When state lawmakers were sworn into office in January, Democrats no longer held legislative power in North Carolina.
For the first time in over a century, Republicans would control the state’s purse strings and its chief policymaking apparatus. The GOP wasted little time in letting folks know that it was a new day in Raleigh.
Within weeks, they were working to overturn long-standing polices affecting guns, elections, abortions and medical malpractice lawsuits.
By spring, Republican legislators had left no doubt: Their control of the North Carolina General Assembly would dominate the political news of 2011, and they had no plans to approach their new power with trepidation.
GOP control of the legislature inevitably led to clashes with Democratic Gov. Beverly Perdue, who didn’t hesitate to pull out her veto stamp.
Perdue, in her third year in the governor’s mansion, still faced questions about her campaign’s use of donor-provided airplane flights in 2008. She also continued to struggle with less-than-stellar poll numbers in the face of a tepid economic recovery.
The year brought bigger problems for former U.S. Sen. John Edwards. A federal grand jury indicted him on campaign-finance related charges. The fallout from scandal at the State Bureau of Investigation’s crime lab also continued in 2011, with a prominent murder defendant given a new trial because of tainted evidence from the lab. And the Occupy Wall Street protests spread from New York to several North Carolina cities, with small bands of protesters taking up residence on public squares.
The Republicans’ haste to get busy making their mark on North Carolina public policy was perhaps understandable. They had been waiting 120 years to control both chambers of the General Assembly.
As they took office, a long-time nemesis did not. Marc Basnight, the Dare County Democratic who had been Senate leader for 18 years, decided to give up his seat rather than sit on the back bench.
Considered one of the most powerful politicians in state history, Basnight had suffered from a nerve disorder that affected his speech and balance during his final two years in office. Still, it was the remarkable Republican success at the ballot box in 2010 — and not his health — that finally ended the longest reign ever for a North Carolina legislative chamber leader.
When Republicans took power, the new legislative leaders came as no surprise. The Senate elected longtime minority leader Phil Berger, a Rockingham County lawyer, to head the chamber. New House Speaker Thom Tillis, a retired business consultant from Mecklenburg County, was a relative newcomer to the legislature but had headed up House Republicans’ political fund-raising efforts.
The new leaders got the legislature up and running quickly, with committees named and meeting within a matter of days of convening. A whirlwind of significant and sometimes controversial legislation followed. So did long-winded floor fights, particularly in the House, with Democrats pitching fits of displeasure.
What followed was legislation putting new restrictions on abortion and loosening restrictions on gun owners. Workers compensation reform and new limits on medical malpractice awards — which had been kept at bay by Democrats and a key political ally, trial lawyers — came as well.
GOP legislators also passed bills limiting involuntary municipal annexation and overturning a cap on charter schools.
They also demonstrated a penchant for returning to Raleigh multiple times after initially adjourning in June. One of those reconvened sessions led to the passage of a proposed constitutional amendment to ban same-sex marriage, a move that gay-rights activists called unnecessary and demeaning.
Perdue ended up vetoing 16 bills, including the state budget bill and the abortion restrictions. The legislature overturned six of the vetoes, getting help from Democrats to achieve the required three-fifths majority.
Perdue and the new legislative leaders had begun the year talking about cooperation. By the end of the year, the two sides were accusing each other of eschewing compromise for political advantage.
Even an attempt to lure a tire manufacturing plant to the state turned into game of political finger-pointing. Perdue accused Berger of scuttling the deal by nixing an incentives deal; Berger accused the governor of insider political dealing that damaged the state’s chances.
Perdue had other problems outside of her relationship with the legislature.
After months of rumors, a Perdue campaign aide, Peter Reichard, pleaded guilty to corruption charge connected with improper campaign flights and an off-the-books campaign worker. That worker and a key Perdue donor also face criminal indictment.
The state prosecutor heading up the case said Perdue had cooperated with the investigation and that no evidence link her to any wrongdoing. Still, the indictments were another page in a long-running book of recent campaign-related political scandals in the state.
With an election year looming — and a potential rematch from 2008 with former Charlotte Mayor Pat McCrory likely — the dour economy did Perdue no favors. Most polls continued showing her approval rating among state voters at no more than 40 percent.
The year wound down with John Edwards still saying that he would fight criminal charges connected to political supporters who provided cash to his former mistress, Rielle Hunter. Edwards’ indictment followed a long federal grand jury investigation, and a trial was scheduled for early 2012.
In cities from Asheville to Raleigh, Occupy Wall Street protesters were variously arrested or given official permission to encamp.
Durham novelist Michael Peterson, convicted of murder in 2003, was given a new trial based on a judge’s ruling that an SBI crime lab technician had committed perjury. That ruling followed an audit questioning lab blood evidence used in 230 criminal cases.
And the year ended with a court battle looming over newly drawn legislative and congressional districts that could give Republicans an even greater advantage in the 2012 elections but which Democrats say are unconstitutional.
Political events, of course, don’t respect calendars, and a number of these story lines will continue into 2012.
Sunday, January 1, 2012
byScott Mooneyham
