As reported in an earlier Blog, titled “The First Senate Coalition,” the rift in the Florida Senate was deep and personal. Heads of the opposing two sides, like an award winning screenplay, were formerlly best of friends in the Senate–President W. D. Childers (D., Pensacola) and the Dean, Dempsey Barron (D., Panama City). As was reported in the earlier Blog, the head count was 26-14 in favor of Barron, but Childers, as the presiding officer of the Senate, had the power to appoint the Chairs. Although I was already Chairman of the important Senate Appropriations Subcommittee funding health care and the criminal justice system, the President appointed me to also Chair the Senate Health and Rehabilitative Services Committee at the same time–one of only two Senators to ever have that distinction. But, with all this extraordinary concentration of power, I would normally have lobbyists camped out in my office. Not on your life–why? Because Barron’s group had the votes, and if there is one thing that a lobbyist can do, it is count votes. In the Chairman’s office then, there was not a lobbyist in sight.
