Legislative regular session scores, 2016

With all business disposed of relative to the 2016 Regular Session, legislators and the governor can receive grades (barring a miraculous veto override session). Fourteen bills were selected and weighed for computation, all but four having been voted upon in both chambers. These were chosen from the watch list compiled throughout the session. For a bill’s vote(s) to be selected, in one chamber there had to be more than one legislator not voting for the winning or losing side.

Being that passage of bills depends upon the seated membership of a body, not voting is counted as a negative vote. However, if a legislator had a leave of absence granted for that day, his absent votes weren’t counted for bills voted on that day and the score adjusted to take that into account.

Here are the bills with votes for final passage in every case on which the scorecard was computed, with the conservative/reform position and the weighing indicated:


HB 266 – removes the data point for hiring by state government in unclassified positions whether the applicant had committed a felony; a conservative/reform vote is against (10 percent).

HB 594 (House only) – would have passed control of waiver of welfare work requirements for some recipients to the Legislature; a conservative/reform vote is for (10 percent).

HB 606 – reduces gamesmanship played by abortion providers receiving public money by not paying any state public dollars to these; a conservative/reform vote is for (10 percent).

HB 805 – allows a fee increase on phone service that should be the responsibilities of local districts; a conservative/reform vote is against (5 percent).

HB 1019 – protects the unborn from being killed solely due to genetic malformations; a conservative/reform vote is for (10 percent).

HB 1102 – allows the state to enforce surrogate motherhood contracts; a conservative/reform vote is against (5 percent).

HB 1148 (House only) -- would have prohibited law enforcement agencies from having policies not following federal law regarding immigration; a conservative/reform vote is for (10 percent).

HB 1156 – gives schools greater flexibility to manage financial affairs; a conservative/reform vote is for (5 percent).

SB 80 – amends the Constitution to give more control to higher education to raise tuition unilaterally; a conservative/reform vote is for (10 percent).

SB 254 (Senate only) – would have added needless compensation mandates on employers; a conservative/reform vote is against (15 percent).

SB 260 – places unnecessary restrictions on forming charter schools; a conservative/reform vote is against (10 percent).

SB 329 – increases TOPS standards to make some future awards more merit-based; a conservative/reform vote is for (5 percent).

SB 433 (Senate only) – would have limited the effectiveness of the State Bond Commission; a conservative/reform vote is against (5 percent).

SB 466 – gives greater latitude in dealing with charity hospitals; a conservative/reform vote is for (5 percent).

Regarding the House, for the most obvious question, Republicans muscling Republican Speaker Taylor Barras into that position, at least for this year, hardly mattered compared to the presumably more conservative Republican state Rep. Cameron Henry, they scoring 90 and 95 (tied for highest), respectively. Democrat Gov. John Bel Edwards’ choice of Democrat state Rep. Walt Leger provided a marked contrast at 40. Leger was close to the Democrat mean of 42.43, while the two from the GOP scored quite a bit more conservatively/reformist that the Republican delegation at 76.65. Republicans had 50 of the 51 highest scores, with traditionally the most conservative/reformist Democrat in the House state Rep. Mike Danahay the interloper. No Republican scored below 55, and Democrats took up the 35 lowest scores.

