Texas Monthly Talks

Pete Laney

… on being a Democrat (but not Speaker).

Interview by Evan Smith

April 2006

(Page 2 of 2)

You understand, surely, that an awful lot of Republicans peg the breakdown of relations between the Democrats and the Republicans to the decision of the D’s to go to Ardmore. They say you should have stayed here like men and women and fought.
We used the only alternative we had left to fight. It was the only shot left in our arsenal.

Nonetheless, the Republicans say—
“We’re in the majority and we can dictate whatever.” I think the relationship had already been established when the new members came in. A lot of these people won in very partisan campaigns.

The die was already cast.
And a lot of Republicans would be amazed at the number of calls that all of us got on our cell phones from Republican members on the House floor thanking us for doing what we were doing. A certain number of those members were hurt by redistricting, but they thought they needed to do it for the cause.

It’s also said that the problem of the two parties getting along these days is that the “Pete Laney conservative Democrat” is an endangered species, that Democrats in office today tend to lean more to the left, that there aren’t many folks in your party who could conceivably cross party lines and get along.
The same thing is happening on the other side. It’s gotten to the point where they say, “Why should we even consider brokering a deal? We’re in the majority.”

So the problem is unwillingness on the part of the Republicans to work with you? Because you hear them saying all the time, “It’s the Democrats who are the problem. They won’t work with us.”
There’s a difference between working together and succumbing.

One of the reasons that there aren’t that many conservative Democrats in the House is that they’ve switched parties.
I think that happens. Maybe it looks like it’s easier to win campaigning with a Republican philosophy.

Let me ask you a variation of my earlier question: Did they leave their party, or did their party leave them?
The only reason that a party leaves you is because you let it. It’s like being on the playground with the bully beating you up every morning. If you hold your hands behind your back and don’t ever say anything, you’re going to get beat up worse. If you work with him, work with the bully, you might make a decent person out of him. The course of least resistance is why they chose to switch parties.

You never switched parties. Did you ever think about it?
Nope. Did not.

Even though you’re quite a bit more conservative than a lot of Democrats.
I’m more conservative than a lot of Republicans.

Then why not switch?
Because there are a lot more people in the Democratic party who do what the Good Book says: Take care of the poor and the afflicted and the downtrodden. I took flak from some of my Republican colleagues for working with the mentally ill, for working with some of the underprivileged from the Children’s Health Insurance Program. That’s not liberal; that’s trying to use the assets of the state to produce the best economics you can. That’s to keep you from getting sick, to take care of the mentally ill so they don’t have to be institutionalized, to try to have an education program that educates people to be good taxpaying citizens rather than uneducated people who end up in our penal system and cost us $25,000 or $35,000 a year to take care of. I think all of those things—education, mental health, things like that—are conservative rather than liberal.

Remember what former lieutenant governor Bill Ratliff once said about why he’s a Republican? Because he agrees with the Republican party 51 percent of the time.
And that caught him a lot of flak, because they want 100 percent.

The Democratic party is any different?
I have never been criticized by the Democratic party for my philosophy or my beliefs. I’ve been criticized by some members of the party for some of the things I’ve accomplished or not accomplished or tried to accomplish. But a majority of them tolerate a lot of flexibility in what we think and believe.

On the subject of flexibility: You introduced Governor Bush to the nation after the drawn-out resolution of the 2000 presidential election. Do you still support him?
He’s still a friend.

But do you support him?
Our personal relationship is a lot different from our political relationship. I have no problem with him personally. Politically, some of the things I would say to him he would probably not want to hear. I don’t know whether his philosophy has changed or the atmosphere has changed. I think that when he was the governor of Texas, he had some input he hasn’t had in Washington; he had somebody who said “This won’t work” pretty close to every day.

How are things with you and Governor Rick Perry? On paper you all ought to get along. Until he became a Republican, you were both conservative rural Democrats from the same part of the state, and you both care a lot about agricultural issues. But your relationship with this governor seems to be a far sight worse than your relationship with the previous governor.
It’s a lot different. He told me one time that the reason he didn’t support me for Speaker was because when he switched parties, he had to agree to give up some of his friends, and I was one he had to agree to give up. I’ve never said anything bad about him. He’s the one who severed the relationship, not me.

You don’t speak very much?
I haven’t been in his office since he’s been governor.

Hold on. You were Speaker for the first two years that he was governor. You’re telling me you haven’t been in his office one time?
I’ve been in the reception room one time, but I haven’t been in the office.

If the governor reads this and invites you to break bread with him in his office …?
I’ll go. I’ll be there.

Last question. What are you going to do when you finally leave office? Do you want to succeed David Smith as the chancellor of Texas Tech, your alma mater?
I don’t think that’s in the cards. I haven’t been approached.

Would you take that phone call?
I’d take the phone call. I don’t know whether I’d take the job.

So what job do you take?
I really haven’t thought a whole lot about what my next venture is, but there is one thing I want to do. I’ve been working with a bunch of college kids who all of a sudden, after tuition deregulation, figured out that they need to involve themselves in the process. I’ve succeeded in getting some of those young folks, men and women, on both sides, involved in political races. And so I want to work with young folks who are of voting age, or fixing to be of voting age, to try to encourage them to give themselves to public service in some way, whether it be on the local level, state level, or national level.

Public service. What a concept.
When you see this capitol building, there’s something wrong with you if it doesn’t affect you, especially if you’ve played any part in the process. I want these young kids to know how I feel about it. I’ve got four grandsons and another grandkid on the way, and I want them to be proud that their granddaddy served in this body. I don’t want them saying, “Why in the world would anybody ever give himself over to public office? Why would anybody want to put up with that?” I want to say good things about the process. I want to work with these kids and let them know that public service is an obligation they’ve got to honor.

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