Texas Insider
Published: 02-14-09
In a short House session today freshmen members were advised to attend meetings on House rules and Representative Straus took the podium with relatively little fanfare.
Some controversy arose however over the recent activity in the Senate. This activity would effectively eliminate the two-thirds rule when the Senate addresses the issues of redistricting and voter ID.
Waco Rep. Jim Dunnam pointedly expressed his feelings that if the Senate thinks two issues should be treated differently then the House should do the same. He scoffed at the notion of voter ID and redistricting being the two most important issues among the thousand others to be discussed this session.
Dunnam then asked Rep. Solomons if the general membership could adopt a 3/5 voting rule on certain issues. Solomons said a majority of representatives could adopt that rule anytime.
It was Rep. Geren however who got the last laugh in the House as he was given the floor following Dunnam. Geren asked the group “Why do we care what the Senate does anyway?” His comment was followed by laughter and mild applause.
