We don’t want it on the ballot nor should it be.

I’m speaking, of course, of gay marriage.

The Conventional Wisdom is that an amendment prohibiting gay marriage would boost the turnout among conservative voters, to the benefit of Republican candidates. So all 44 GOP delegates are believed to have signed a petition to bring such an amendment to the House floor, circumventing the normal committee process. (The Judiciary Committee is likely to vote on the issue later this week.).

There is also unanimity in the Democratic caucus - to keep the amendment off the House floor and the November ballot. While only one Republican might break ranks and vote against the amendment itself, a fair number of Democrats would vote for it. However, most of them would so only if Maryland’s highest court, the Court of Appeals, were to rule that a ban on gay marriages violates the state constitution.

Striking down a statute as unconstitutional is an awesome exercise of judicial power. Consequently, it’s not frivolously done. “The Court will not anticipate a question of constitutional law in advance of the necessity of deciding it,” wrote Justice Brandeis.

Amending the constitution is also an awesome exercise of power. Consequently, the legislature and then the electorate should not impose their will in this way, altering our fundamental document of governance, unless absolutely necessary.

In addition, the divisive nature of the marriage issue would color the public debate this November, to the detriment of consideration of other issues, which have a greater impact on the well being of the electorate.

When we talk among ourselves, we call it the Sandra Day O’Connor Corrective Act.

What Supreme Court cases interpreting the federal civil rights laws were decided by a 5-4 vote, with Justice O’Connor in the majority? That’s the question I asked after the Justice sent her resignation letter to President Bush this summer.

Put another way, what protections could be undone by a more conservative court? What could we do legislatively to align Maryland’s civil rights laws with the Court’s current and more expansive reading of the federal statutes?

The result is officially called the Civil Rights Preservation Act of 2006. I discussed the bill draft today with three lawyers who practice in this field.

They briefed me on how the bill would benefit someone denied a job or access to a public accommodation. “We need sympathetic, articulate and diverse witnesses at the bill hearing who would be harmed if this legislation is not enacted,” I said.

“What are the chances for this bill?” one of them asked.

“If we can make this an important civil rights bill in an election year,” I replied, “Good.”

The Pro-Growth Progressive, the book reviewed in Sunday’s New York Times, arrived yesterday. Today, I read the chapter entitled “Seeing At-Risk Minority Males as Future Fathers and Workers.” Then I called the bill drafter.

The author praises the Second Chance Act of 2004, introduced in the Congress by two Democrats and two Republicans. It would offer comprehensive support to ex-offenders - housing, employment services, mental health treatment, and counseling.

At this late hour, I told the drafter, you can copy the language from this bill and not have to reinvent the wheel. Plus, make it a pilot program, with a cap on the cost of $250,000 (as I had done with the Maryland Alternative Teaching Opportunity Program to stay within the unwritten budgetary limit).

And draft it to the Public Safety Article so that the bill is referred to the Judiciary Committee, where I’m a member. She understood.

I had been stuck in the Joint Hearing Room all afternoon. Not entirely cut off from the outside world - thanks to my laptop, but totally unaware of what was going on across the street.

I had a 3:30 appointment with leading officials of a technology investment company. Assuming that I already knew, they told me that Senator Hollinger’s committee had voted favorably on our bill.

“What was the vote?” I asked. “6-4,” they replied.

Some rumors - true or otherwise, spread like wildfire in Annapolis. Other things may happen and, to paraphrase Yogi, you don’t hear about it until someone tells you.

----

The Gazette, a Montgomery County newspaper, reported today the results of its poll of 30 Annapolis insiders, who were asked to rank the most effective and ineffective legislators. Of the 141 House members, I was ranked 12th most effective - with this comment:

‘‘Gets the job done all the time.”

Even Brooks Robinson misplayed a few, I wrote a friend. Nonetheless, you’ll be seeing that comment again this summer - on my campaign literature.

When your megaphone’s not as big as the Governor’s, you try harder.

