The Rules of the House are adopted usually shortly after the election of the Speaker and of the various officers of the House. I'm interested in what - apart from the Constitution of course - governs the House when these Rules haven't been adopted.
During the 2023 speakership election proceedings, which took several days, the Clerk - chairing the House at the time - announced an adjournment under clause 12c of rule 1 if my memory is correct. This furiously resembles the infamous clause 12b of rule 1, which empowers the chair to declare the House in recess in case of an immediate threat on the safety of the House - that which was invoked on January 6 2021. This would seem to indicate the Clerk was using the old Rules package. But during the same aforementioned proceedings, when a Republican member(-elect) accused the Democrats to be drinking on House floor, said member claimed (and media repeated) that her words could not be stricken from the record because there was no Rules. So, which is it ?
This answer cites "metarules" governing the House in the absence of any aforementioned Rules, and states that such metarules can only be amended under valid Rules. Is that accurate, and if so, how does it work, is there a block of rules that goes permanent until/unless amended out, and another block which expires the same time as the Congress adopting it ? If so, why doesn't any rule package get voted to the permanent block, rather than the temporary one ?