Family Cap

Gov. William Donald Schaefer's final legislative session didn't turn out the way he had intended. Thanks to an election-year mood in the General Assembly -- particularly in the state Senate -- few of the governor's major proposals survived. It was a bitterly disappointing setback for Mr. Schaefer, a setback that obscured a long list of significant and far-sighted proposals the governor pushed through the legislature in his previous seven sessions.Still, not all was doom and gloom. A modest gun-control bill banning 18 types of assault pistols was approved on the governor's fourth try. A bill tightening controls on cigarette sales to minors was weakened but finally passed.

Here is how members of Maryland's delegation on Capitol Hill were recorded on selected roll-call votes last week:Y: YES N: NO X: NOT VOTINGHOUSE: LOCKBOXVoting 364-59, the House passed a bill (HR 1162) to ensure that savings from spending cuts voted on the House and Senate floors are used to lower the deficit rather than buttress other programs.0$ A yes vote was to pass the bill.N X MemberY * * Ehrlich, Robert, R-2nd* N * Hoyer, Steny H. D-5thY * * Bartlett, Roscoe G., R-6thY * * Wynn, Albert R., D-4thY * * Cardin, Benjamin L., D-3rdY * * Mfume, Kweisi, D-7thY * * Gilchrest, Wayne T., R-1stY * * Morella, Constance A., R-8thSENATE: MORE CHILDRENBy a 66-34 vote, the Senate stripped a pending welfare overhaul bill (HR 4)

By the end of this month, Gov. William Donald Schaefer must decide which bills passed by the General Assembly should be vetoed. Since this is an election year, the governor's vetoes cannot be overridden by the newly elected legislature next January. So Mr. Schaefer's thumbs-down verdict this time will be final.The governor has a likely veto candidate in a bill that would make English the official language of Maryland. It's a sham.The bill is totally without merit. It makes no substantive change in state law and alters nothing in the way the state conducts its daily business.

In a fascinating replay in miniature of the national debate over crime and welfare reform, the District of Columbia's overwhelmingly Democratic, "liberal" city council has given its blessing to two bills that could have come straight out of Newt Gingrich's "Contact with America." If that seems a contradiction, it only shows how corrupted words like "liberal" and "conservative" have become in a season when political labels are tossed around with careless contempt for meanings.The council, alarmed over rampant juvenile crime in neighborhoods where parents can't or won't control their children, passed a curfew banning young people under 17 from being on the street after 11 p.m. on weekdays or after midnight on weekends.

An article in yesterday's Carroll County edition incorrectly reported the amount of an Aid to Families with Dependent Children grant. The grants are $3.65 per person, per day.The Sun regrets the errors.State welfare reform shouldn't lose sight of the basic idea of welfare -- helping people, said the chairwoman of the Carroll County Department of Social Services board of directors.Elinor Causey, a retired teacher, and other members met last month to draft comments to send to Gov. William Donald Schaefer and his Commission on Welfare Reform.

If new delegates in Annapolis thought they had gotten a good taste of the legislative process, they may want to revise their impressions later this week. The subject under consideration on the House floor tomorrow afternoon and evening is Gov. Parris N. Glendening's budget for fiscal year 1996. But the real focus of the debate falls in his courageous but controversial decision to lift restrictions on funding for Medicaid abortions.Since 1980, Maryland has allowed Medicaid funds to pay for abortions only in cases where the mother's life or health is seriously threatened, or in cases where pregnancy results from rape or incest or when the fetus is deformed.

Seven gubernatorial candidates squared off last night on a host of family issues that ranged from welfare reform to spanking school children, but offered few specific remedies.The candidates, both Democrats and Republicans, wrestled with the complex issues of government's role in protecting and providing for children and families, and spurring the state economy with the hope of more and better-paying jobs.The two-hour forum at the University of Maryland Baltimore County was sponsored by the MarylandCommittee for Children Inc., a pri vate, nonprofit advocacy group.

When the Republican Congress and Democratic President Bill Clinton agreed to "end welfare as we know it" in 1996, it stood to reason that states would need time to recover from decades of policies that undermined work incentives and encouraged family breakups - or never forming two-parent families in the first place. After more than a decade with the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act of 1996 in place, however, we now can see success has been widespread and deep, and we can assess how some states effectively capitalized on the freedom offered by this landmark national welfare reform, and how some failed embarrassingly.