At last year’s hearing on my stem cell legislation, the Governor’s budget secretary submitted a written statement of opposition. Even though no Cabinet Secretary who likes his or her job takes a position on a major piece of legislation without the approval of the Governor, his press office spun the Secretary’s opposition as not indicative of the Governor’s position. For the most part, the media let him get away with it.

Consequently, at yesterday’s stem cell hearing, an aide to Speaker Busch and I gave to the press copies of the letter submitted by the Budget Secretary this time around. (“We believe that HB 1 is unnecessary.”) The Baltimore Sun reporter got it and understood its significance.

It’s mentioned in the 2nd paragraph of the story, followed by a response from the Speaker that the letter illustrates the Governor’s reluctance “to deal in embryonic stem cell research from the outset.”

The Washington Post, on the other hand, was treated to an exclusive interview with the Governor. The 2nd paragraph of its story read, “But it was a voice legislators did not hear, neither yesterday nor a year ago, that could alter this year’s debate - that of Gov. Robert L. Ehrlich, Jr.”

The article concluded with this quote from the Governor: “I would discourage both sides from impacting this thoughtful approach that we’ve developed.” That “thoughtful approach” is a $20 million appropriation with no indication as to how it will be awarded.

Needless to say, there was no reference to the letter from the Budget Secretary.

In his State of the State address today, the Governor discussed his funding for stem cell research, but the word “embryo” never passed his lips. I pointed this out afterwards to a reporter, who responded that our bill didn’t use the word either. When I got back to my office, I re-read our bill and emailed him three references to “embryo” in the legislation.

A great deal was said during the 4 ½ hour hearing on my embryonic stem cell research bill today.

“We are not chasing mirages. We are pursuing dreams. Therapies delayed are therapies denied,” declared Johns Hopkins researcher John Gearhart.

“Patients’ hope should be based on scientific data, not exaggerated claims. The onus is on embryonic stem cell researchers,” responded Catholic Conference lobbyist Nancy Fortier.

However, words that were written, not spoken, may also affect the future course of this legislation.

“We hope that you will support the Governor’s [$20 million] appropriation to the Stem Cell Research Fund. Accordingly, we believe that HB 1 is unnecessary,” wrote the Governor’s Budget Secretary Cecilia Januszkiewicz.

So the response to my conversations this week with executive branch officials, asking that the Governor work with the legislature in establishing criteria for spending this money, is “No.”

Perhaps, the Governor made a commitment to Republican legislators that they won’t have to vote on whether the State should fund embryonic stem cell research. And if my bill is not reported to the House floor and no amendment is offered to his budget bill specifying how that $20 million is to be spent, they won’t have to cast such a vote.

No one will know just how that money is going to be spent. That is unacceptable, not just to Democratic legislators but to the researchers who want to know if their proposals will be evaluated on the basis of scientific criteria.

For the second time in two days, I was meeting in my office with Executive Branch officials, discussing embryonic stem cell research.

“The Governor’s $20 million appropriation for this research is a great step forward,” I said, “but there needs to be legally binding language as to how this money will be spent. That’s what we did with the money we received from the settlement of the state’s lawsuit with the cigarette industry, and that’s what we need to do here as well. The legislature, the executive, and the scientific and academic communities need to reach a consensus.”

My secretary interrupted. “Cal Ripken’s out in the hallway.”

I hesitated. I didn’t want to go out there and not have him remember my Gold Glove performance at the inaugural Ripken Baseball Minor League Experience.

I needn’t have worried.

“You caught every inning in four games,” said Cal. “But one,” I interjected, ever the statistician. (I also tagged out three runners at the plate but didn’t mention that.) Cal also recalled pitching to me in the “All-Star” game. “We were in sync on your pitch selection,” he said.

“How fast were you throwing?” somebody asked. “About 60,” Cal replied, “but in high school I threw 90.”

“After the Orioles drafted me, they had to decide where to play me,” Cal related. “Earl wanted me to be an infielder. The general manager and the head of the farm system wanted me to pitch.

