A View from the Suburbs                                                     

Snapshots of Illinois Republicans
taken in the halls of Congress

Just as in Illinois, at the federal level power is passing from city Democrat to suburban Republican

By MADELEINE DOUBEK

It is the obvious end to a drawn-out battle over the unfunded mandates bill that passes as plank two in the platform known as the "Contract With America."

After seven days of floor debate and consideration of more than 100 Democratic amendments, Republicans, eager to put the final nail in their plank, shout their answers to a series of voice votes on the House floor as U.S. Rep. Cardiss Collins, a Chicago Democrat who is her party's floor manager for the bill, tries all she can to further stall the bill's passage and Republican success.

Making one last effort, Collins asks that the bill be moved back to the House Committee on Government Reform and Oversight. Restless Republicans raise their voices louder and yell down the maneuver. Collins leans back, raising her eyebrows as the shouts wash over her. And then, she smiles slightly. She is not totally surprised at her opponents' tenor.

Within minutes, the final tabulated voting is complete and House Speaker Newt Gingrich takes to the floor, announcing passage of the bill.

The chamber fills with applause, hoots and catcalls as the brazen young Republican majority celebrates only its second legislative victory.

And there, across the aisle from Collins, Chief Deputy Whip J. Dennis Hastert, a Yorkville Republican, is grinning broadly as Gingrich shakes his hand, pats him on the back and congratulates him for producing every single one of the 230 Republican votes.

The scene is symbolic. Just as in Illinois government, here at the federal level power passes from city Democrat to suburban Republican.

And pass it has. All over the Capitol grounds and Washington, D.C., there are snapshots that illustrate it.

Rep. Henry J. Hyde, the Bensenville Republican who controls the House Judiciary Committee, holds court in Attorney General Janet Reno's private dining room at the U.S. Justice Department.

Hyde's renowned charm is turned on for Reno and three of her deputies as they eat grapefruit during their first breakfast meeting. But it is Reno who is aiming to impress. She jots notes and tells her deputies "the chairman" has a new book about federal asset forfeiture law due out that they all must read.

The book "is an easy read, if I dare say so," a jovial Hyde says. He jokes about starring in a Justice Department book signing and chats amiably about the baseball strike and "breaking the Harvard-Yale axis" in Washington by hiring attorneys from other schools.

Rep. John E. Porter, a Wilmette Republican who represents the North Shore, is, as he calls it, "delivering a message."

He is delivering it this day to Joyce Ladner, the acting president of federally chartered Howard University, as he sits in a blue leather wing chair in his Hill office.

"Dr. Ladner, I'm worried about your university," he begins. "You have a serious problem on your hands. I have five new members on my committee. I appreciate you seeing me, but you need to see them," Porter says, quietly, but directly, warning the administrator that she should prepare for a cut in her federal funding.

It is a message this socially progressive, but fiscally conservative suburban Republican will be "delivering" a lot in the weeks and months to come. He is chairman of one of 13 appropriations subcommittees and he and his colleagues will be carving into the education, labor, and health and human services budgets.

This day's delivery to Ladner followed a two-and-a-half-hour hearing during which one witness after another perched behind the microphone to plead with Porter and his colleagues about maintaining and increasing funding levels for biomedical research for everything from

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AIDS and kidney disease to neurological science.

And each witness has a painful anecdote to share. Porter thanks them and repeatedly promises only that he and his colleagues "will do our best."

In the hearing room, a younger Danny Rostenkowski watches the proceedings from inside the gilded frame hanging on the wall

In the massive white hearing room adorned with gold stars and colossal chandeliers, a younger, trimmer Danny Rostenkowski watches the proceedings, with arms folded, from inside the gilded frame where he hangs on the wall.

His portrait is all that remains of his legendary tenure.

Now, it is a less intimidating Texas Rep. Bill Archer who guides Ways and Means. And it is Rep. Philip M. Crane of Wauconda who sits at Archer's right hand, second in command and chairman of the Trade Subcommittee.

It is Crane who sits while staffers whisper in his ear during a hearing on the Republican version of a middle-class tax credit.

It is Crane whose time is coveted by every group passing through town.

In the space of five hours. Crane buzzes back and forth between the hearing, the anteroom and his office, meeting with hospital administrators, bankers, financial advisers and international politicians.

Between chats with hospital officials and a local municipal lobbyist, Crane moves smoothly into a visit with Korea's trade ambassador, a man seeking to head the new World Trade Organization.

What does all this influence feel like after spending a career — 25 years — lost in the minority shadows?

"The frustration had really taken its toll," Crane tells a banking friend. "It's a day to exult."

Madeleine Doubek is political editor of the suburban Daily Herald. She recently spent a week on assignment in Washington, D. C.