Recycling bins are back in the State House. The governor rides in a sport utility vehicle that can burn ethanol. Maryland is about to join a handful of states that mandate low-emission cars, and it is closer than it has been in years to prohibiting smoking in bars, abolishing the death penalty and banning assault weapons.
In ways large and small, Annapolis is showing signs of a leftward tilt just six weeks after Democratic Gov. Martin O'Malley succeeded Republican Gov. Robert L. Ehrlich Jr.
But halfway into the General Assembly session, just how liberal Maryland's new government is remains to be settled. Bills that would raise cigarette taxes to expand health care, impose a fee on new development to clean up the Chesapeake Bay and give state unions greater bargaining power are hardly a sure thing, even with a Democrats in control of the legislature.
Tax increases - likely to be a major topic in Annapolis as lawmakers grapple with expected revenue shortfalls of more than $1 billion a year - have been suggested, but O'Malley has talked about trying first to make state government more cost-efficient.
Even though all of the leaders in Annapolis are Democrats, they often do not agree on how or when to tackle major issues, and some say the State House has an institutional conservatism.
"He's a progressive," Senate President Thomas V. Mike Miller, a Democrat, said of O'Malley. "I don't mind being progressive. ... But we've got a lot of institutional memory here. It's a philosophy that we stand on the shoulders of the senators who came before us."
Maryland's constitution gives the governor tremendous power to set the direction of the state, but Assembly rules give the House speaker and Senate president significant authority over the course of legislation.
When all three agree, the government can move rapidly. But former House Speaker Casper R. Taylor Jr., a Democrat who is now a lobbyist, said there is usually an institutional tension between the presiding officers that slows things down. That's happening now with the budget, he said, and it's a good thing.
"The governor is taking a very effective, comprehensive and deliberate approach to ... the most fundamental issue facing the Maryland state government right now, which is the structural deficit," Taylor said. "That issue should have been addressed years ago, and I include myself in those who should have done something. ... This governor is approaching it the right way."
