Snowe a leader of Senate Centrists Maine lawmaker could be important power broker during upcoming term

WASHINGTON – A senator’s power has traditionally been defined by the title he holds. Except for this year.

Sen. Olympia Snowe, R-Maine, lacks the trappings of a plum chairmanship, but is nonetheless emerging as one of the Senate’s power brokers thanks to her efforts to bring centrists from both parties together to tackle issues likely to arise in a split Senate.

Snowe and her colleague across the aisle, Sen. John Breaux, D-La., gathered moderates this week to breathe new life into the Senate Centrist Coalition and discuss the importance of bipartisanship on such issues as the budget, campaign finance and education in a Senate divided evenly along party lines.

Gathering in the midst of a presidential election that has fractured relations between strict party-liners, the moderates came together under what Snowe called “very difficult circumstances.”

Nonetheless, the meeting drew a crowd of a dozen Democrats and 14 Republicans, including Sen. Susan Collins, R-Maine, and seven senators-elect.

The coalition was created in 1995, when the late Sen. John Chafee, R-R.I., drew together Republican and Democrat party centrists to offer a budget reconciliation during the government shutdown. The group met sporadically and weakened throughout the late 1990’s.

After Chafee’s death in 1999, Snowe and Breaux scheduled an informal session of moderates with the purpose of continuing Chafee’s legacy of bipartisanship, a Snowe aid said.

Since then, the group has had sporadic meetings and limited success, but coalition leaders said its importance has grown exponentially over the last weeks as the country experiences a divisive national election.

“The coalition is critical at this time when we have an evenly divided Senate and a close presidential election,” Snowe said. “It gives confidence to the American people that their government works.”

Snowe, who describes the coalition as a “constructive force,” said that one of the coalition’s priorities is to work with the Senate Budget Committee on a budget resolution.

Collins, who has been involved with the coalition since she joined the Senate in 1997, offered a resolution to the budget dilemma to her colleagues at the meeting. Under Collins’ plan, the budget would include a smaller tax package and less spending money, with more money budgeted to reduce the national debt.

Such compromise will be the cornerstone of the coalition, which centrists hope will serve as a powerful political voice and a message to conservatives and liberals that bipartisanship is the word of the 107th Congress.

“It is going to be incumbent on the members of the Senate to do what we can to reach across the political aisle,” Snowe said. “The coalition will set the right tone and change the political dynamic.”

What could perhaps be the launching pad for this strengthened coalition will be its attempt at passing the Elementary and Secondary Education Act, which outlines the government’s efforts to help public schools. The Senate attempted to renew the act this year in a bipartisan effort led by vice presidential hopeful Sen. Joe Lieberman, D-Conn., and Sen. Judd Gregg, R-N.H., but could not resolve funding issues.

Collins, who worked on an alternative to the reauthorization bill, said that the two parties had “very fruitful negotiations” on the issue.

“Those negotiations provided a good foundation for an attempt to forge new education policy,” Collins said.

If successful on the education front, the coalition would then turn its head to more partisan reforms such as health care, welfare, Social Security and campaign finance, Snowe said. Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., perhaps the most tenacious advocate of campaign finance reform, has a seat on the coalition.

The coalition might also get involved in a potentially dicey decision-making process involving committee chairmanships in a split Senate.

Senate Minority Leader Tom Daschle, D-S.D., has urged his GOP colleagues to consider co-chairmanships for Democrats, while Senate Majority Leader Sen. Trent Lott, R-Miss., has vowed that he will maintain Republicans’ positions as the majority party.

“At this point, we feel that both leaders ought to negotiate,” Snowe said. “If we could assist our leadership on each side, we will do that.”

What is just as important as its agenda, leaders say, is the example of bipartisanship the moderates are setting at a time when partisan pride is flying high.

“This is a pivotal moment in this chapter of Senate history and how we proceed will have an impact for the next two years,” Snowe said.