Boehner begged for a one-on-one negotiation with Obama — a power play to show he, not his unruly conference, was running the show. He emerged from Mitt Romney’s loss as a strengthened leader: He’s the most powerful Republican in the country.

He even moved to strip trouble-making lawmakers of plum committee assignments in a bid to flex his internal muscle. Without consulting his membership, Boehner offered Obama $800 billion in revenue.

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“This is where I’m going,” Boehner personally told his fellow leaders when he made Obama the offer, a fresh blast of confidence.

That newfound political capital was quickly sanded-down by Boehner’s own crew.

What happened to the 63-year-old in just the last week is striking. On Saturday night, word leaked out that he had given into the White House’s demand that he allow tax rates on the rich to snap to 39.6 percent. Immediately, conservatives were grumbling but still gave Boehner room to maneuver.

On Monday night, Boehner called Obama to inform him he would devise a plan and pass it out of the House — Plan B, he called it — because negotiations with the White House weren’t moving quickly enough.

Boehner’s in-house power structure quickly sprung into action.

His leadership team spent the past few days gathering support for the legislation — as of late Wednesday, there were clear signs that Boehner’s bill did not have sufficient support. On Wednesday night and all day Thursday, Boehner worked the House floor, personally making the case for the bill to wavering members. By late Thursday, he was sitting on the floor with Reps. Patrick Tiberi (Ohio), Tom Latham (Iowa) and Mike Simpson (Idaho) — close allies and friends, who support the speaker unfailingly.

Top Republicans remained hopeful, until late Thursday when GOP lawmakers voiced a public protest. Twenty-one Republicans voted against a spending bill to send a signal to leadership that the tax-rate bill didn’t meet their muster. It was the rank and file screaming that Plan B would not pass.

One hour and 15 minutes later, Boehner was leading Republicans into a Capitol basement meeting room to wave the white flag.

Some of the same members kicked off committees and denied leadership spots — Rep. Tim Huelskamp of Kansas and Rep. Tom Price of Georgia — led the resistance.

Rep. Aaron Schock (R-Ill.) put it plainly: “Nobody’s elected king in our conference.”

”And so I thought the speaker did a very good job of making the case for why this was a good proposal and at the end of the day though, it’s up to the conference’s will, is what happens,” Schock said. “Nobody can tell any duly elected representative who represents over 700,000 constituents how they have to vote. So you have to then respect the process and each individual’s vote.”

Last month, Boehner won unanimous support of the House Republican Conference to serve as speaker for the next two years. But for the first time, GOP lawmakers privately told POLITICO Thursday night that there are questions about Boehner’s grip on power.

With Congress out, potentially until 2013, he might not see some of those faces until he gets to the House floor to be officially voted in as speaker.

Seung Min Kim and Ginger Gibson contributed to this report.