Congressional Redistricting

WASHINGTON -- Rep. Tom McMillen, a Maryland Democrat pitched into a new congressional district with Republican Rep. Wayne T. Gilchrest, recently raised nearly six times as much money as his opponent, according to federal records.The five-term Crofton Democrat collected $285,046 in contributions from individuals and special interests between April 1 and June 30, compared with $51,342 raised by Mr. Gilchrest, according to campaign finance reports filed with the Federal Election Commission.There is an even greater disparity in cash reserves.

WASHINGTON -- Rep. Tom McMillen, a Maryland Democrat pitched into a new congressional district with Republican Rep. Wayne T. Gilchrest, has raised nearly six times as much money as his opponent, according to recent federal records.The five-term Crofton Democrat collected $285,046 in contributions from individuals and special interests between April 1 and June 30, compared with $51,342 raised by Mr. Gilchrest, according to campaign finance reports filed with the Federal Election Commission.

In Anne Arundel County politics, 1991 will be remembered as the yearthe county got re-drawn and quartered.The county, which for years dominated a single congressional district, became a minority in four districts under a plan approved by the General Assembly in October.A bipartisan group of citizens and leaders sued to have the plan thrown out, but a divided panel of federal judges ruled last week that the plan was legal.Opponents are considering taking their case to the U.S. Supreme Court.

Anne Arundel County political leaders filed a bipartisan suit in Baltimore's federal court yesterday, challenging a congressional redistricting plan they say denies the county a voice on Capitol Hill.The suit, brought by the Anne Arundel County Bipartisan Citizen's Coalition, asks the court to declare unconstitutional the plan that splits the county among four congressional districts. It asks that the General Assembly be required to pass a new redistricting plan by Dec. 1, or that the court impose a plan by Dec. 15.The suit, which lists the county Democratic and Republican parties and five county residents as plaintiffs, also seeks to bar state election officials from registering candidates for the March 3 congressional primary until the districts are resolved.

ANNAPOLIS -- Deadlock turned to deadline on congressional redistricting yesterday as House Speaker R. Clayton Mitchell Jr., D-Kent, said he would end the special legislative session Monday night unless a compromise is reached.Mr. Mitchell, irritated after nearly four weeks of haggling, said he would favor sending competing House and Senate redistricting plans to Gov. William Donald Schaefer, who could then choose one of them.Mr. Schaefer said later at a hastily called news conference that he would be willing to do that and was leaning toward the House-passed version.

Far more than the shape of congressional boundaries is at stake in the Annapolis brouhaha over redistricting. It's a fight over power and who really calls the shots in the three-ring circus known as the State House.Three characters are at the heart of this drama: the governor, the speaker of the House and the Senate president. Friction among the three has always been present. It is inherent in Maryland's governmental framework.But there's a difference. This time, the battle is between House Speaker R. Clayton Mitchell and Senate President Thomas V. Mike Miller.

Members of the Maryland Senate were returning to Annapolis today to work on passing a new congressional redistricting plan to leave for their absent colleagues in the House of Delegates.House Speaker R. Clayton Mitchell Jr., saying that the Senate was not giving his favored proposal a fair consideration, sent the 141 delegates home yesterday, only 24 hours after the start of the special session called to draw new district maps.Mitchell's action puzzled some senators, who said the two chambers had not had a chance to negotiate the politically loaded issue.

The standoff between Maryland lawmakers over congressional redistricting continued today in Annapolis as the Senate returned to work while, across the hall, the House of Delegates chamber remained empty.House Speaker R. Clayton Mitchell Jr., saying the Senate was not giving his favored proposal a fair consideration, sent the 141 delegates home yesterday, only 24 hours after the start of the special session called to draw new district maps.Today Mitchell, seated outside his State House office, said he is willing to meet privately with Senate leadership "today, the next day and the next day and the next."

"The public doesn't, for the most part, give a tinker's damn how these lines are drawn."-- Senate President Thomas V. Mike Miller.The legislature's foremost champion of a "people's plan" for congressional redistricting, Senate President Mike Miller, is trying to have it both ways. A month ago, he pushed through the governor's redistricting committee a map that he labeled a plan for the common man, but which was in actuality an exercise in raw, partisan politics. Now he is once again holding firm for this monstrous proposal, this time claiming that the public doesn't give a hoot what politicians do in tracing new congressional boundary lines.

ANNAPOLIS -- House and Senate leaders predicted yesterday that their respective chambers will pass competing congressional redistricting plans this week and that it could take days to work out a compromise.The gap between the plan the House of Delegates is expected to back and the variety of plans under consideration by the Senate is so great that the presiding officers have even discussed the possibility of postponing Maryland's March 3 presidential primary to buy more time, although they said that was unlikely.