Everyone won’t agree with the methods or the goals, but Maryland finds itself leading often on progressive solutions to pressing national problems.
Last fall, voters made Maryland the 8th state to legalize marriage equality. The assembly voted for it. And the people ratified that vote. Efforts to overturn the assembly’s approval of Dream Act failed as well.
Republican-led efforts to prove that legislators and Gov. Martin O’Malley were out of step with rank and file voters found little support. There’s a reason, after all, that Maryland is regarded as one of the most Democratic states in the nation.
And now, during the about-to-end legislative session, action on two fronts adds even more support for the assertion that this state has led on matters of great national concern: Gun control and reducing the cost of medical care.
A House-passed bill is likely to approve the governor’s gun control proposal. With agreement in the state senate, Maryland would be enacting a law in keeping with the nation’s outrage after the slaughter of innocents and their teachers at Sandy Hook, Connecticut. Controls on handguns and rifles would be tightened. Many assault rifles would be banned. Multi-bullet clips would be limited. Maryland would join Connecticut in keeping faith with murdered children.
At the same time, with the leader ship of Dr. Joshua Sharfstein, Maryland is working on new ways to control health care costs. The proposal will attempt to further tighten procedures designed to limit the cost of hospital stays. The complex proposals are seen as ways to cut costs across the nation.
Emotion, science and legislative leadership here are addressing critical problems. There is criticism and disagreement, to be sure. But there is none of the paralysis that has put problem solving out of reach.
One-party rule in Annapolis explains it, to some extent, but voters have consistently endorsed what Annapolis does.