“My father, ever the organizational diplomat, said that if I started as an infielder but didn’t hit, they could make me a pitcher. But they couldn’t move me from pitcher to infielder [because Cal would have missed too many minor-league at bats].

“I said I’d prefer to be an infielder because you play every day.”

You don’t want to be known as a legislator who introduces “60 Minutes” bills. Flashy issue on Sunday night becomes bill drafting request on Monday morning.

I didn’t watch “60 Minutes” last night. The NFC title game was not yet a blowout. But before I settled in for seven quarters of football, I did read the Sunday New York Times, which prompted the following this morning:


"I write to request that legislation be drafted linking economic aid for single men to responsible fatherhood, based on Gene Sperling's proposal to do so in his new book, The Pro-Growth Progressive. The book was reviewed in yesterday's NYTimes, and I ordered it from amazon.com this morning."


Encouraging responsible behavior among women - through job training and substance abuse treatment, has been at the heart of Maryland’s welfare reform, which has reduced the rolls by 2/3.

For several years, I’ve tried to expand those efforts to men. The Building Strong Families Act of 2005 is one example. (As I wrote last week, the bill died because a gay marriage amendment would have been offered on the floor.)

Intrigued by the brief reference to responsible behavior in the review, I bought the book by a Clinton economics adviser and made the bill request. But why the reference to amazon.com?

Tomorrow is the deadline to make a bill request and be guaranteed that your bill will be drafted in time to avoid referral to (and delay in) the Rules Committee. So I wanted the drafter to know I was doing my best to find out more about this concept. (But not by overnight shipping.)

You’ll be shocked, shocked to learn that politics is involved in our override of 13 of the Governor’s vetoes. As well as policy and the Ehrlich style of governance.

Unlike the last two years, we made little effort to pare down the list of bills where the Democratic majority flexed its 85-vote muscle (the 3/5ths necessary to override a veto). But there was no willing partner in the Executive Branch to resolve the disputed issues.

The four voting bills are a representative example. When the Governor vetoed this legislation in late May, he wrote that he would appoint a study group in light of Maryland’s “national reputation as a state with a rich history of voter fraud.”

It was not until five months later, on Halloween (I don’t make this stuff up!) that the Governor created his commission. Contrary to custom, he did not consult the legislature’s two presiding officers on the membership of the group.

As one of the sponsors of the Voters Rights Protection Act, I was extended the courtesy of testifying before the commission. Its report was not issued until the day before the session started. During the floor debate this past week, nary a word was spoken about its recommendations.

For instance, the commission proposes that an individual be allowed to cast a provisional ballot only in the county where he or she is registered. That’s an idea worth considering, but there’s no sign that a bill will be introduced.

The Commission also writes that “The Governor believes that the legislature should adopt a voter identification system that emulates the best practices from other states.” Does the Governor think that no one should vote without a state-issued ID? If he does, he should introduce a bill.

A governor who wanted to meet the legislature half way, instead of dueling at a distance by sound bites, would have acted differently - when these bills were before the legislature last winter, when he appointed the commission to study them, and when the commission made its recommendations this month.

Reading the newspaper on the House floor can be very relevant to the issue we’re debating. Not always, but it was this morning.

As we were debating a rule change today, I read a New York Times article on eminent domain that a Baltimore City official had alerted me to.

For many politicians, the story quoted an economic development official, defending eminent domain was as perilous as endorsing gay marriage. “This issue is the third rail right now. You step on it, you die.”

Today’s rule change will prevent a delegate from offering a floor amendment that would add a constitutional amendment to a bill that was not already a constitutional amendment. Put another way, if a bill creates or amends a law that was passed by the legislature and does not require the voters’ approval, you can’t try to link it to a provision that does.

Last year, if a bill affecting marriage was being debated on the House floor, a constitutional amendment prohibiting same-sex marriage was certain to be offered. One of my bills, the Building Strong Families Act of 2005, fell victim to this ploy; it died in committee - to avoid a floor fight.

