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Pennsylvania budget fight about mandates

Forgive Pennsylvanians for not realizing that the most important election in the state last year was not the one that Gov. Wolf won. In hindsight it's clear that the public should have paid more attention to who Republicans were choosing to be their legislative leaders. They're the engineers of the five-month stalemate that has blocked Wolf's proposed budget.

Wolf was confident when asked during his campaign if he could handle a legislature with Republicans in control of both chambers. But that was before the governor had actually experienced the lack of leverage that he and his Democratic colleagues have in Harrisburg. His veto of an alternative GOP budget doesn't mean they won't try to pass another one.

That could happen if Republicans can recruit a veto-proof number of Democrats to help them pass a so-called stop-gap budget so schools and the social-service agencies that depend on state funding can get paid. It will be hard to resist the Republicans' argument with the Erie School District threatening to close shop and Philadelphia schools trying to borrow $250 million to keep their doors open.

Polls show the public blames the legislature more than Wolf for the budget impasse. But as the schools' situation becomes more desperate, support for Wolf could become criticism. That would suit Senate President Pro Tempore Joe Scarnati (R., Jefferson) and Majority Leader Jake Corman (R., Centre), who talk about compromise but haven't budged on the natural gas extraction tax Wolf proposes to increase school funding.

Their recalcitrance was brewed in the legislative elections last November, when for the first time in 40 years Senate Republicans ejected their floor leader, Sen. Dominic Pileggi (R., Delaware). Corman replaced Pileggi, who was seen as too eager to work with Democrats, and Scarnati was reelected president pro tempore. In the House, tea-party favorites Mike Turzai (R., Allegheny) and Dave Reed (R., Indiana) became speaker and majority leader, respectively.

That quartet — Corman, Scarnati, Turzai, and Reed — scoffs when Wolf talks about the mandate he received when Pennsylvania voters elected him governor on a platform that included a fracking tax to support schools. They argue that they were given a mandate too when they were elected on promises to rein in taxes. That's fine. Elections typically put people with different mandates in office. It's what happens after the election that matters.

Congress learned that lesson two years ago when a stalemate shut down the federal government. That lesson helped produce the bipartisan two-year budget that President Obama signed Monday. Wolf has proposed compromises, but the legislature's Republican leaders have offered very little in return. They apparently care more about the mandate from their GOP peers not to give in.

The Republicans' adamancy is another reminder of a time not so long ago when Philadelphia Democrats had more clout in the legislature. The city's delegation today isn't what it was, which isn't all bad when you think of the corruption conviction of former State Sen. Vince Fumo. But representatives of the state's largest city should have a louder voice.

Harold Jackson is editor of the The Inquirer Editorial Board.