Even as the top leaders of the state Legislature consider loosening their iron grip on the Capitol, and letting rank-and-file lawmakers play a greater role in decision-making, their counterparts at Washington are doing just the opposite. House Speaker Dennis Hastert recently let it be known that he will not allow major bills to come to a vote unless most of his GOP members support them.

A “majority of the majority,” representing little more than one-quarter of the House membership, would effectively wield a veto over legislation. This informal rule further marginalizes minority Democrats and diminishes the clout of bipartisan coalitions.

Meanwhile, members of the Senate GOP agreed to give their majority leader, Senator Frist, the unilateral authority to fill certain vacancies on the most powerful committees – seats that Republicans had previously awarded on the basis of seniority. This enables Dr. Frist to enforce party discipline by rewarding loyalists and punishing mavericks.

These are precisely the sort of policies that New York State lawmakers are now rethinking, under pressure from voters and civic groups.

One should not conclude, however, that Washington is morphing into another Albany. Congress has a long way to go to match the autocracy of the state Legislature. If anything, the changes under way at the nation’s Capitol help to highlight how far Albany has veered outside the mainstream of American governance.

Mr. Hastert’s “majority of the majority” rule, for example, is nothing new at the state Capitol. In fact, the Assembly and Senate take the principle a step further: The speaker of the Assembly and the majority leader of the Senate rarely bring a bill to the floor unless they have enough yes votes from their own party members to guarantee final passage – that is, 76 of the 104 Democrats in the Assembly, and 33 of 35 Republicans in the Senate. As a result, the opposition of 29 Assembly Democrats or three Senate Republicans is enough to impede legislation.

As a practical matter, however, the votes of just two legislators – the Assembly speaker and the Senate majority leader – trump all the others. If the leaders don’t bring a bill up in their respective party conferences, it won’t go to the floor for a vote no matter how many other legislators favor it.

A bill known as “Timothy’s law,” which would require health plans to provider broader coverage for mental health services, has repeatedly passed the Assembly and has overwhelming bipartisan support in the Senate. Yet Majority Leader Joseph Bruno has refused to allow a vote on the Assembly version. Instead, he put forward an alternative bill that passed the Senate but not the Assembly.

The new prerogative acquired by Dr. Frist, to fill certain committee seats without regard to seniority, also seems quaint by Albany standards.

In the state Legislature, the speaker and the majority leader not only control all committee assignments, they also unilaterally pick the chair of each panel and reserve the right to rescind those appointments on a moment’s notice. In 2000, when a group of Democrats moved to oust Sheldon Silver of Manhattan as speaker, Mr. Silver’s first move was to strip the rebels of their chairmanships. Keep in mind that leadership posts in the state Legislature come with stipends worth, in some cases, tens of thousands of dollars. Legislative leaders can substantially reduce the income of members who don’t toe the line.

It’s little wonder, then, that committee meetings in Albany are largely meaningless affairs. The chairmen do not bring up bills that the top leaders oppose, and they usually spend no more than a minute or two discussing the particulars of any piece of legislation before granting it routine approval.

As a result of these rules and traditions, the legislative leaders and governor – the so-called the “three men in a room” – privately negotiate deals on the budget and other major legislation, and the rest of the Legislature generally acts as a rubber stamp. There is so little suspense about the outcome of any given vote that many members wander out of the chamber rather than sit still for the largely perfunctory, symbolic debates.

In Washington, by contrast, committee chairmen are elected by their colleagues to fixed terms, and as a result enjoy a measure of independence and clout of their own. Committee positions don’t come with extra pay, but seats on the most important panels carry considerable clout. This is why lawmakers care so much about holding the seats that Dr. Frist now has the ability to fill. And notwithstanding Mr. Hastert’s new effort to assert majority control, bipartisan coalitions are still a major force in congressional deliberations, adding zest and suspense to floor fights on major legislation.

Albany politicians used to justify their top down system on the basis of efficiency, arguing that strong leadership was necessary to corral the competing interests of 212 legislators representing the far-flung districts of a heterogeneous state. It’s hard to make that argument now, after 20 years in a row of late budgets and repeated failures to compromise on the most pressing issues facing the state.

In response to criticism from civic groups – and, more importantly, the defeat of several incumbents in recent legislative elections – Albany leaders are promising to turn a new leaf. Just how far they are willing to go with reform should become clear next week, when the two houses of the Legislature formally adopt rules for their new session.

The proposals under consideration would give rank-and-file legislators, including those from minority parties, more opportunities to force votes and hearings on bills with broad support. One proposal calls for allowing committee chairmen to hire their own staff, instead of using aides selected for them by the central leadership. So far, however, no one is pushing for committee chairmen to be elected rather than appointed. And until that happens, Albany will not approach the level of democracy that prevails at Washington.