Are the speakers of the Rhode Island House dictatorial wolves concealed underneath a democratic sheep skin?

Are the speakers of the Rhode Island House dictatorial wolves concealed underneath a democratic sheep skin? 

That may sound like an overly alarmist question; however, the truth is that the way the House of Representatives functions behind closed doors is not that far from a dictatorial approach. According to an article in Providence Journal, the number of times the Speaker in Rhode Island House loses a vote is close to zero, and it is not a mere coincidence (1). At the most recent event of Demystifying Democracy at Common Cause Rhode Island, four representatives of different districts in Rhode Island spoke up about the issue and of their concerns. Although the direction of the conversation frequently sidetracked, the main intention of the representatives was to address the problem of the House Speaker’s absolute power in terms of the flow of legislation. 

They emphasized that a main cause of this invincible power is the rules of the House themselves. These rules are passed every two years and they dictate the smallest of issues to the most crucial ones in the House. The representatives called to attention that it is exactly these rules that give the Speaker of the House too much power and control. According to an article in the Providence Phoenix, one of these rules says that “The Speaker, or the Speaker’s designee, shall prepare the floor calendar for each legislative day.” (2) In other words, amongst all the bills that are introduced, the House Speaker gets to choose which of them can make it to the floor to be voted on. Unsurprisingly, all the ones that make it to the floor always pass. 

The rule that the Speaker could decide which bills to be voted on is very problematic as it allows him to have everything in his favor: the bills he does not like will basically never get passed because he will never choose to allow it to make it to the floor. Therefore, it might make sense that a good first step to diminish the House Speaker’s total control is altering the House Rules. I believe every bill that is introduced should have a chance to be brought to the floor and be discussed. If that is too idealistic, then at least the Representatives should have a say in whether a bill should be voted on. This way, there would not be many bills constantly left out of discussion just because the Speaker does not want to pass it. 

Now, a question might be asked: can’t the representatives just unite and together vote against the House Speaker? However, at this point and time, the legislators feel so powerless against the House Speaker that sometimes they vote differently from what they think is correct: that is of most utmost concern. A Speaker in the past had even reassigned three representatives solely for the reason that they voted against what the Speaker had in mind (2). With their career at stake, the representatives often feel they have no choice but to vote with the Speaker. This is not a real democracy as the representatives are not doing their job of representing the people; instead, they are simply representing the House Speaker over and over again. It is truly a dictatorial system that is pretending to be democratic.

 It is worth noting that the House Speaker is not voted by the general population of Rhode Island: he is voted by an electorate of 75 people (2). Once the House Speaker is voted in, he is considered one of the most powerful politicians in Rhode Island. Shouldn’t the choosing of a person of such immense power and control of how the state of Rhode Island functions undergo the decision of the general population?

The problem of the decisive power of the Rhode Island House Speaker was supposed to be the center of concern and conversation during the Demystifying Democracy event. Before walking into the event however, I had no idea what the event was going to be about as Common Cause’s website did not specify the topic at all. I was handed a few printed articles as I walked in, but I had no time to read through the articles carefully since the event began almost immediately. This led to a period of confusion of what the representatives on the stage were talking about. Also, curiously, when the audience had a chance to ask the representatives questions at the end of the event, their questions were mostly unrelated to the main topic and seemed more like different individual concerns.I believe if the Common Cause website could introduce the topic on their website prior to the event or included links to the articles handed out at the event so that people could inform themselves before going, the event would have been much more efficient and informative. I had never been to a local political event as such, and in the past I was never really interested due to a lack of knowledge about political systems or processes. The topic of this event intrigued me as I was not aware of how dictatorial the House of Representatives is behind the scenes. I think more people of Rhode Island state should come to awareness about this and end the false democracy as soon as possible.