History in the un-making?

LITTLE ROCK — These are the times that make history in Arkansas. In fact, history travels so fast in our state that it risks colliding with itself.

In a secret ballot not so secret in its apparent party-line tally of 54-46, Democratic state Rep. Darrin Williams of Little Rock was elected Friday as speaker-designate of the House for the next session beginning in January.

A personable, capable and politically deft young lawyer and former Mark Pryor aide, Williams sought to minimize the factor of his skin color. That happens to be black.

He said his colleagues didn’t vote for him because of it.

I suspect that is true.

They voted for him because he was the Democrat. Party labels now mean everything in a Little Rock that has gone Washington.

Still it’s cause for cultural celebration that Williams could achieve this pinnacle-the all-time highest for a black man in Arkansas politics.

But it will serve the cause of civil dialogue if we keep in mind that Williams himself minimized the race factor.

That’s in case Republicans make their own history in November and, for the first time since Reconstruction, take over the state House of Representatives.

Then, on the first day of the ensuing session in January, they could unwrite this history that Williams has made.

Most likely they would decline to provide the usual perfunctory ratification of the speaker-designate. Instead they most likely would elect one of their own, probably Rep. Terry Rice of Waldron, who lost narrowly to Williams on Friday.

The existing House membership can’t actually elect the leadership for the next one, which, at a minimum, will be about 33 percent different.

In the past, certain courtesies and formalities have been honored. But that was before the advent of two party politics in Arkansas.

If the scenario of a Republican takeover and partisan re-vote takes place, I wouldn’t be surprised to see it make brief national news.

It would go something like this: In Arkansas, a state with a stormy racial history where Barack Obama got only 39 percent of the vote in the last election (39 percent being my prediction), Republicans have stripped a black legislator of his history-making election as speaker of the House of Representatives.

It sounds a tad tacky when you put it that way. But we shouldn’t put it that way.

Consider the example of the state Senate.

Sen. Larry Teague of Nashville, a personable and capable and politically deft insurance man and Democrat from Nashville in Howard County, has been elected president pro tem designate for the next session.

His skin color happens to be white.

So one day several months ago I was visited by an emissary dispatched by certain Republican state senators.This emissary wanted to tell me that the GOP senators liked and respected Teague.

In fact, Teague had told them he would stand aside on his election in favor of Republican Sen. Michael Lamoureux of Russellville if the Republicans took control through the elections in November.

But it was Ronald Reagan, after all, who famously said “trust, but verify.”

And it wouldn’t hurt, my visitor said, if I called Teague and asked him, for the record, what he would do if his party lost the majority in November.

It seemed a legitimate inquiry and a worthy column subject.

So I called Teague.

He said he’d told the Republican senators, and could assure me, that he would step aside if Republicans take over, which he hopes they don’t.

A tad disingenuous by comparison is Williams’ statement Friday that he hoped the next House membership would respect this vote regardless of any interim electoral outcome.

He said the speaker’s job required extensive preparation of the kind he will now undertake.

The speaker is uncommonly powerful these days, personally selecting committee chairmen, stacking the Rules Committee to decide any important dispute in his favor, and directing-and at times even dictating-the agenda.

It is unreasonable to think that Republicans would achieve a House majority from the voters in November and then cede power to courtesy, tradition, internal convenience or racial appearances.

Elections have consequences, as the saying goes.

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John Brummett is a regular columnist for the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette. Email him at [email protected]. Read his blog at brummett.arkansasonline.com.