It's been a frustrating summer, Rep. Jim Leach told House Speaker Newt Gingrich this week.
What's weighing on the House Banking Committee chairman's mind is a pair of insurance amendments added to the regulatory relief bill.
One, opposed by virtually the entire banking industry, would bars the Comptroller of the Currency from authorizing new powers. The second, opposed by community banks and independent insurance agents, would let banks affiliate with insurance companies in most states.
Rep. Leach proposed one solution last week, an all-or-nothing vote on the House floor. In a more recent memorandum to the House leadership - the same one in which he expressed frustration with the bill - he offered a handful of additional alternatives.
Most were variations on a theme: Drop the amendment permitting banks to affiliate with insurance companies or give states the right to opt in or opt out of that approach.
But he also reserved the right to pursue an option that might well frustrate a few people off Capitol Hill: adding the regulatory relief package - with both insurance amendments - plus repeal of the Glass- Steagall Act to the budget reconciliation bill.
The reconciliation bill is a fast train. It is the legislation that implements the Republicans' deficit-reduction plan, and it is a top leadership priority. As a matter of high politics, the reconciliation bill may be beyond the ability of industry lobbyists to influence.
Adding major banking legislation to the budget bill would be an unusual step, to say the least. But congressional sources say it could done.
The House Banking Committee has been given a deficit-reduction target of $2.4 billion, and there are no restrictions on what the panel can include in its package. "We can put anything we want in there as long as we get $2.4 billion," said one congressional source.
For Rep. Leach, the reconciliation approach - and it appears to be an alternative he is weighing seriously - would solve a number of problems.
First, it would permit him to bring two major banking bills to the floor quickly. The two measures have been put on hold, and their progress is now being measured by calendar quarters, rather than weeks or months.
Second - and more important - it would subordinate the contentious banking issues to the politics of the budget.
It is a shrewd gambit, but not the only one Rep. Leach is weighing. Another option is to combine the Glass-Steagall and regulatory relief bills during House-Senate negotiations, which is also a time in which lobbyists have limited influence.
And then there is the all-or-nothing approach.
A single up-or-down vote on both amendments would make life hard for industry groups, who must balance the pain of one amendment against the gain from the other. But would simplify the world for lawmakers.
Legislators hate choosing between competing interest groups. An all-or- nothing vote would permit them to cast a ballot against the two amendments and then tell each industry group what it wants to hear.
The insurance agents could be told that the vote was cast against the affiliations provision, and bankers could be told that it was the hated Comptroller's moratorium that was the intended object of the "no" vote.
All this assumes that the agent groups - particularly the Independent Insurance Agents of America - would oppose the package, and that's by no means clear. As much as the agents hate the affiliations provision, which would let banks into the business, they want the Comptroller's moratorium.
Another assumption here is that the House leadership won't decide on an option of its own. But the top Republicans in the House appear to have tilted toward the insurance agents. They could decide to send the regulatory relief bill to the floor under a rule that would permit a vote on the affiliations provision while protecting the Comptroller's moratorium.
For large institutions with an interest in both banking and insurance, that would a nightmare scenario. And it could come to pass. As Rep. Leach said, it's been a frustrating summer.
