WASHINGTON -- Tomorrow it begins, the takeover of Capitol Hill by a Republican-led Congress hellbent on making a skeptical nation feel good about government by delivering on its promises.
"We were elected to keep our word. We will keep our word. We have already begun," said Newt Gingrich of Georgia, poised to ascend the rostrum tomorrow as the first Republican speaker of the House in two generations.
In a pep talk to his House colleagues last month, Mr. Gingrich declared, "The deeper point for the American people is: The changes are going to be real, they're going to be substantive . . . they're going to make a difference in the government and a difference in your lives."
Immediately after Mr. Gingrich and new Senate Majority Leader Bob Dole of Kansas officially take their posts tomorrow, the Republicans will plunge into their ambitious agenda for the first 100 days promised during the fall election campaign.
Taking the lead will be the House, where nearly all the GOP members signed a "Contract with America," pledging to bring a package of tax cuts, welfare reform, regulatory relief, new limits on lawsuits and government reforms to a vote during that 3 1/2 -month period.
The contract, just the first phase of the Republicans' broader scheme for reshaping the federal government, will keep the lawmakers working nearly nonstop until Easter, forsaking the generous winter breaks that contributed to an image of congressional laziness.
Senate Republicans made a less-sweeping commitment before the election to work for the passage of many of the same items.
But post-election GOP fervor for meeting the terms of the contract, which many in the party insist provided the underpinning for their stunning triumph, is now driving the agenda in both chambers.
Even so, the task is daunting.
Some elements of the contract may not even pass the House, where the Republicans have a slender majority of 230 to 204.
Getting them through the Senate, where the GOP has only 54 of the 60 votes it would need to stop a filibuster, will be a more difficult matter.
"I think there's going to be some reality set in," said Mr. Dole,
who also served as majority leader in the mid-1980s.
"The House can move much more quickly than we can," he noted during an interview last week.
"I assume the Democrats here have determined they only need 41 votes to hold things up," he said, with typical wry humor.
The resistance of some Republicans to a few contract items -- such as congressional term limits -- may also be a problem in the Senate.
"It seems to me the real story this year is not going to be the conflict between the Republicans and the Democrats or the Congress and the White House, but between the House and the Senate," said Rep.-elect Robert L. Ehrlich Jr., a freshman Republican from Baltimore County.
Gingrich's power
In the House, Mr. Gingrich has consolidated so much authority in his office, historians say, he could well become the most powerful speaker since Republican Joseph G. Cannon, who held the post from 1903 to 1911.
Unlike recent predecessors, Mr. Gingrich oversees all committee assignments and patronage jobs.
He has also weakened committee control of legislation.
"But the Senate," Mr. Ehrlich observed, "is 100 independent power centers."
Democrats are already predicting that Republicans will achieve little more than cosmetic changes that will have no impact on the economic issues that concern most voters.
"Their 'Contract [with] America,' whether you like it or hate it, is all slogans and hot buttons, without so much as a wink or nod about real jobs or real opportunities," said Rep. Richard A. Gephardt, the Missouri Democrat who slips from from majority leader to minority leader.
"The Republicans should enjoy their majority while they have it -- because in two short years, it'll be gone," Mr. Gephardt asserted in a recent speech.
Democratic strategy
Mr. Gephardt and Thomas A. Daschle, the South Dakota Democrat who takes over tomorrow as Senate minority leader, are moving toward a strategy of forcing Republicans to spell out how they would cut spending in order to eliminate the budget deficit by 2002.
That's the deadline promised in their proposed balanced budget amendment to the Constitution.
"We think it's very important for people to know what the consequences would be before the amendment passes," Mr. Daschle said in an interview. "We think it's up to them to be specific."
Mr. Daschle said his party has a responsibility to block the Republicans if they try to take action that is "extreme."
But Democrats in the House and the Senate and the Clinton White House all appear confused about exactly how to respond to the Republican steamroller. Mr. Dole observed that Mr. Gephardt's decision last month to upstage the president's tax cut proposal by announcing his own similar plan two days earlier is a clear sign of "disarray."