This summer, the Supreme Court ruled that governments can condemn private property for economic development by for-profit businesses. Our Republican caucus quickly responded by announcing it would offer a constitutional amendment banning eminent domain for this reason.

No doubt the same floor amendment strategy would be pursued. A constitutional amendment would be offered to any bill dealing with eminent domain.

How are these two issues wedded together? A constitutional amendment appears on the November ballot. Same-sex marriage prohibitions boosted the turnout among conservative voters in several red states in the Bush-Kerry election. A constitutional amendment on either marriage or eminent domain is intended to have the same effect on voters in Maryland this fall.

There are several apolitical reasons why a bill should not amend both the Maryland code of laws and the Maryland constitution. For instance, the Governor can veto the former but not the latter. Could he veto this hybrid? Plus, there are other ways for a constitutional amendment to be put before the full house.

Once again, good policy is good politics.

Yesterday’s veto override got little attention in today’s newspapers. So Lisa Gladden and I sent a letter to the editor of several papers. Whether or not they publish it, I can.


Dear Editors:

The Voters Rights Protection Act enhances citizens’ access to the voting booth by preveting voter intimidation and suppression. By overriding Governor Ehrlich’s veto, the General Assembly takes another step forward on the path trod 41 years ago by those who marched across the Edmund Pettis Bridge near Selma, Alabama.

We were the lead sponsors of this legislation. It adopts language from the federal Voting Rights Act of 1965 that prohibits the use of force, threat, menace, intimidation, bribery, deception, or reward to influence a voter's decision whether to go to the polls. Conduct that results in or has the intent to result in the denial or abridgement of the right of any citizen to vote on account of race, color, or disability is prohibited as well.

Such ugly acts are not historic relics of the Deep South. Four years ago, leaflets urging people to vote - but on the day after the election, were distributed in minority neighborhoods in Baltimore City and Prince George’s County. In adition, these flyers wrongly implied that you couldn’t vote if you owed child support or parking tickets. Our bill makes this deception a crime.

Provisional ballots are one of the reforms passed by the Congress after the Florida election debacle in 2000. If your name is not on the voters’ list at the precinct where you go to vote, you cast a provisional ballot. It’s counted after the polls close - only if you’re registered at another precinct.

But it counts only for federal offices, not state and local ones. Our bill changes that. Your vote counts for all offices for which you voted that were on the ballot in the precinct where you’re registered.

Republicans across the country are seeking to depress turnout among minorities by making it more difficult to vote, writes John B. Judis in The New Republic. They have supported legislation in seven states, such as Georgia, Wisconsin and Arizona, that requires voters to present state-issued photo IDs at the polls.

People who do not have a driver’s license must get an ID card from the state in order to vote. As we learned after Hurricane Katrina, many low-income blacks and Hispanics do not have driver’s licenses. One federal judge compared this requirement to a poll tax.

In the wake of the Bloody Sunday police beatings of civil rights demonstrators on the Edmund Pettis bridge, President Lyndon Johnson said to a joint session of Congress, "The most basic right of all was the right to choose your own leaders. The history of this country, in large measure, is the history of the expansion of that right to all of our people." The Voting Rights Act of 1965 was enacted five months later.

Forty years later, systematic denial of the franchise has ended, but ingenious efforts to thwart this fundamental right, such as those in Florida in 2000 and Maryland in 2002, still mar our electoral process.

With the passage of the Voters’ Rights Protection Act of 2005, all Marylanders can be confident that their fundamental right to vote shall not be abridged.

Senator Lisa Gladden and Delegate Samuel I. “Sandy” Rosenberg

Until today, there were only six bills that I list on my bio. Now, there are seven.

“The Voters Rights Protection Act of 2005 is now the law of Maryland.”

We had just overriden the Governor’s veto of the bill, and I placed a call to Senator Lisa Gladden. Both of us had crossfiled/sponsored the legislation. That’s how I began our conversation.

The new law combats voter suppression by adopting language from the federal Voting Rights Act that prohibits the use of force, threat, menace, intimidation, bribery, deception, or reward to influence a voter’s decision whether to go to the polls. Conduct that results or has the intent to result in the denial or abridgement of the right of any citizen of the United States to vote on account of race, color, or disability is prohibited as well.

