Carolyn Kaster, Associated Press Pennsylvania House Majority Leader Samuel Smith, R-Punxsutawney, speaks with reporters after the Senate voted to repeal the midterm pay raise. The House followed suit and also voted to rescind the increases but attached a clause that could jeopardize the effort. Click photo for larger image.

HARRISBURG -- The issue of repealing pay raises for state legislators and other officials isn't over yet.

Although the state House and Senate passed bills yesterday and early this morning repealing the controversial 16 to 34 percent raises, the bills have a key difference that legislators weren't able to resolve before adjourning. The House and Senate aren't scheduled to be in session again until Nov. 14, unless leaders call members back early to settle this issue.

Public anger has been raging since the Legislature, without debate, approved raises for legislators, cabinet members and the judiciary at 2 a.m. July 7. Despite lawsuits and protests across the state, lawmakers had resisted any effort to repeal the raises until this week.

The bills passed by the House and Senate have this key difference:

The Senate version would repeal the raises for legislators even if judges were to file a successful lawsuit restoring raises for judges. The House version says if the judges have their raises restored, then all raises would be restored.

The House's nonseverability clause was "a poison pill" that would subvert the entire legislation, the Associated Press quoted Senate President Pro Tem Robert Jubelirer.

"The constitution says you cannot reduce the (compensation) of the judiciary," Mr. Jubelirer said. "The reason being so the General Assembly can't blackmail the judiciary, otherwise we could cut their salaries every time we disagree with them."

But House leaders said the public expected all the salary increases to be repealed, and questioned whether the Senate was trying to protect judges' raises, including the one for Mr. Jubelirer's wife, Renee Cohn Jubelirer, an appellate court judge.

"I think this is about protecting the salaries of judges ... and the fact that one of them happens to be married to the president pro tem, yeah, I think that is in fact what this is about," House leader Sam Smith said.

Mr. Jubelirer called the accusation shameful and false.

In the Senate, which voted first, the decision to repeal was unanimous. The House, which voted early this morning, voted 196-2 with little debate to approve the amended bill. The two highest-ranking Democrats, House Minority Leader H. William DeWeese, of Waynesburg, and Minority Whip Mike Veon, D-Beaver Falls, voted no.

When that version was sent to the Senate, the House change was eliminated and the Senate reaffirmed its version.

Even with the potentially problematic amendment, the repeal votes marked a startling turnaround. As recently as Tuesday night, senators were considering a repeal of only a portion of the pay raise, but the anti-pay raise movement quickly gained the upper hand.

Several senators acknowledged yesterday that the tide had clearly turned against the raise.

"The pay raise is dead, it's not going to survive," said Senate Majority Leader David Brightbill, R-Lebanon, who had been one of its staunchest defenders.

"This is the start toward correcting a major wrong that was done to the people of Pennsylvania," said Barry Kauffman of Common Cause, which filed a federal lawsuit to block the raise.

"It's a remarkable day," said Eric Epstein, one of the leaders of the Sept. 26 "Pink Pig" rally against the raise, at which 1,500 people massed in protest on the Capitol steps. "The improbable, the impossible, the unimaginable has become reality," he said.

The bill repeals not only state legislators' raises, but also higher compensation for Cabinet members and more than 1,000 state judges. Some legislators, pointing to a section of the state constitution that says compensation for judges "shall not be diminished during their terms of office," warned that the repeal could be subject to legal challenge.

State Sen. Sean Logan, D-Monroeville, the author of the repeal bill, said he hoped there would be no legal challenge.

But if there is, Mr. Logan said, he will try to separate the pay raise repeal for legislators from the repeal for judges, so that legislators' pay raises would be canceled regardless of what happens with judges.

The House version appeared to throw a wrench in those plans.

"This year has been a baptism by fire," said Sen. Bob Regola, R-Hempfield, who's in his first year in the Senate. He said all other state issues have been forgotten during the past four months, engulfed by the protest over the pay raise. He said voters seemed to hold all lawmakers guilty, including himself, even though he voted against it.

Drew Crompton, an aide to Mr. Jubelirer, R-Altoona, whose salary would shoot up to $145,000 from $110,000 with the raise, said the Senate decided it was time to head in a new direction.

"If you try the same thing for four months and it isn't working, you try something else," Mr. Crompton said.

Mr. Jubelirer faces the strong possibility of a GOP primary challenge in May from a Blair county commissioner. Pay raise protesters had taken out billboards in the district slamming Mr. Jubelirer, who's held his seat for 30 years.

"Sen. Jubelirer has good positives in his district, but the pay raise has diminished those positives," Mr. Crompton said.

Gene Stilp, a Harrisburg lawyer who had filed his own lawsuit against the raise in July, expressed surprise, but pleasure, that the Senate went along with the wishes of pay-raise protesters around the state.

"This proves that voters, taxpayers and the people of Pennsylvania can have an impact if they try," he said. "But don't let anyone tell you these politicians did this for good government reasons. They did this because they are fearing for their political lives."

John C. Whitehead, The Patriot-News via AP State Sen. Patricia H. Vance, R-Cumberland, left, talks with state Rep. Steve Nickol, R-Hanover, after the Senate unanimously voted yesterday to rescind the midterm pay raise. Later in the evening, the House also voted in a similar manner. Click photo for larger image.

The 16 percent to 34 percent increase doesn't actually take effect until Dec. 1, 2006, but 134 of the 253 legislators decided to use a provision called unvouchered expenses to take the higher compensation starting Aug. 1.

Many critics had called that unconstitutional, since the state constitution forbids a lawmaker from getting a raise in mid-term. But two court decisions, in 1987 and 1995, have upheld the legality of unvouchered expenses. That didn't quiet public anger, however.

Mr. Logan, who had voted against the raise July 7, said he also didn't like the way it was done -- at 2 in the morning, without any public discussion or hearings. That's what also angered a lot of citizens groups.

"The process used to approve the raise was wrong," he said. "We need to restore integrity to this chamber and the Capitol."

The original compensation measure set state legislators' pay at 50 percent of what U.S. congressional members earn -- now $162,100. Logan said he wasn't saying state legislators aren't worth that amount, but that any increase should be enacted after proper public hearings and open discussion.

Under the repeal, those legislators who have taken unvouchered expenses, which were paid monthly on Aug. 1, Sept. 1, Oct. 1 and Nov. 1, wouldn't have to return that money. The repeal bill would take effect Dec. 1.

Sen. Jim Ferlo, D-Highland Park, and Mr. Kauffman of Common Cause said that while repealing the raise is fine, the Senate needs to go further and reform its procedures so that late-night votes without public input aren't used anymore.

"We need to repent, repeal and reform," Mr. Ferlo said. "Today we are moving ahead on repeal [of the raise], but we need to make reforms of our institution."

Mr. Ferlo, a former neighborhood leader in Pittsburgh, praised people around the state who had actively protested the raise.

"There was a creative and principled protest since July 7," he said. "People spoke their minds in all corners of the state. Many thousands of Pennsylvanians were rightfully indignant."