|
archived: 20 - 26 May, 2007 Back Next UPDATED: MAY 23, 2007ONE STEP CLOSER A Republican bill to ban same sex marriages in North Carolina passed out of a State House Committee today despite Democrats controlling the Committee. The history of how this happened is a bit complicated, but important for North Carolina Democrats to understand. Part of the responsibility resides on the door step of the Progressive Democrats of North Carolina. Progressive democrats pushed for the Democratic controlled House to end a plethora of traditional rules they considered anti-democratic. One of PDNC’s proposals: The House should adopt rules such that any bill may be brought forth for a vote in a committee upon a majority vote of that committee, and any bill having passed a committee vote, may be brought forth to the floor upon a majority vote of the House. In an article at the time entitled PROGRESSIVE AGENDA?, TPJ warned that passage of such a rule would result in measures that Democrats oppose being considered; principally, a constitutional ban on same sex marriages that Republicans have been pushing for years in North Carolina. The PDNC appears to believe that reforming the legislative process would afford progressive legislation a better opportunity to be enacted. We refer specifically to the PDNC’s statement, “Want to kill a popular bill in the public interest but opposed by powerful interests? Have the committee chair not bring it to a vote, or send in “floating” committee members with instructions to vote it down, or refer it to the Rules Committee with a pliable chair and bury it there, or several other ways. Want legislation to pass for a powerful interest that members would be embarrassed to vote for? Insert its provisions in the budget bill.” Progressives should carefully consider that the structure and powers attendant in the legislative process as described by the PDNC also ensure to the advantage of progressive positions. IF the PDNC’s reforms are enacted, progressives will have assisted in enacting constitutional ban on same sex marriages, perhaps including civil unions, in North Carolina. Why? The public in North Carolina is strongly opposed to same sex marriages. as currently is true in most other states. North Carolina adopted legislation banning such marriages. Republicans have led the effort nationally to advance constitutional amendments and they have focused their efforts in North Carolina as well. A bill calling for a constitutional amendment has not passed because Democratic committee chairmen in the General Assembly have refused to bring such a measure to a vote in committee. If a bill calling for a constitutional amendment comes to a vote, in committee or on the floor of either House of the General Assembly, it will pass. Under the specific proposal of the PDNC that a majority of either House of the General Assembly can call for a vote on a bill, Republicans quickly will have the vote on the constitutional amendment. Are progressive Democrats willing to foster reforms that will have this result? And, it will certainly not end with same sex marriage. The State House adopted reform measures that permitted Republicans to force their bill calling for a constitutional ban on same sex marriage to a vote in Committee. The bill passed Committee and was sent to the floor. This was the sequence of events: The bill flipped from a committee to full House and back to a committee on Tuesday, as proponents tried to force a chamber vote and Hackney resorted for the first time to using the kind of procedural gambit that was a hallmark of past House leaders. The House Rules Committee sent the bill to the full House in the morning, moments after narrowly rejecting an effort to send it to another committee - a tactic aimed at keeping the proposal from coming to a vote. Two Democrats joined the Republicans on the committee in voting to keep the measure alive. In the end, Speaker Hackney exercised his authority as Speaker to send the bill to another Committee, where the bill will most probably die. However, there is still a chance that the bill will resurface, either this year or in the “short session” of the General Assembly next year. Republicans came dangerously close to having their bill passed by the House. If it had passed the House, Senate Democrats would have been hard pressed not to have voted on the measure. Progressive Democrats helped inflict this wound. Progressive Democrats have also wounded Speaker Hackney. Republicans will now portray Speaker Hackney publicly as standing against the majority will of North Carolinians. It is indeed ironic, that progressives have wounded a Speaker who is sympathetic to their causes. At the least, progressive Democrats have helped Republicans come one step closer. Republicans now have visibility for their constitutional amendment and they have momentum. It is a scenario that should never have been possible in a Democratic controlled General Assembly. Progressive Democrat “strategists” essentially exposed homosexuals in this State to a “sell-out” in pursuit of their own narrow agenda. LOOKING AHEAD Following up on our article on voter registration that appears below, TPJ looks at two Congressional Districts in particular detail today. In the 11th Congressional District, Democratic Rep. Heath Schuler will have to defend his 2006 capture of this seat from Republicans. The chart immediately below is the number of newly registered voters in the District. The counties are color coded: blue indicating Democrats registered more voters than Republicans or Unaffiliated; red to denominate counties in which Republicans registered more votes than Democrats or Unaffiliated; and no color to reflect where Unaffiliated voters registered greater than Republicans and Democrats.
The next chart reduces the new registrations to percentages (“New”) and compares the percentage of newly registered voters to the percentage for that Party/Unaffiliated (“Co T”) in that County. The simple question is whether a Party or Unaffiliated is registering more or less new voters than exist in the County generally. The county column is color coded; blue, to show counties in which Democrats are registering new voters at higher percentages; red, to show counties where Republicans are registering new voters at higher percentages; and no color to denote counties in which Unaffiliated voters are registering at higher percentages.
Both charts generally reflect that neither Party is gaining much of an advantage over the other at this early stage of the 2008 election cycle. In fact, Unaffiliated voters are leading in new registrations, followed by Democrats. Looking just at the new registrations, one senses that the 2008 election will be another highly contested affair in the 11th CD and could depend in large measure on how Unaffiliated voters split. The 8th Congressional offers interesting contrast. First, a caveat. The 8th CD has a number of counties that are split and TPJ does not, at the moment, have access to new registration data for parts of the respective split counties. The charts below take in whole counties only. Therefore, the conclusions reached are best estimates only. The chart below shows new voter registrations for the 8th CD based on whole counties. The color codes in the county column for the 11th CD also apply here.
| |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||