In Oregon, a House Perfectly Divided, Sharing Power

Try to arrange an interview with Bruce Hanna, the new Republican co-speaker of the Oregon House of Representatives, and odds are good you will be asked if you would also like to meet with Arnie Roblan, the new Democratic co-speaker.

“I would be remiss if I did not offer,” said Steve Lindsley, their conscientious communications director.

Ask Mr. Roblan a question, but do not be surprised if Mr. Hanna answers it. Mr. Roblan says he does not mind. Nor, he says, does he mind that Mr. Hanna is the one they agreed could actually sit in the speaker’s office. Mr. Roblan notes that his office across the hall is a shorter walk to his caucus meetings.

“I have no ego in place, so it’s easy,” Mr. Roblan said.

Like many states, Oregon is facing a steep budget deficit this year, but at least its House is perfectly balanced: it has 30 Republicans and 30 Democrats, the first time it has been evenly split.

“The issue is, how do you share power in difficult times?” Mr. Roblan said.

Mr. Hanna and Mr. Roblan, who also happen to a share a forested border and two counties in their distant districts, insist that they can transcend the partisanship so apparent in their chamber. They point to the unusually early completion of the always controversial schools budget. They point to each other’s upbringing in southwestern Oregon. They finish each other’s sentences.

“Co-governance...” Mr. Hanna began.

“...all the way down,” Mr. Roblan inserted.

“...means co-chairs of all of our policy committees,” Mr. Hanna went on.

Bicameral committees, which include House and Senate members, get complicated.

“You’ve got a Senate member over there going, ‘O.K., now I have two House members to be co-chair with,’?” Mr. Hanna said. “It’s tri-chairs.”

Mr. Roblan clarified: “One of them is a half. The others are quarters.”

This prompted a co-laugh.

Oregon’s is hardly the first House divided. Even the Oregon Senate was after the 2002 election. Alaska’s Senate is currently split, and Montana’s House and Senate have been divided now and then over the years, though Republicans have recently taken hold. Plenty of other states have navigated splits.

The National Conference of State Legislatures provides a three-inch-thick packet to legislative leaders who come looking for help when November yields a tie. (Parties rarely aim for equality. In Oregon, Republicans picked up six seats last fall, ending complete Democratic control.)

“It’s happened literally every election for more than two decades,” said Brenda Erickson, of the National Conference of State Legislatures. “It does need, in some cases, a certain type of personality to make it work better. It’s not going to necessarily work great. Our political system is not meant to work in a tied system. Majority rule is the basis for the American system.”

Mr. Hanna and Mr. Roblan both say they want majority rule — and will be working to win it in elections next year. But that can wait.

“My career has been about bringing people together,” said Mr. Roblan, a former high school principal from Coos Bay.

Mr. Hanna, who owns a Coca-Cola bottling company in Roseburg, has been pegged by others as more partisan, but he said that stems from just doing his job as a former minority leader.

“This plays to my core more,” he said.

There is much to do before the session ends in June, including passing a budget for social programs, where the two lawmakers have clear differences of opinion. Each insisted he did not suspect the other of secret partisan plotting.

“I don’t mean it’s like lying in a field of flowers going, ‘Oh, this is nice,’?” Mr. Hanna said. “But the memory of how did we operate, how did we treat one another, that’s going to be lasting.”