Here's a link to my full story at spokesman.com on the House Ethics Committee hearing today, in which the panel voted unanimously to recommend that Rep. Phil Hart, R-Athol, be removed from the House Revenue & Taxation Committee while he presses his own personal fight against back state income taxes.

That vote was unanimous, but Rep. George Sayler, D-Coeur d'Alene, voted with the panel's Republican members in an earlier 5-2 vote to dismiss a charge against Hart of abuse of legislative privilege. "I've said before I don't think this is a partisan issue," Sayler said. "I don't see that we had a clear standard to judge by, in terms of the immunity clause ... when it can be used and when it cannot be used. I certainly thought it was inappropriate, and cast a black mark on the legislative body, and I would hope that Rep. Hart would change his practice, but in terms of a clear violation of that clause, I didn't see it."

Sayler said, "From a personal perspective, I do believe his behavior was unethical. But from a legal perspective, I didn't see we had the justification."