U.S. House members who leave Congress to become lobbyists are free to begin immediately advising clients and can play a key role in lobbying efforts, as long as they keep their activities strictly behind the scenes, according to a memorandum released April 8 by the House ethics committee.

Former lawmakers may be involved in lobbying during their one-year "cooling-off" period as long as they do not personally appear before or communicate directly with a current lawmaker, the 13-page committee memo said.

"Such a 'background role' would not pose the contemplated risk of improper influence since the current officials [who are lobbied] would not be aware of the former official's participation," the memo added.

"However, any such participation must remain behind the scenes; during the one-year cooling off period, former members must not permit their name to be openly associated with contacts made by other persons."

The memo from the panel, known formally as the House Committee on Standards of Official Conduct, comes amid heightened interest in post-employment restrictions.

A new law passed last year--the Honest Leadership and Open Government Act--added new restrictions on retiring members of Congress. Also, several veteran lawmakers recently have announced their retirement, including Rep. Albert Wynn (D-Md.), who last month said he would leave Capitol Hill before his current term is up and take a job with the Washington lobbying and law firm Dickstein Shapiro.

Like other House members and top staffers, Wynn will face the year-long cooling-off period restricting his lobbying activities after his resignation becomes official.

Push for Tougher Restrictions Failed

HLOGA's new provisions gave senators and top Senate staff a new, two-year period for post-employment restrictions, but the period remained at one year for House members and staff. The new law does require, however, greater disclosure of House lawmakers' negotiations for future employment, as well as their recusal from legislative decisions affecting a prospective future employer.

Some reform groups backing HLOGA had pushed for a tougher provision that would have prevented former lawmakers from engaging in any type of lobbying activity--either publicly or behind the scenes--during the cooling-off period after leaving Congress. This provision--adopted as an amendment by Sen. Russ Feingold (D-Wis.)--was contained in the lobbying and ethics reform legislation (S. 1) as it initially passed the Senate last year. However, the new restrictions on lobbying activity were dropped from the final version of HLOGA cleared by the House and Senate.

The final measure retained the previous restrictions only on "lobbying contacts."

Allowing former lawmakers to be involved with lobbying efforts as soon as they leave Capitol Hill has helped to make lobbying among the most attractive professions to retiring House and Senate members. A study by the watchdog group Public Citizen published in 2005 found that 43 percent of members of Congress who had left office since 1998 and were eligible to lobby had become registered lobbyists.

The study pointed to such high-profile examples as former Rep. Bob Livingston (R-La.), who left the House in 1999, opened his own lobbying shop, and made a reported $1.1 million in the first year, even though he was restricted from personally lobbying his former colleagues. The next year, after the cooling-off period was lifted, his firm's lobbying revenues shot up to $4.8 million, the Public Citizen study said.

The new House ethics committee memo on post-employment restrictions is online at http://www.house.gov/ethics/m_post_employment_restrictions_Members_2008.