Nonetheless, the Governor and the Republican members of the House cried “Fraud!” The lone provision of the bill they cited dealt with provisional ballots, one of the election reforms passed by the Congress after the Florida election debacle in 2000.

If your name is not on the voter’s list at the precinct where you go to vote, you cast a provisional ballot. It’s counted after the polls close - only if you’re registered at another precinct. But it counts only for federal offices, not state and local ones.

Our bill changes that. Your vote counts for all offices for which you voted that were on the ballot in the precinct where you’re registered.

Even though we’ve conducted several elections with provisional ballots since 2000, the Republicans raised the specter of rampant voter fraud - people traveling across the state on Election Day to vote countless times.

After speaking with Lisa Gladden, I went to the rostrum to thank the Speaker. “Five minutes into our first discussion of this bill, you understood that it was sound on policy grounds and good politics as well.” Expanding access to our most fundamental right as citizens is sound policy, and Republican opposition exposes their strategy to dampen minority turnout.

There will be no bill signing. No souvenir pens and photos with the Governor. Instead, we can celebrate the bill’s passage on Election Day.

I should have known but didn't:

Tomorrow, the Governor will introduce his budget. And for the fourth time in four years, the General Assembly will cut his budget. Man bites dog; Democrats take bite out of Republican's spending proposals.

How do I know what will happen this year when I didn’t remember that we had done so each of the last three years? The Governor's budget exceeds the limit on spending growth adopted by the Spending Affordability Committee, a group of legislators and private individuals.

That guideline is followed by the legislature and noticed by Wall Street. It's one of the major reasonsd why Maryland has the highest possible bond rating - AAA.

And if I didn’t know of the Governor’s history of liberal spending until reminded of it today, the average voter doesn’t either.

---

Don't tell my mother, but I made a cell phone call during the Baltimore City delegation dinner tonight.

But I can’t discuss the nature of the call until I know if I’ve brought home the bacon.

I rose to explain my vote on the Walmart bill. But the Speaker had his eyes on the vote tally, not the House floor. He knew there were 88 green votes (three more than needed) because of an electronic tally available only to him on the rostrum. So there was no need for me to speak and give the Democratic whips the time to round up the votes needed to override the Governor’s veto.

This is what I was going to say:

Several delegates have mentioned Franklin Roosevelt tonight - during the debate on Walmart, as well as the minimum wage legislation. FDR signed two minimum wage bills - the first as Governor of New York, the second as President. New York established a minimum wage because the federal government had failed to do so.

Once again, Washington has shirked its responsibility. Our bill would raise the minimum wage in Maryland from $5.15 per hour to $6.15 per hour. Other states have already done so. Since the Republican controlled Congress has blocked efforts to raise this standard, we must act at the state level to help assure a living wage for working men and women.

Two summers ago, I read op-ed articles about meetings among business, labor and other officials to try to address both the spiraling costs of employer-provided health care and coverage for the uninsured. I was encouraged that such a coalition could move the political discussion in new ways. Regrettably, nothing has come of those conversations.

As taxpayers, we are paying the costs of employers, such as Walmart, who do not provide health care coverage for their employees. We foot the bill for hospital visits by the uninsured and for those who are enrolled in Medicaid. Until there is action on this issue at the federal level, it is the states who must serve, in Justice Brandeis' phrase, as the laboratories of democracy.


I saw the Speaker at a reception later tonight. We laughed about his “failure” to see me rise to speak.

“Save it for stem cells,” he said.

Once again, I began the session the way I did 23 years ago - cholesterol-loading at Chick and Ruth’s Deli. An omelette and home fries - but no bread, in deference to my South Beach diet.

Then I began what I hope will become an Opening Day tradition. I visited the Uriah P. Levy Jewish Chapel at the Naval Academy, just opened this September. There’s a marker that says “Samuel I. Rosenberg - Hon. Samuel I. Rosenberg.”