Henry	95	Republican
Talbot	95	Republican
Stokes	94	Republican
Barras	90	Republican
Carter, S	90	Republican
Davis	90	Republican
DeVillier	90	Republican
Garafalo	90	Republican
Landry, N	90	Republican
Magee	90	Republican
Miguez	90	Republican
Pylant	90	Republican
Amedee	85	Republican
Connick	85	Republican
Ivey	85	Republican
Simon	85	Republican
Berthelot	80	Republican
Carmody	80	Republican
Coussan	80	Republican
Dwight	80	Republican
Emerson	80	Republican
Hazel	80	Republican
Hilferty	80	Republican
Lopinto	80	Republican
Mack	80	Republican
McFarland	80	Republican
Morris, Jim	80	Republican
Pearson	80	Republican
Pugh	80	Republican
Schexnayder	80	Republican
Shadoin	80	Republican
Zeringue	80	Republican
Broadwater	78	Republican
Cromer	75	Republican
Danahay	75	Democrat
Harris, L	75	Republican
Hodges	75	Republican
Huval	75	Republican
Johnson, M	75	Republican
Schroder	75	Republican
Bacala	72	Republican
Abraham	70	Republican
Bishop, S	70	Republican
Chaney	70	Republican
Falconer	70	Republican
Foil	70	Republican
Hoffman	70	Republican
Leopold	70	Republican
Miller, G	70	Republican
Morris, Jay	70	Republican
Adams	67	Republican
Brown, C	65	Democrat
Edmonds	65	Republican
Hollis	65	Republican
Howard	65	Republican
Pope	65	Republican
Thibaut	65	Democrat
Bagley	60	Republican
Horton	60	Republican
Richard	60	Independent
Seabaugh	60	Republican
White, M	60	Democrat
Wilmott	60	Republican
Abramson	55	Democrat
Anders	55	Democrat
Brown, T	55	Independent
Carter, R	55	Democrat
Guinn	55	Republican
Havard	55	Republican
Hensgens	55	Republican
Miller, D	55	Democrat
Reynolds	55	Democrat
Armes	50	Democrat
Carter, G	50	Democrat
Gisclair	50	Democrat
Johnson, R	50	Democrat
Lyons	50	Democrat
Billiot	45	Democrat
Franklin	45	Democrat
Hall	45	Democrat
Harris, J	45	Democrat
Hill	45	Democrat
Jackson	45	Democrat
Jefferson	45	Democrat
Landry, T	45	Democrat
Pierre	45	Democrat
Bagneris	40	Democrat
Cox	40	Democrat
Gaines	40	Democrat
James	40	Democrat
Leger	40	Democrat
Montoucet	39	Democrat
Jordan	38	Democrat
Bouie	35	Democrat
Jones	35	Democrat
Hunter	30	Democrat
Moreno	30	Democrat
Price	30	Democrat
Smith	30	Democrat
Carpenter	25	Democrat
Jenkins	25	Democrat
LeBas	25	Democrat
Glover	20	Democrat
Marcelle	15	Democrat
Norton	10	Democrat

In the Senate, Republicans registered the 14 highest scores and 21 of the 23. While predictably Democrat state Sen. Gary Smith registered the highest among his party, right behind him oddly was state Sen. Regina Barrow, whose previous record was decidedly more liberal/populist. This was a consequence of her missing a few votes that would have helped liberal/populist causes. No other Democrat scored above 50 while no Republicans scored below 50. The Democrats had the 10 lowest scores. GOP Sen. Pres. John Alario scored slightly above the delegation’s chamber average of 60.46, while Democrats averaged 37.72.

Peacock	80	Republican
Donahue	75	Republican
Walsworth	75	Republican
Allain	70	Republican
Alario	65	Republican
Appel	65	Republican
Chabert	65	Republican
Claitor	65	Republican
Fannin	65	Republican
Mizell	65	Republican
Erdey	63	Republican
Gatti	60	Republican
Hewitt	60	Republican
Perry	60	Republican
Smith, G	60	Democrat
Barrow	58	Democrat
Cortez	55	Republican
Long	55	Republican
Riser	55	Republican
Smith, J	55	Republican
White, B	55	Republican
Morrish	53	Republican
Johns	50	Republican
LaFleur	50	Democrat
Lambert	50	Republican
Martiny	50	Republican
Mills	50	Republican
Thompson	50	Democrat
Ward	50	Republican
Boudreaux	45	Democrat
Milkovich	40	Democrat
Tarver	40	Democrat
Carter, T	39	Democrat
Colomb	35	Democrat
Luneau	29	Democrat
Morrell	26	Democrat
Bishop, W	25	Democrat
Brown, Troy	25	Democrat
Peterson	6	Democr

All in all, the House averaged 62.59 and the Senate 52.30, so weighed together the Legislature as a whole had a mean score of 59.80. In comparative perspective since the scorecard began recording in 2004, the partisan gap reached its second highest mark ever at 30.69, although it was only 2 points greater than those over the last Gov. Bobby Jindal term, a Republican. Even so, House Democrats’ scores edged up nearly 6 points, while the GOP’s were 9 points higher. In the Senate, the GOP score declined 2 points from the Jindal second term and Democrats’ went down 1 point. Thus, Edwards in his first year found a significantly more conservative/reformist House than had Jindal in his last four years, but a slightly more liberal/populist Senate even as it remained slightly more conservative/reform as a whole.

As for Edwards, he scored a 63, some 30 points higher than his eight years in the Legislature where during that time he scored as one of the most liberal/populist members. In large part this came because he had the chance to sign legislation dealing with abortion restrictions and other matters unrelated to tax policy, as those measure could not be considered in this regular session. Alario, one of the higher scorers in the Senate, proved adept at keeping legislation away from both himself and Edwards that commanded conservative/reformist majorities on issues other than abortion (except for HB 1102, the surrogacy bill). Thus Edwards scored right at the House average and significantly above the Senate, and for this year at least can claim himself more conservative/reformist.