The governor, the lieutenant governor and the presiding officers of the House and Senate are all Catholic, but that is a mixed blessing for the Catholic Church and the issues it lobbies for in Annapolis.
Only in rare cases do these leaders and Catholic lawmakers support all the positions the church favors — opposition to abortion, embryonic stem cell research, same-sex marriage and the death penalty, and support ofits anti-poverty agenda and funding for textbooks at nonpublic schools.
Last year’s election results brought “a new and challenging reality” to Annapolis, longtime Maryland Catholic Conference lobbyist Richard Dowling said. Catholic lawmakers are in line with the church’s position “in various ways at various times for various issues,” he said.
Dowling notes that Maryland Catholic voters back a national trend in which Catholics in other states have become more supportive of Democratic candidates. Based on exit polling by CNN on Nov. 7, Catholics voted 53 percent for Gov. Robert Ehrlich, a Protestant, and 46 percent for Mayor Martin O’Malley, and 54 percent for Lt. Gov. Michael Steele for Senate over the winner, Rep. Ben Cardin.
“Increasingly, I think Maryland Catholics are becoming concerned about the radical drift that’s marked policy-making over the course of the last decade or so, and they’re adjusting their voting preferences accordingly,” Dowling said.
He sees O’Malley more likely to support a statute recognizing same-sex marriage than he did Ehrlich, but the governor has said he would sign a bill abolishing the death penalty, a move the church supports.
Dowling found it “significant and heartening” that O’Malley said he did not want to give embryonic stem cell research priority over the adult stem cell studies in allocating the $25 million in grants he has in his budget.
O’Malley hosted a reception for Catholic Schools Week on Thursday, he attended Catholic schools for most of his education, and sends his children to Catholic schools. But in this year’s budget, he put the same $4 million for the textbook and technology program at private schools that Ehrlich did last year.
The church had sought $6 million, Dowling said, the original funding for the program when it started under Gov. Parris Glendening. At the same time, more private and Christian schools are applying forthe reduced funding.
