Speaker Tom Craddick got by with a little help from some old friends who reaped the spoils of victory after years in the valley, but nobody flexed muscles like Gov. Rick Perry in 2003.	State Representative Phil King knew he had come a long way from his old job as justice of the peace when he negotiated a map for Congress that could put several Democrats out of business.

December 29, 2003

Republicans Take Command in the Texas House and Senate
as Capitol Inside Unveils First Power Rankings for Legislature

By Mike Hailey
Capitol Inside Editor

Jane Nelson was happy to have her best session ever as a major Senate power

John Whitmire came up with his own exit strategy and left Texas 10 in New Mexico

Leticia Van de Putte went from inside player to rebel leader to fight GOP remap

Todd Staples and other senators knew Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst would back them up

Two things appear obvious as the Texas political world spins from the old year into the new. Republicans have an agenda and they plan to push it through the Legislature while they're in command. In a House that's more unpredictable and harder to manage, GOP leaders have decided that the most efficient way to do that is concentrate almost all of the power in the hands of the few who can be trusted to get the job done exactly as prescribed. Democrats did the same thing to a large degree they ran they shop. The difference is Democrats took their power for granted because they'd always had it - and that made it seem less threatening when a Republican like Bill Ratliff or Teel Bivins came along and earned a spot on the starting team. Republicans are far more guarded about the power they now hold - and after spending so much time and money trying to get it - they are not as inclined to share it as much as the previous owners.

There were several ways to become a major power player at the Texas Capitol in 2003 - the year the Republicans took over the west wing and came within a new Congressional map of clearing the monopoly game board. If you were a member of a Texas House that was controlled by the GOP for the first time in more than 130 years, a) you could be one of Tom Craddick's old friends and top allies and be fairly confident of landing a leading role or b) you could have endorsed Craddick for House Speaker immediately after the general election avalanche the year before and then hope for a decent supporting part or c) you could be a Democrat who might have voted for Craddick after refusing a seat on the bandwagon or d) you could be Lon Burnam, the Fort Worth Democrat who cast the only official vote against the Midland Republican who would be speaker a few minutes later. If you fell into the third category, you would quickly be reminded what it's like not chairing a committee while you tried to get psyched up for your new role as a member of the loyal opposition. If you were Burnam, you could say you made history. But that's about it. But if you had an R by your name, and you had persevered for ages in the desolate valley alongside the new speaker without sacrificing a penny's worth of allegiance to the principals that conservative Republicans hold dear, then you had finally reached the promise land.

In the Senate, your potential path to power would depend less on who you knew at the outset and more on what you could do to help the new Lieutenant Governor, David Dewhurst, do the best job he could do as a relatively inexperienced political leader taking charge of the upper chamber for the very first time. There was no established inner circle of Dewhurst confidants who'd already yelled shotgun to get first call on the best jobs when the guard changed and the power was reshuffled. In the House, opponents from the past were treated as such. In the Senate, everyone started with a blank slate - more or less - including the senator who handed the gavel over to Dewhurst and returned to his desk on the floor without being punished for giving the new presiding officer the cold shoulder when he was a candidate for the job the year before. That, of course, was Ratliff, who would have been ranked second or third in the first ever Capitol Inside Texas Senate Power Rankings if he had not induced his own fall from the new leader's good graces and thrown in the towel by the end of the year.

The second or third most powerful Senate member - Senator Bivins - arrived in the freshmen class the same year as Ratliff - and the two men took similar paths at comparable paces to the chamber's highest levels of power over their 14-year careers. Bivins is also turning his keys over in January so he can be prepared to hit the ground running in Sweden when he starts work as an American ambassador - courtesy of President George W. Bush's nomination to the diplomacy gig. Having already submitted their letters of resignation and sparked special election contests for their seats in Northeast Texas and West Texas, respectively, the two lions failed to qualify for slots on the power chart for 2003. But they have been replaced by tigers who have been paying their dues for most of the past decade and will not be shy about stepping into the void of power at the top and making it their home for a while. The order of the Senate Power Rankings will change after Dewhurst replaces Ratliff and Bivins with new chairs on the State Affairs and Finance committees respectively. When you take your first look at the Senate Power Rankings below, you will marvel to yourself how quickly time flies.

The Power Rankings measure how much clout a representative or senator enjoyed during the past calendar year by virtue of their committee assignments, appointments to agency boards and commissions, political party caucus posts and the roles they had in the process of moving major legislation through the Capitol mill. Anyone with a key role in Congressional redistricting cashed in on the power points before the year was all said and done. Authors and sponsors and many of the members who chaired the committees that kicked out the major pieces of legislation - homeowners' insurance reform, medical malpractice liability and tort reform, the state budget, and of course, the Congressional remap - are ranked high on the list. The 10 most powerful House members for the year goneby include two Democrats who played key roles on the starting GOP team in 2003. Three Democrats are ranked in the Senate top ten for all together different reasons than their high-ranking counterparts in the House.

In an effort to keep subjective appraisal to a minimum, Capitol Inside assigned a value to standing committee chairs and vice-chairs, select interim studies, agency appointments, major bills and other special circumstances that we felt had to be considered to get to the truth about who's really running the show under the pink granite dome. For example, you get four additional points if you organized an out-of-state walkout to break a quorum to drag out the fight on redistricting. Because of extraordinary circumstances like that, some legislators on this year's list might not be in position to rank as high next time around. The top player on each list is a no brainer - it's the guy who's in charge. There are some on the lists you'd expect and a few others you might not have been able to even imagine up until now. Between them they share a colossal amount of influence and stroke over the direction state government is taking and the roads down which it will go.