Fighting with the House speaker, no matter which one, is old hat for Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick

It's probably a safe bet that few, if any, close watchers of the Capitol had "Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick admits to missing former House Speaker Joe Straus" on their 2023 bingo card.

For those new to the game or suffering from short memories, Straus stood at the helm of the House from 2009 through 2017, meaning he was in place when Patrick won the statewide election in 2014 that made him the presiding officer of the Texas Senate.

A protégé and admirer of former President George H.W. Bush, Straus was part of that seemingly vanishing breed of Republicans who stayed astutely attuned to the needs of the business community, and one whose default view of any given Democrat was not that he or she must be kept at arm's length at all times.

Patrick, by contrast, was a natural fit with the ascending tea party wing of the GOP and used his platform as a conservative radio talk show host and station owner to hoist himself up the political ladder. He was looked at as something of a back bench bomb thrower when he landed in the Senate after the 2006 election. Eight years later, he was running the place, and he has been ever since.

In Patrick's case, "running the place" is not the same as a railroad manager making sure the trains are on time. For Patrick, it means deciding which trains run on which tracks, where they're going, when they have to get there, and exactly what cargo is inside every freight car.

Patrick and Straus got into a high-profile tug of war in 2017 when the speaker made clear that the House would not accede the lieutenant governor's demand that it pass a measure to restrict the public restroom options for transgender Texans. It became known as "the bathroom bill."

Much of the business lobby was against it on the grounds that it would make Texas appear intolerant and companies with diverse workforces would take their trade to other states. When Straus sided with business, Patrick suggested the Republican speaker was out of touch with his party and more attuned to the views of then-President Barack Obama.

Straus won the battle inside the Capitol, but by the time the shooting stopped, he had given up plans to seek another term as some conservative House members emboldened by Patrick's denunciation began calling for his ouster.

That's the reason that when the fourth special session of 2023 ended, again with a key part of Patrick's agenda being stonewalled by the House, it was surprising how wistful the lieutenant governor sounded when he mentioned the name of his old nemesis.

"Joe Straus and I didn't agree on a lot, but I always found Joe Straus to be an honorable person," Patrick told reporters Tuesday. "He always told you what he was doing. Never thought he was trying to play games."

Patrick's newfound fond memories of Straus might be colored by his growing contempt for the Republican who is currently running the House, Beaumont's Dade Phelan.

Like in the case of Straus all those years ago, Phelan's sin against the lieutenant governor is that he did not forcefully push a Patrick priority through the lower chamber. And like in the case of Straus and the bathroom bill, the school voucher plan failed under Phelan because enough House Republicans sided with the Democrats to knock it off the rails.

It could be argued that Patrick misspoke when he said he and Straus "didn't agree on a lot." Actually, they agreed on quite a bit during their time together.

Both chambers back then passed legislation to limit access to abortion and to require law enforcement agencies to comply with federal immigration detainers levied on people who had entered Texas without authorization. Both Houses also expanded gun rights and agreed on a plan to boost funding for highways.

The same could be said for Phelan and Patrick, and on many of the same issues. Together, they pushed one of the nation's toughest anti-abortion laws onto the books. They oversaw the allocation of $11 billion for border security under the umbrella of Operation Lone Star. They dispensed with the requirement that a license is needed to carry a handgun in Texas.

But that didn't stop Patrick from accusing Phelan of "stupidity" in the way he runs the House.

The fact is, the House and the Senate, though related, are different creatures. Because Patrick is elected statewide, he can claim a mandate from voters in the way he chooses to set the course for the Senate. And senators have given him a long leash with the rules they impose on the chamber's operations. The result: Patrick pretty much always gets his way.

Speakers are sent to the House by the voters of their district, but they get to preside over the chamber if they are chosen by the other members. That means the vote of a Democrat for speaker carries just as much weight as the vote of a Republican.

And each member of the House can claim a mandate only from the voters in the district back home. That, by definition, means that speakers have no statewide mandate on any particular issue. They do have their individual priorities, and they do have the power to cajole or arm-twist to advance their agendas or thwart those of their adversaries.

But the speaker's leash is much shorter than that of the lieutenant governor. If he stretches it too tight, the members can yank it back.

Whether that's the system's wisdom or its stupidity depends on the point of view of the observer.

This article originally appeared on Austin American-Statesman: Why Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick has a history of battling with House speakers