House falls four votes shy on override. Lawmakers then reach accord on three month continuing resolution.
The actions that drove the adoption of the continuing resolution took place in the house�..There, lawmakers debated for more than three hours before supporters of the legislature�s budget position fell four votes shy of the 2/3s majority needed override Governor Craig Benson�s veto.��With democrats voting as a block in support of the override��The real debate was confined to members of the GOP�.And speakers on both side of the issue tended to frame the matter as a question of loyalty. For arch -conservatives like John Gibson Merrimack.�..The loyalty most worth heeding was the anti-tax republicanism typified by the Benson veto.
�We are being asked to decide whether the leadership of this legislature is right or is the governor is correct�.And Mr. Speaker I truly believe this � this budget will saddle this state with an income tax in 2006�.Mr. Speaker the governor is right�..And I admire his courage.�
But for other, more established members of the caucus members of the caucus�..the loyalty to prize was something altogether different.
For Ken Weyler of Kingston, vice chairman of the house fianc�ommittee.��the override seemed less about backing a specific set of budgetary principles��than it did to protecting the house�s institutional prerogatives from the encroachment of state�s chief executive.
�The governor can do what he likes but this is first and last and always a legislative document�..And I hope you will maintain the supremacy of this body in all matter of budget.�
Other prominent house members also stressed that the Governor�..and not the house, should be willing to compromise��Deputy House speaker Mike Whalley�..said given that the gulf between what lawmakers wanted to spend�..and what governor Benson said he�s tolerate��the veto was unnecessary.
�Mr. Speaker this disagreement is over 25 million dollars per year�..On a 4.4 billion dollar budget per year�.If you sugar that down what that means is we have a disagreement with the governor over 60 cent spent 100 dollars.�
Such arguments, however, failed to convince even all members of house leadership��Four committee chairman voted against leadership to support the Benson veto. House judiciary chairman Henry Mock took great pains to stress that his defection was based entirely on personal principle�But the Jackson lawmaker also used what many legislators said was the day�s decisive speech to urge lawmakers to heed the mandate that swept Benson into office in the 2002 election.
�He ran against a fervent income taxer��. and many of us rode into this house on his coattails and on the coattails of an income tax��Now is not the time to sell him out.�
And lawmakers didn�t�� But even after the political victory of the failed override�.. the Benson loyalists were not in a conciliatory mood.�..When the continuing resolution they adopted was changed by the senate�..they were ready to reject it because the temporary spending plan took its numbers from the legislatures vetoed budget. They only baked off when House speaker gene chandler delivered the following news.
�I have just spoken with the governor�He has assured me he will work with the house and the senate on coming up with a new budget�..And hopefully this house will adopt the committee of conference report and that�s it.�
Legislative leaders must now select a new budget committee of conference �.Lawmakers will have until October 1st to reach agreement on new two -year spending plan.
