His announcement this week that he will retire, at age 61, surprised his colleagues and invited the usual encomiums when somebody in power decides to hang it up. House Majority Whip Tom DeLay, a fellow not normally given to sentimentality, was seen wiping his eyes during Armey’s farewell announcement on the House floor Wednesday.

Behind these public expressions, a fierce battle to succeed Armey as majority leader is already underway even though he won’t be “standing down,” as he put it, until after the November 2002 election. Moderate Republicans huddled in a telephone booth to see if there was any way that they could promote a kinder, gentler candidate from their ranks. For a brief moment Ohio Rep. Rob Portman seemed a credible contender. But Portman quickly took himself out of the running. He and others are apparently convinced there is no stopping DeLay, who even before Armey made his retirement official had begun phoning his colleagues to nail down their support for his leadership bid.

Anybody tempted to cheer Armey’s departure should be forewarned that life on Capitol Hill without him won’t mean a greater voice for moderates. Armey was a conservative roadblock who made life miserable for moderate Republicans–and Democrats of all stripes–but he was a pussycat compared to DeLay. Armey fancied himself a policy intellectual. He cared more about the purity of his positions than the winner-take-all hardball practiced by DeLay, delegating most of the tactical dirty work to “the Hammer,” DeLay’s moniker on Capitol Hill.

It is already assumed that DeLay controls the House, and that the vacuum created by Armey’s announced retirement will simply allow DeLay to move into the position as a shadow majority leader a year before the Republican Caucus votes to make it official. The speed with which DeLay consolidated his base stunned his colleagues, but it really shouldn’t have. DeLay is a man who embodies the “you’re either with us or you’re against us” spirit that is so fashionable now in Washington. When the Republicans took over Congress in 1994, DeLay let all the corporate representatives and business trade groups know that he expected them to hire Republican lobbyists.

Given DeLay’s power and the expectation that he will ascend higher in the GOP hierarchy, it takes a very brave or very foolhardy Republican to challenge his hold on the job of majority leader. The White House might prefer that a compassionate conservative, rather than DeLay, become the face of the Congress. But President Bush has shown no inclination to challenge his party’s right wing. DeLay has the political equivalent of tenure. He is untouchable.

Why did Armey walk away from a job second only in stature to House Speaker? One theory is that he fears the GOP will lose its majority next November, so it’s better to get out now while the GOP’s stock is high. But Armey has never been known as a political calculator. A more likely answer is that after 18 years, he has come to realize that the issues he championed have had their day. Even if he lasted another 18 years, the popular support will never be there in the Congress to abolish the IRS or pass a flat tax, or any of the other hobbyhorses he has ridden.

Actually, it’s amazing Armey lasted as long as he did–and in a position of such visibility. He was not a good spokesman for the party. A dark and brooding visage given to bursts of bluntness, he never succeeded on the Sunday-morning television circuit and was too impatient to put up with the demands of weekday cable appearances. Even among his colleagues, he was not popular. In retrospect, his days were numbered ever since he participated in a failed coup to oust Speaker Newt Gingrich. Gingrich later resigned, but the episode created lasting distrust between Armey and many Republicans, even those who were not Gingrich loyalists.

The apex of Armey’s congressional career had to be 1994, when he worked closely with Gingrich to fashion the Contract with America, the document that formed the basis of the conservative agenda when the GOP won control of the House. The ‘94 election seemed to signal a thirst for radical change, and Armey and others saw themselves at the vanguard of a new conservative revolution. But the opportunity for change passed almost as quickly as it arrived, and despite a president weakened by a sex scandal, the revolution sputtered and stalled, and Armey’s vision seemed better suited to a Texas classroom than real politics.

Now Armey will get a chance to spend more time with his family, a professed reason for his stepping down, and to test out life after Congress. The betting is that for all his railing against Washington, he is likely to follow in the footsteps of Gingrich and many other expatriates from Capitol Hill, and establish a beachhead in the capital city from which to create a lucrative life.