The departure of Texas Rep. Tom DeLay from Congress marks a new phase in the Republican Revolution, which took control a dozen years ago promising a new way of doing business in Washington. Over the last several years, it has looked much like a larger version of the old ways of power and pressure, short-term victories, long-term costs and broken trust. Rep. DeLay led the party on much of this, and his legacy will be to have made the House a more adversarial, less respectful place. He wasn’t nicknamed “The Hammer” because he was constructive.

Rep. DeLay announced Tuesday that he would not seek re-election. Four days ago, Tony C. Rudy, his former deputy chief of staff, pleaded guilty to conspiracy and corruption charges. He was the second aide to plead guilty to charges related to activities by Republican lobbyist Jack Abramoff, and the prosecutors’ trail is now very close to the congressman himself.

But in no sense has Mr. DeLay been associated with merely the garden-variety corruption of the capital. It was always much bigger than that. Mr. Abramoff’s access, for instance, was greatly helped by the GOP’s K Street Project, a plan pushed by Mr. DeLay that not only allowed the Republican National Committee to pressure lobbying firms to hire only Republicans but to fire Democrats in lobbying firms that hoped to have any access to the House majority.

Rep. DeLay’s fund-raising committee violated campaign finance rules in 2002; Rep. DeLay himself was indicted on the issue. Two years ago, he was admonished by the House ethics committee, after a long delay, on multiple charges involving misuse of his influence. They included his offer to support the House candidacy of the son of a another Republican representative from in return for his vote on a Medicare bill held open for hours and late into the night. Rep. DeLay’s speeded up redistricting of congressional seats in Texas was more evidence of his win-at-all-costs manner.

The result of this is a lobbying system with too much influence on legislation, the exclusion of elected Democratic members of Congress from participating in important legislation and a Congress that barely meets so that it will not have to confront that nation’s challenges.

Yesterday, Rep. DeLay said he was proud of his accomplishments in the House. He likely is, but both his party and Congress generally will need several years to recover from the changes he led.