Maryland Accountability Project

PRESS RELEASE

February 7, 2005

New Report Finds General Assembly Has Become Marginally More Conservative

Senate More Conservative Than House of Delegates

ANNAPOLIS – Has the Maryland General Assembly become slightly more conservative? So says a report released today by the Maryland Accountability Project. In its second annual voting pattern scorecard, the legislative nonprofit watchdog group found a slight conservative shift in the votes of both Republicans and Democrats in the General Assembly. The MAP “voting pattern” scorecard can be downloaded by clicking here.

The latest MAP scorecard scores legislators on twenty bills – a cross-section of economic, social, and regulatory legislation. The bills used include both very public legislation that received substantial media coverage and smaller, more obscure legislation that received little or no attention. Unlike other legislative scorecards, the MAP scorecard is not issue-based, and instead scores the overall voting pattern of state legislators on a larger pool of legislation. Legislators have no advance notice as to which bills MAP will be scoring in a given year.

The MAP scorecard uses a scale of 0-100 with 0 representing a 0% conservative voting record and 100 representing a 100% conservative voting record. MAP does not take positions on the bills scored and uses the conservative position as a baseline for scoring.

In 2004, the average score in the House of Delegates was 33%, up from 26%, and the average score in the Senate was 38%, up from 33%. The highest individual score was 90%, up from 88% and the lowest individual score was 5%, up from 0%.

“MAP’s data does show a slight conservative shift by the General Assembly between the 2003 and 2004 sessions,” said Doug Graham of the Maryland Accountability Project. “The reason for this marginal shift is anyone’s guess – perhaps Governor Ehrlich is influencing the legislative agenda or maybe legislators avoided hot button issues and worked more on consensus legislation. As the 2006 election approaches, MAP will watch to see if the General Assembly shifts more conservative or liberal or stays the same.”

For the second year in a row, Senator Alex Mooney (R-03) ranked as the most conservative member of both the Senate and the entire General Assembly, this time with a 90% score. Delegate Don Dwyer (R-31) again ranked as the most conservative member of the House of Delegates with an 85% conservative score. Senator James Brochin (D-42) again ranks as the most conservative Democrat in the Senate, but this year, is tied for the first time with John Astle (D-30), both with a 40% conservative score. Delegate Kevin Kelly (D-01B) again ranks as the most conservative Democrat in the House of Delegates, but this year he shares that status with two other Democrats: Delegates Joan Cadden (D-31) and John Wood (D-29A), all of whom received a 45% conservative score.

For the first time, Delegate Dan Morhaim (D-11) ranked as the most liberal member of both the House of Delegates and the entire General Assembly with a 5% conservative score. Senators Nathaniel Exum (D-24) and Paula Hollinger (D-11) ranked as the most liberal members of the Senate with a 15% score. Delegate Jean Cryor (R-15) ranked as the most liberal Republican in the House of Delegates with a 20% score, and Senators Donald Munson (R-02) and Sandra Schraeder (R-13) had the lowest score among Republicans in the Senate with a 55% score. Senate President Mike Miller (D-27) and Speaker of the House Michael Busch (D-30) each scored a 20% conservative rating.

The Maryland Accountability Project (MAP) is a nonpartisan, nonprofit organization dedicated to educating citizens about Maryland ’s state government and the activities of state public officials and to generally encouraging citizens to participate in the democratic process to hold public officials accountable. More information about MAP can be found on the organization’s Web site at www.marylandaccountabilityproject.org.

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