My family provided for that tribute to my paternal grandfather and me. (On the other side of my family tree, this will be the last year there’s a Hecht Co. sign in Annapolis - or anywhere else.)

The opening session itself was ceremonial. Veto overrides and a rule change were special ordered (postponed) until tomorrow.

My lone substantive meeting of the day was prompted by a front-page story in the New York Times this fall: “Options Open, Top Graduates Line Up To Teach to the Poor.” Many college seniors are interested in teaching - many more than are accepted into programs like Teach for America.

For example, 12% of this year’s graduates from both Yale and Spelman College, a historically black institution, applied to TFA. Less than 13% of all applicants were accepted.

There must be plenty of qualified applicats who could teach in Maryland schools, I said to myself. “Should we pursue them?” I asked Nancy Grasmick, State Superintendent of Schools, when she was the guest Socratic dialoguer at my Legislation class at Maryland Law School a few weeks later. Yes, she replied.

Today, I met with two members of her staff to discuss the bill draft for the Maryland Alternative Teaching Opportunity Program. To attract people to Teach For America and other innovative teacher preparation programs, the state would match local school boards’ payments for a summer internship program to 150 prospective teachers.

Why only 150? The program would cost less than $250,000, the unwritten limit on the fiscal note for a bill. Nonetheless, it’s a start. Those 150 teachers could touch the lives of thousands of students.

That’s why I love my job. I can take an idea and try to make it public policy.

Late this morning, all 188 members of the legislature received an email from the Governor’s Office. It invited us to his press conference tomorrow regarding the announcement of his “Science and Technology Initiatives.”

The events is in Baltimore at 10:45 a.m. The session begins at noon. Tough to do both without a State Police escort.

At 2:00 this afternoon, we held our press conference at Lawyer’s Mall. In the shadow of the statue of Thurgood Marshall, I said: “Marshall knew when people were playing games with his clients - denying them equal justice under law. Governor, stop playing games with stem cells. Fund the research. Show us the money!”

As our event ended, word circulated that the Governor’s office was hastily arranging a 5:30 press briefing. There, his staff announced that he would be amending his budget to provide $20 million for stem cell research. Proposals using adult or embryonic stem cells would be eligible.

When the press called, I said: “It would be irresponsible for the legislature not to adopt criteria for how this money should be spent. There are serious ethical and scientific concerns here. And we would do that with a Democratic governor. I can recite chapter and verse of instances when we’ve done so.”

This evening, I received an e-mail from one of the scientists who has been very involved in our effort. “I'll be in NYC tomorrow, but back late tomorrow nite. By that time, I hope we can all look over all the details.” I replied: “It is a great victory and step forward but now we have to legislate the details.”

And we haven’t even begun the session yet...

The Sun article about today's events is at http://www.baltimoresun.com/news/local/politics/bal-te.md.stem11jan11,1,2420438.story?coll=bal-home-headlines

“Stem cell politics on tap” read the front page headline in today’s Sun.


Late last week, a friend in the Executive Branch leaked to me that Governor Ehrlich would be holding a press conference this Wednesday to announce that he would be funding the construction of a new building for stem cell research.


Those labs will be without top-flight scientists if the State doesn’t fund embryonic stem cell research. To make that point - and to emphasize that the Governor is not providing state dollars for this research, we’re holding our press conference tomorrow - the day before the Governor’s. And we leaked that fact to a Sun reporter.


“Parking law is focus of bill” read the headline on the lede story in the Maryland section of today’s Sun. We do stem cells in Annapolis, I said to myself. At the City Council, they do parking.


But then I was off to a breakfast meeting my State Senator, Lisa Gladden, and I were having with neighborhood community leaders. Their concerns were about housing code violations and an unwanted development project. We said we’d explore how we could help by introducing legislation in Annapolis.

And I was reminded of what then Delegate Torrey Brown told me 23 years ago, just before I was sworn in for the first time. “The work you do for your constituents back home,” he said, “is just as important as the policy decisions you make in Annapolis.”

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