Rep. Dick Armey of Texas, who started planning eight months ago for a transfer of power the Democrats considered unthinkable until election night, figures the Democrats are still in a "bad mood" and will come to realize that obstruction will damage them politically.
Mr. Armey, the new House majority leader, said in an interview that the contract was deliberately fashioned so that it did not promise more than the Republicans believe they can deliver.
"It's an enormous undertaking. I won't underestimate it in the least," he said. "But politics gives you a chance to be two things: a pleasant surprise or a bitter disappointment. We have no intention of letting the Republican majority be a bitter disappointment."
Not since the days of Speaker Cannon has a Congress convened with such a clear and self-generated agenda, said James A. Thurber, director of the Center for Congressional and Presidential Studies at American University. "And in those days everything was done in the back rooms," Mr. Thurber added.
Tomorrow's votes
The House is scheduled to begin work tomorrow at what -- for Congress -- is blinding speed, with votes scheduled on eight changes in congressional procedures that have already been approved by the Republican caucus.
The changes include slashing the size of committee staffs by one-third, limiting terms of committee chairmen and requiring a three-fifths vote -- instead of a simple majority -- to raise personal and corporate taxes.
Mr. Armey warned that the first day could stretch into the night if the Democrats put up a fight on any of the issues, such as a controversial plan to eliminate funds for congressional organizations such as the Black Caucus or Women's Caucus.
More sweeping changes promised in the contract are to come up over the next 3 1/2 months as they emerge from House committees.
Among the first to be considered will be the balanced budget amendment, which Mr. Gingrich has scheduled for a vote on Jan. 19.
In response to Democratic criticism, House GOP leaders have also promised to take up by the end of February an unusual procedure for voting on spending reductions needed to offset the $200 billion in tax cuts promised in the contract. The Republicans say those cuts will be made before any votes on tax cuts.
In the Senate, where Republicans must win agreement from the Democrats on a schedule for action, Mr. Dole has no intention of trying to match the House stride for stride. He says he hopes for just one speedy vote this week -- on a proposal, also to be considered in the House, that would bring Congress under the same personnel and safety laws imposed on private businesses.
Mr. Dole will also try to bring up quickly a measure sought by governors to prohibit the federal government from requiring states to take costly actions without providing them the necessary funds.
Further, the Republican leader wants to move soon on several items in the GOP contract, including the balanced budget amendment; a revision of last year's crime bill to eliminate $5 billion for rehabilitation programs and tighten some penalty provisions; and a proposal to give the president the power to veto individual items in a spending bill.
Republican leaders in both chambers are determined to try to avoid potentially divisive battles over social issues such as abortion, school prayer and gun control for at least the first six months.
"I'd like to be able to get up at the end of six months and say, 'Here's our report card. Here's what we've been able to do,' and tick off some of these things," Mr. Dole said. "The last thing we need, I think, is to get tied up early on something that drags on for weeks."
Republicans say they are keenly aware that the stakes involved in their performance over the next few months are very high.
'Put up or shut up'
"The American people have given the Republicans an extraordinary opportunity, and this is put up or shut up time," said Kenneth M. Duberstein, a White House chief of staff under former President Ronald Reagan. "The election was not an endorsement of the Republican party, but a repudiation of Bill Clinton and the Democrats in Congress. . . . Either the Republicans deliver or the control of Congress will be a revolving door."
Beyond the success or failure of their program, Republicans feel they have an additional burden to demonstrate to the increasingly cynical American people that at least some politicians can be trusted.
"We feel we've got the weight of America's faith in government on our shoulders," said Ed Gillispie, a spokesman for the House Republican Conference, referring particularly to the 73 GOP freshmen. "That's no exaggeration. It's almost palpable."
Even so, the extraordinary nature of this week's events -- highly organized Republicans taking control of Congress for the first time in 40 years in the middle of the first term of a Democratic president -- clearly calls for a celebration, Republicans say, and they are fashioning something like an inauguration.
Instead of the usual opening day of speeches and small private gatherings, they are planning two days of parties and a large public reception. Mr. Gingrich and Mr. Dole will outline their plans in what are being billed as major addresses. Also planned is a day of family activities to punctuate the theme of a family-friendly Congress.
