PROVIDENCE — One after another, state lawmakers rose from their seats on the House floor to defend their right to speak without having an “unelected” Ethics Commission peering over their shoulders and adversaries lodging complaints against them.

But then, the House approved and sent to the Senate a bill that would give voters a chance in November to reinstate the Ethics Commission’s power to investigate and prosecute state legislators who use their positions to benefit themselves, their relatives and their business associates.

The vote was 67 to 5 in favor of the bill introduced by House Speaker Gordon D. Fox, early in the 2010 election-year session when he was still the House majority leader.

Before the bill passed, however, the House on a 37-to-33 vote defeated an amendment introduced by freshman Rep. Brian Newberry, R-North Smithfield, which would have excluded all verbal and written statements by legislators from Ethics Commission jurisdiction.

“Now, if we are talking about vote-buying, vote-trading, vote-selling … That stuff should not be happening,” Newberry said. But “I don’t want to see someone have an ethics complaint filed against them simply for speaking their mind either on the floor, in a committee, in a hallway or out in the public. … I am very concerned about protection of First Amendment rights.”

But House Majority Whip J. Patrick O’Neill, D-Pawtucket, countered with these observations: “We, unfortunately, have disappointed the public for a number of years. … The public wants this. … You are never going to stop people filing ethics complaints against you. This is big-girl and big-boy politics, ladies and gentlemen. You are going to have to deal with these complaints. … [But] if you are not doing anything wrong, you’ve got nothing to worry about.”

The measure now goes to the full Senate, where Majority Leader Daniel Connors, D-Cumberland, has repeatedly questioned the need for any action, and said again recently: “If a member of the Assembly were doing something illegal, they could be prosecuted right now in the U.S. District Court by the U.S. Attorney and be subject to penalties for violating the law like any other citizen.”

Fox’s legislation was prompted by a June decision by the Rhode Island Supreme Court that dismissed ethics charges against former Senate President William V. Irons based on a novel reading of the “speech-in-debate” clause in the state Constitution that says: “For any speech in debate in either House, no member shall be questioned in any other place.”

High-profile lawmakers had argued for years that this clause placed them beyond the reach of the Ethics Commission or its predecessor, including former House Speakers Matthew J. Smith and John B. Harwood.

But the high court’s 2009 ruling in Irons’ case blasted open the current hole in state Ethics Code enforcement. Following the ruling, the commission took the position that it was no longer even allowed to issue advisory opinions to lawmakers.

Irons had been accused of using his public office to obtain financial gain for pharmacy giant CVS while collecting hundreds of thousands of dollars in insurance commissions from Blue Cross on a health-insurance policy for CVS employees in Rhode Island.

Irons’ lawyer argued, and the Supreme Court agreed, that the “speech-in-debate” clause insulates lawmakers from Ethics Commission scrutiny for any “core legislative act,” including “proposing, passing or voting upon a particular piece of legislation.”

The citizens’ advocacy groups Common Cause, Operation Clean Government and the League of Women Voters argued that state lawmakers should be subject to the same Ethics Commission scrutiny that applies to every other elected official in Rhode Island, from the governor to the members of each local school board, zoning board and town council.

How they voted

Voting yes

Ajello, D-Providence

Almeida, D-Providence

Brien, D-Woonsocket

Caprio, D-Narragansett

Carnevale, D-Providence

Carter, D-North Kingstown

Coderre, D-Pawtucket

Corvese, D-North Providence

Costantino, D-Providence

DeSimone, D-Providence

Diaz, D-Providence

Driver, D-Richmond

Edwards, D-Tiverton

Ehrhardt, R-North Kingstown

Fellela, D-Johnston

Ferri, D-Warwick

Fierro, D-Woonsocket

Flaherty, D-Warwick

Fox, D-Providence

Gablinske, D-Bristol

Gallison, D-Bristol

Gemma, D-Warwick

Giannini, D-Providence

Guthrie, D-Coventry

Handy, D-Cranston

Hearn, D-Barrington

Jackson, D-Newport

Jacquard, D-Cranston

Kennedy, D-Hopkinton

Kilmartin, D-Pawtucket

Lally, D-South Kingstown

Loughlin, R-Tiverton

MacBeth, D-Cumberland

Malik, D-Warren

Marcello, D-Scituate

Martin, D-Newport

Mattiello, D-Cranston

McCauley, D-Providence

McNamara, D-Warwick

Melo, D-East Providence

Menard, D-Lincoln

Naughton, D-Warwick

O’Neill, D-Pawtucket

Pacheco, D-Burrillville

Palumbo, D-Cranston

Petrarca, D-Lincoln

A. Rice, D-Portsmouth

M. Rice, D-South Kingstown

Ruggiero, D-Jamestown

San Bento, D-Pawtucket

Savage, R-East Providence

Schadone, D-North Providence

Segal, D-Providence

Serpa, D-West Warwick

Shallcross Smith, D-Lincoln

Silva, D-Central Falls

Sullivan, D-Coventry

Trillo, R-Warwick

Ucci, D-Johnston

Vaudreuil, D-Cumberland

Walsh, D-Charlestown

Wasylyk, D-Providence

Williams, D-Providence

Williamson, D-Coventry

Winfield, D-Smithfield

Voting no

Baldelli-Hunt, D-Woonsocket

DaSilva, D-East Providence

Newberry, R-N. Smithfield

Pollard, D-Foster

Watson, R-East Greenwich

Did not vote

Azzinaro, D-Westerly

Lima, D-Cranston

Murphy, D-West Warwick

SOURCE: House roll call

kgregg@projo.com