Making Sausage

An interesting look into the world of legislating: In the Wee Hours, Votes Change as Arms Twist. For example:

Shortly after 2 o'clock this morning, with so many Republicans defecting that the Medicare prescription drug bill seemed headed for defeat, Representative Jo Ann Emerson found herself in a showdown on the House floor with some of the most powerful men in Washington.

Mrs. Emerson, a Missouri Republican, voted no, objecting to a provision in the legislation that would make it difficult for people to import drugs from Canada. The House Republican leadership, including Speaker J. Dennis Hastert, surrounded her, asking what it would take to change her vote. She pulled a slip of paper from her purse, pointed to the six-line provision highlighted in yellow and replied: "Take it out."

The provision was not removed. But in explaining today how she voted, Mrs. Emerson said that the leaders promised to strip it out at a conference with the Senate, and to schedule a separate House vote on her bill that would allow prescription drugs to be imported. So by 2:30 a.m., she had switched her no vote to yes.

Mrs. Emerson's last-minute reversal was one of several twists that, in the end, delivered victory to the Republicans by a razor-thin majority. The 216-to-215 vote to give elderly people some relief from the high costs of prescription drugs came after a day of arm-twisting and cajoling — not only by the House leadership but also by officials at the highest levels of the Bush administration, including Vice President Dick Cheney and Secretary Tommy Thompson of health and human services.

Mr. Thompson stayed in the Capitol until the last vote was counted, and for Republicans, the Herculean lobbying effort was necessary. So tenuous was the situation that the leadership was forced to extend the customary 15-minute voting period to more than 50 minutes in order to round up the necessary votes.