The Republican National Committee, with new stationery featuring the Capitol on its letterhead, is planning additional inauguration festivities next month as a fund-raising enterprise.
"I'm very excited," said Rep. Constance A. Morella, a Montgomery County Republican who will take over this week as chairman of a Science subcommittee. "After eight years in the state legislature and eight years in Congress, I'm finally going to get my own subcommittee. It's excellent."
Rep. Wayne T. Gilchrest, a third-term Republican from Maryland's Eastern Shore, also advances with the GOP takeover. He will chair a Transportation subcommittee.
For Democrats in the Maryland delegation, though, most of whom are losing leadership positions, the prospect of life in the minority is pretty grim.
"I'm not optimistic at all," said Rep. Benjamin A. Cardin, a Baltimore Democrat who believes House Republicans will shut the Democrats out of policy-making, just as the Democrats did to them for decades. "I'm going to have to learn all the parliamentary tactics for being obstructionist, but I don't think Democrats are going to be as good at that as the Republicans were."
OTHERS TO WATCH
HOUSE
Robert L. Livingston Jr., R-La.: Chairman, Appropriations Committee. Wants increased scrutiny for government spending. Says he favors leaner, not meaner government.
Jim Leach, R-Iowa: Chairman, Banking and Financial Services (formerly Banking, Finance and Urban Affairs) Committee. A prominent Whitewater critic. Expected to join Sen. Alfonse M. D'Amato, R-N.Y., in holding new hearings into the matter.
Thomas J. Bliley Jr., R-Va.: Chairman, Commerce Committee (formerly Energy and Commerce). Friend of tobacco industry. Takes over a panel that had provided a high-profile forum for anti-smoking crusaders.
Floyd D. Spence, R-S.C.: Chairman, National Security Committee formerly Armed Services). A Navy veteran. Expected to press for the increases in defense spending spelled out in the "Contract with America."
SENATE Phil Gramm, R-Texas: No formal leadership role, but an influential voice on budget and tax matters. A likely presidential candidate. Will compete with Mr. Dole for the Senate spotlight and perhaps make it hard for him to compromise with Democrats.
Jesse Helms, R-N.C.: Chairman, Foreign Relations Committee. An outspoken opponent of foreign aid and President Clinton's foreign policy, especially the Middle East peace talks with Syria.
Alfonse M. D'Amato, R-N.Y.: Chairman, Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs Committee. The most vocal critic of Mr. Clinton on Whitewater now leads a committee conducting a congressional inquiry into the matter.
Orrin G. Hatch, R-Utah: Chairman, Judiciary Committee. Will lead hearings on constitutionality of school prayer and term limits. Big say in confirmation of federal judges and Supreme Court justices.
@TENTATIVE ASSIGNMENTS
These are tentative committee assignments for members of the Maryland congressional delegation:
SENATE Paul S. Sarbanes, Democrat: Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs; Budget; Foreign Relations; Joint Economic.
Barbara A. Mikulski, Democrat: Appropriations; Ethics; Labor and Human Resources.
HOUSE Wayne T. Gilchrest, R-1st: Resources (formerly Natural Resources); Transportation and Infrastructure (formerly Public Works and Transportation); chairs Transportation subcommittee on public buildings and economic development.
Robert L. Ehrlich Jr., R-2nd: Banking and Financial Services; Government Reform and Oversight.
Benjamin L. Cardin, D-3rd: Ways and Means, Standards of Official Conduct.
Albert R. Wynn, D-4th: International Relations; Banking and Financial Services.
Steny H. Hoyer, D-5th: Appropriations; chairman, Democratic Steering Committee.
Roscoe G. Bartlett, R-6th: National Security (formerly Armed Services); Science (formerly Science, Space and Technology); Small Business.
Kweisi Mfume, D-7th: Banking and Financial Services; Joint Economic; Small Business.
Constance A. Morella, R-8th: Government Reform and Oversight; Science (formerly Science, Space and Technology); chairs Science subcommittee on technology.