The biggest challenge issued by Gov.
Mike Beebe and the new leadership of the Arkansas Legislature to themselves and to state lawmakers is to do better than their counterparts in the federal government.
The state Legislature convened in Little Rock this week with calls for true bipartisanship from this historic session with its Republican majorities in both houses.
The underlying message: Don’t be like the overly partisan U.S. Congress, frozen in gridlock and founded on resentment.
Trust each other. Work together for the people who sent you to Little Rock.
On Monday, both newly elected House Speaker Davy Carter and Senate President Pro Tem Michael Lamoureux let their respective chambers know they expected cooperation within and between these politically divided chambers.
The session will be about “how we treat each other,” Lamoureux, a Russellville Republican, told fellow senators on Monday after 21 Republicans and 14 Democrats were sworn into the 35-member upper chamber.
At the other end of the Capitol, Republican Carter of Cabot, who won his post with strong Democratic support, urged the House membership(51 Republicans, 48 Democrats and one Green Party representative) to work together and told them they will be judged by what they accomplish for Arkansas.
“We must resolve to not let Washington’s animosity seep in and poison our well of civil discourse,” Beebe cautioned a day later.
“Arkansas cannot change the way things are done in D.C., but we can continue to set the example of how men and women with different views can still come together in the best interest of our citizens,” Beebe said.
The term-limited governor’s remarks came Tuesday in his final “state of the state” address to lawmakers.
A lot of Beebe’s speech was about Medicaid, both the need to address a revenue shortfall and to approve an expansion of the federal program to help 250,000 of the state’s working poor. But it began and ended on this idea of meeting obligations to the electorate regardless of party label.
Much has been written and said about how different this session might be “because of who you are,” he said.
A veteran of 20 years in the state Senate before he served as attorney general and governor, Democrat Beebe said his instincts say this session won’t be that different from the others he experienced.
Their solemn responsibilities are the same as their predecessors in those seats, all of whom walked through the doors “with varied backgrounds and intentions,” he said.
As their predecessors came together, so will these lawmakers, Beebe suggested, noting the opportunity to inspire future Arkansas lawmakers and perhaps teach the Congress a thing or two.
It was a fitting opening for a session with the right message to the members.
But time will tell how well they listened and how open they really are to compromise.
The backgrounds and intentions of the members of this Legislature are about as varied as they can get and based on hard-set beliefs. They may be open initially to listen to each other but listening doesn’t necessarily result in compromise.
Campaign promises have a way of locking candidates into positions that aren’t easily abandoned.
Beebe’s remarks recognized the dilemma for lawmakers, particularly those who went to Little Rock on pledges to oppose anything to do with the federal health care legislation so many call Obamacare.
For the most part, there’s nothing the state legislators can do about the federal law. But they must decide whether Arkansas will participate in expansion of Medicaid.
And three-quarters of both houses must agree before it can happen.
Beebe tried to explain refusing to take the federal dollars to expand the program in Arkansas won’t dent the national debt but will deny insurance to their Arkansas neighbors who can’t afford it otherwise.
He tried to tell them expanding Medicaid will get those people covered.
It will also ease the cost of uncompensated care to the state’s hospitals and help keep fiscally challenged hospitals open and employing health care workers.
All of those outcomes ought to result from the kind of bipartisanship and cooperation the governor and the leaders encouraged.
In time, we’ll see in time if it happens.
BRENDA BLAGG IS A FREELANCE COLUMNIST AND LONGTIME JOURNALIST IN NORTHWEST ARKANSAS.
Opinion, Pages 5 on 01/16/2013