Voters

Baltimore voters were poised to approve four charter amendments Tuesday, including one to move city elections to the same years that the nation chooses a president. The city would hold its next election in 2016, under one of the changes leading by broad margins in early returns. The amendment would effectively give the mayor and city council — elected in 2011 — five-year terms this time, and in the future would allow local officials to run for state office without worrying about losing their city positions.

The realities of the 2012 presidential campaign season: 23 million unemployed or underemployed Americans, soaring gas prices, mounting debt, a controversial national health care law about to take effect, unrest overseas, and a fiscal cliff looming. Historical precedent — since FDR, no president has been reelected with unemployment hovering around or above 8 percent — and polling showing most people felt the country was on the wrong track pointed to a "change election cycle" and a resounding Mitt Romney victory.

As results poured in at the midnight hour for the 2012 elections, it appeared Baltimore County voters were in step with statewide voters on most ballot initiatives including the hot-button issue of same-sex marriage — but not on expanding casino gambling. With 230 of 235 county precincts reporting, the proposed Civil Marriage Protection Act, Question 6, was leading by about 51 to 49 percent. That was about the same as statewide percentages, with nearly 61 percent of precincts reporting.

If 2,500 Baltimore middle school students have their way Tuesday, President Barack Obama will be re-elected, children of some illegal immigrants will pay in-state tuition rates, same-sex couples can marry and gambling in Maryland will not expand. The results were announced Monday by the students of City Neighbors Charter School, who through a "Voters of Tomorrow" initiative conducted a mock vote in 29 city schools on key choices facing the state and country on Election Day. The project was a culmination of social studies lessons this fall for sixth-, seventh- and eighth-graders at City Neighbors, which included following debates, arguing different positions in class, and hearing viewpoints from figures on both sides of the issues, including Republican Del. Pat McDonough, Democratic Del. Mary Washington and the immigrant rights group Casa de Maryland.

Marylanders made history Tuesday as they voted to make same-sex marriage legal - a question that had been defeated each of the 32 times it had been on the ballot in other states. "To Maryland's children - please know that you and your families matter to the people of our state," Gov. Martin O'Malley, who pushed for the law, said early Wednesday in a statement declaring victory. "Whether your parents happen to be gay or straight, Democratic, Republican or Independent, your families are equal before the eyes of the law. " The Free State joins six others and the District of Columbia, which have allowed same-sex marriage.

Voters across Maryland reported record lines and waits of up to two hours Tuesday as a close presidential contest and several controversial state ballot questions drew people to the polls. "In all the elections I've been to, I've never seen a line this long," former congresswoman Helen Bentley said of her precinct at Dulaney High School. Maryland could become the first state in the nation to uphold gay marriage on referendum. Voters are considering another first - whether to grant in-state college tuition to certain illegal immigrants, the only time in the country the issue has been decided at the polls.

President Barack Obama won re-election yesterday thanks to a narrow edge in a swath of key battleground states. His prize: another four years as the leader of a sharply divided nation facing a series of seemingly intractable problems, chief among them the economy, the debt and employment. The first order of business must be to avoid the fiscal cliff looming over the country at year's end that will mandate tax increases and deep, across-the-board cuts to defense, entitlement programs and domestic spending programs unless he and Congress can agree on a way forward.

If four years ago they voted for historic change, on Tuesday, Maryland supporters of President Barack Obama cast their ballots for patience. "I figure that in four years, he couldn't have done everything to right the course after the previous administration," Kimberly Shorter, 39, of Woodlawn said after casting her vote for him. "Of course, there was some disappointment with the fact that he didn't do everything he set out to do, but he's human...

I am genuinely puzzled by the bewilderment of people like Dan Rodricks who do not understand the anger of voters and the source of that anger ("At long last, it's time to cast our votes," Nov. 6). They are angry about the augmented intrusion of government into their lives at every level — national, state, municipal. It is an intrusion that, almost without exception, is expensive and ineffective in advancing any social or fiscal progress. It is not the bailout of Wall Street, the auto industry, and other TARP beneficiaries — although that bailout is an indicium.