The Morning After

Barely 10 hours after the confetti fell, barely five hours after the parties ended, there were the House speaker, the Senate president and the governor sitting together for the first of many bill signings in coming weeks.

Senate President Thomas V. Mike Miller Jr. (D-Calvert) said as he had the night before:: "One bill does not make a session," clearly referring to the one bill that died just minutes before the midnight adjournment. The measure to spread out electricity rate increases for BGE customers actually won preliminary approval on "second reading" in the Senate.

Then Miller called for a procedural vote that would allow the Senate to give it final approval or "third reading" on the same day.

The procedural vote, though, required a two-thirds votes, not a simple majority of the 47 senators. Miller needed 32 votes. He got 31.

"We've had a great four years," Miller told his dejected colleagues. "Don't let this last bill affect you. ... The Senate's more important than any one bill."

John Wagner