules around those bills once they become law.

It was a direct assault on the governor, who in November used an “emergency” rule to sidestep the Legislature and unilaterally implement a phase of his plan for universal health care. The governor first tried to maneuver his plan through the Legislature — the conventional route for major spending initiatives — but lawmakers rejected it.

A special committee of lawmakers, who under state law have the power to review the governor’s administrative rules, rejected that “emergency” rule. The governor responded that he believed the committee’s role is merely advisory and that it did not have the power to reject his rule.

A suburban attorney filed a lawsuit challenging the governor’s decision to ignore the committee’s decision, and a court is reviewing the matter. The legal controversy is not new. Former GOP Gov. Jim Thompson argued in 1980 that the committee’s power to reject a governor’s rules is unconstitutional.

Madigan’s new strategy apparently is intended to kill the governor’s rule-making authority altogether, or at least when it comes to certain bills, by requiring such bills to cover all the details that the governor might otherwise cover in the course of an administrative rule.

A rule sought by the governor cannot conflict with the law it is linked to. If the Legislature addresses every conceivable detail in the actual bill, there would be nothing left for the governor to address with a rule.

The governor’s rule-making authority would be effectively neutralized.

Madigan spokesman Steve Brown said all “appropriate” bills must now include an amendment requiring lawmakers to include details that have been traditionally left for the purview of the governor’s rules.

“Our interest is to help (the administration) implement their policies, and so bills that would require rules, we will amend them so that’s prohibited,” he told me. “It will spell everything out in the legislation.”

He added, “The administration wishes those to all be in the law, and that’s what these amendments will require the agencies to do.”

But will Madigan succeed in implementing his new strategy, thereby prompting wholesale change in how Illinois laws are made, or will he succeed only in aggravating the governor?

It’s not clear. Senate President Emil Jones Jr., a Chicago Democrat like Blagojevich and Madigan, sided with the governor during last year’s protracted battle of wills. If Jones continues to watch Blagojevich’s back this year, it’s unlikely the Senate will sign off on bills stuffed with all the additional language Madigan intends to stuff them with.

If Jones balks at Madigan’s strategy and the speaker refuses to budge, there will be more gridlock at the Capitol.

The development came the same day lawmakers returned to Springfield after a month-long break. Committee hearings were thrown into flux as legislators tried to figure out what this meant to bills already drafted and ready for a vote.

In Illinois, laws are built on three levels. The state Constitution is the foundation and basic framework. Statutes approved by the Legislature speak to the details left out of the Constitution. And rules implemented by the governor speak to the details left out of statutes. Through rules, the governor’s agencies implement law.

Madigan’s strategy would effectively morph certain bills to cover the nuance typically covered in rules. This, in effect, would make bills much, much longer. And, amid gridlock on top of gridlock, the lawmaking process would become even more convoluted.

Entry Filed under: Emil Jones, Michael Madigan, House of Representatives, Rod Blagojevich, Illinois politics