Mr. Blomberg's grass-roots lobbying changed the schedule to 6 a.m.
As a result, it has been the subject of a fierce lobbying campaign, with environmentalists and major business groups sparring on the airwaves and in grass-roots lobbying state by state.
The four-million-member gun rights group, one of the country's most powerful grass-roots lobbying organizations, had stayed silent in recent days, issuing no statements, deactivating its Facebook account and declining interview requests since the killings of 20 schoolchildren and 7 adults, including the mother of the gunman.
The new group hopes to cut through Washington's legislative logjams by harnessing the millions of volunteers and donors who helped elect Mr. Obama to a second term last fall, turning their enthusiasm and money to grass-roots lobbying on issues like immigration, climate change and the expansion of Medicaid.
Still, proponents of the bill were caught slightly off-guard by the timing of Mr. Hastert's announcement and said they had expected it to come up in the last week of February, which would have given more time for grass-roots lobbying.
That's changing, thanks to a spate of producer lawsuits and well-organized grass-roots lobbying.
The C.C.L. was founded by Marshall Saunders, a retired businessman living in San Diego who had previously spent 12 years volunteering for a grass-roots lobby called Results, which has had major success building support in Congress for initiatives aimed at basic needs for the poor.
The government has promised to reconsider and has indicated it is likely to concede to an organised lobby from a grass roots "fair fuel" campaign backed by the AA and the Road Haulage Association.
He should promise that it will be turned over to someone like Marshall Ganz to run as an organization which will push for progressive change based on grass roots activism not inside the Beltway lobbying and maneuvering.
Her campaign has argued that her lobbying efforts "at the grass roots and behind-the-scenes helped cultivate the conditions necessary for the peace to take hold and last," according to a memo from her press office.
Mr. Novelli promised that in the future, AARP would take more of a leadership role in lobbying efforts, would build its grass roots into a more potent force and would become more forceful on issues like pensions.
