With two weeks left in the legislative session, time is short, the to-do list is long, and fights are brewing that could lead to the General Assembly’s passing almost no major laws this year.

Gov. Mark Sanford’s plan to cut income taxes tops the to-do list — a source of frustration for the Republican governor and some Republican lawmakers who have not been able to force the plan through the Republican-controlled Legislature.

Tort reform also is high on the list, the top priority of business leaders and the influential S.C. Chamber of Commerce. Many legislators also want a ban on same-sex marriages; conduct grades for students; and more flexibility for charter schools.

Republican legislators will need to be willing to work long nights and in lock-step to pass any of these measures, said Glenn McConnell, president pro tem of the Senate.

“I hope the Senate has the stomach for this,” he said. “Otherwise, some of these bills will die.”

So far, the five-month legislative session has been hijacked by two behemoths:

• The writing and rewriting of the $5.5 billion state budget for 2004-05

• The failed effort to require primary enforcement of the seat-belt law.

“It was the first matter in the box on the day we got here, after the prayer,” Sen. John Land, D-Clarendon, said of the seat belt fight. “We dealt with it every day.”

This has left a backlog of big bills getting squeezed into the last two weeks, including most of Sanford’s legislative priority list.

‘PENDING IN THE SENATE’

The House is frustrated, with Speaker David Wilkins having taken the floor Wednesday to deride the Senate for sitting on House proposals.

Wilkins, R-Greenville, ticked off a list of them: fiscal discipline, property tax reassessment, judicial nominations.

After each, House members called back the status: “pending in the Senate.”

Now, fights are brewing that could block any of them from passing — a good or bad thing, depending on whom you ask.

Senators are set to take up the billion-dollar tax cut Tuesday morning.

Democrats say the plan takes too much money out of an already depleted budget — money that should pay for services. They say they will block Sanford’s income-tax plan by talking it to death.

“We have short-changed, underfunded our government for the last four years,” said Land, the Senate Democratic leader. “To be talking about limiting ourselves in growth in favor of an income tax cut is just ruthless.”

McConnell, a key Sanford ally on income tax, said he will work through the weekend to convince Republicans to outwit and outlast the Democrats, even if it takes talking until sunup.

“A lot of the senators are ready to stay in here some mighty long hours to move some bills,” McConnell said. “If somebody says they’re going to get up and talk, we got to call their hands.”

NAGGING BOBTAILS

The income-tax fight within the Senate is just one of the dynamics at play.

Another is warfare between the House and Senate.

The weapon: the bobtail, an arcane but strategic way to send bills back and forth, with legislation of varying degrees of relevance tacked on. The technique can force the other body to take up legislation it might not otherwise.

The House sent over same-sex marriage, probate judge eligibility and revision of lobbying laws on a bill raising penalties for attacking teachers. House leaders forced the Senate to deal with the income-tax cut Tuesday by tacking it on to legislation that took priority in the Senate calendar.

“It’s like a rocket attack right now,” McConnell said. “There’s so much coming in.”

Senators are tempted to do the same, he added, but they realize this type of war could end in mutually assured destruction.

TO DO, OR NOT TO DO

A third force at work is Sanford, who is trying to get his agenda through the morass.

At the same time, he has until Tuesday to decide how much of the General Assembly’s budget to veto, knowing the more he vetoes, the more precious legislative time the House and Senate will spend trying to override his decisions. This would leave less time for the income tax cut and his other priorities.

Sanford could veto little and declare victory; the General Assembly paid back a 2-year-old deficit as he urged and plans to sell surplus land and cars, as he wanted.

But he still sees plenty he does not like in the budget, such as reliance on $90 million in hoped-for new tax collections and not repaying trust and reserve funds.

The bottom line?

The to-do list may look different at the end of this week, and still more different at sessions’ end, June 3.

“My priority list starts narrowing, depending on how the cards are dealt,” McConnell said.

Or, it all could be left undone.

“As far as the rest of the session,” Land said, “I don’t see anything but biding time.”

Reach Bauerlein at (803) 771-8485 or vbauerlein@thestate.com