04.12.2006 | BOSTON – Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney, right, shakes hands with Massachusetts Health and Human Services Secretary Timothy Murphy after signing into law a landmark bill designed to guarantee that virtually all Massachusetts residents have health insurance at Faneuil Hall in Boston, Mass.. Sen. Edward Kennedy, D-Mass., is center, and Massachusetts House Speaker Salvatore DiMasi, is at right. (AP Photo/Elise Amendola, File)

(Photo by Associated Press)

Mitt Romney's years as Massachusetts governor, 2003-2007 35 Gallery: Mitt Romney's years as Massachusetts governor, 2003-2007

During the first presidential debate, former Massachusetts Gov. W. Mitt Romney touted his 19 tax cuts in the state as evidence of his ability to work in a bipartisan way, saying he learned early as governor that he needed to collaborate with the Democrats who ran the Legislature.

"I had the great experience – it didn't seem like it at the time – of being elected in a state where my Legislature was 87 percent Democrat, and that meant I figured out from day one I had to get along and I had to work across the aisle to get anything done," Romney said during the debate, when his overall performance gave new momentum to his candidacy. "We drove our schools to be number one in the nation. We cut taxes 19 times."

Romney, the Republican nominee for president, painted himself as someone willing to work as a team with the opposing party during his years on Beacon Hill. He suggested he was prepared to govern in the same manner with a possible divided Congress in Washington if elected president on Tuesday over his Democratic rival, President Barack Obama.

Was Romney re-writing state political history with his portrayal of his bipartisan skills as governor?

There is no doubt that Romney joined with legislators in crafting the state's historic 2006 near-universal health care law, his signature achievement in office. Romney visited the homes of the House speaker and the Senate president to push for the law, reached out to then-U.S. Sen. Edward M. Kennedy to help in Washington and later celebrated with Kennedy and other Democrats during a ceremony at Faneuil Hall.

Romney, who made tens of millions of dollars during the 1990s as a venture capitalist, could also be sharply partisan.

After all, legislators overrode Romney's vetoes about 800 times over four years. Even on the health care overhaul, legislators voted to trump Romney's veto of a critical part of the law that he felt was unnecessary - a $295-per-employee assessment on certain employers who don't provide health insurance.

Michael J. Widmer, president of the Massachusetts Taxpayers Foundation, said Romney simply signed those 19 tax cuts in many cases without any prior work with legislators. The majority of the "tax cuts" were selective and small tax credits or deductions, not broad-based cuts, Widmer said.

"Most of them were produced by the Legislature," Widmer said. "It really wasn't part of a process with the Legislature."

Widmer said Romney was at odds with the Legislature most of the time, distinguishing himself from GOP predecessors such as William F. Weld and A. Paul Cellucci.

"The one bipartisan effort of his administration was health reform,'' which resulted in coverage of a little more than 400,000 additional people in the state, Widmer said.

"In terms of collaborating with legislators, Weld did a superb job and Romney did not," Widmer said.

House Minority Leader Bradley H. Jones Jr., a North Reading Republican, said Romney was more bipartisan in comparison to his successor, Gov. Deval L. Patrick, a two-term Democrat who is eyeing a possible run for the presidency in 2016.

Jones said Romney would routinely meet with Democratic and Republican legislators. But Jones said the last time he met with Patrick was back in 2008 when the governor was advocating for a bill to legalize casinos and was facing strong opposition from the then-House speaker.

Alex Goldstein, executive director of Patrick's political committee, responded that Patrick has shown a willingness to work with the Legislature throughout his time in office, regardless of party, and has the accomplishments to show for it.

Jones said Romney is right in laying claim to the tax cuts, which included the state's first two "sales tax holidays" in 2004 and 2005. The cuts also included a bill to prevent a retroactive increase in the state's tax on the sale of stocks and a property tax break for elderly home owners.

One of Romney's most partisan efforts occurred in 2004 when he helped recruit and then finance more than 100 new Republican candidates for the 200 House and Senate seats in Massachusetts. The effort failed when all incumbents were re-elected to office. Romney then seemed to turn more of his attention to testing the waters for a presidential run in 2008.

Sen. Stephen M. Brewer, a Barre Democrat who is chairman of the Senate Ways and Means Committee, said that Romney called him once in four years. He said Weld and Cellucci would regularly call him into their offices and ask for his support for initiatives.

He said Romney was bright and a good family man, but also cool and distant.

"It was a detached and aloof way of governing," Brewer said.

Romney left many legislators bitter, for example, when he vetoed a bill for stem cell research in 2005. Critics said he was looking to improve his conservative credentials for his bid for president in 2008.

The law allows scientists to create embryos for scientific experiments, a process called therapeutic cloning.

At the time, Romney, a former Mormon lay leader and chief of the Salt Lake City 2002 Winter Olympics, said he supported harvesting stem cells from embryos at fertility clinics, but he was against cloning.

Goldstein, executive director of Patrick's political committee, said Romney and his supporters are looking back at his time in Massachusetts through rose-colored glasses. Goldstein said Romney stood in the way of legislators in key areas such as stem cell research.

Romney's supporters in Western Massachusetts said he also worked well with Democrats when he first came into office and faced $3 billion deficit in the state budget, then $22.3 billion.

Romney took the lead – and most of the heat from the public – when he proposed and won almost $500 million in fee hikes on state services.

"For all the criticism that Massachusetts legislators throw in Mitt Romney's direction, the fact is, he worked very well with Democratic leadership in the House and the Senate," said Rep. Todd M. Smola, a Palmer Republican. "All you have to do is look at his record. He was a good fiscal manager. No one can take that away from him as governor."

Romney also joined with legislators in three annual rounds of closing of tax loopholes used by corporations. When fully phased in, they raised $375 million a year, according to Widmer of the tax foundation.

"Mostly, they were not loophole closings," said Widmer. "They were changes in tax policy, which increased taxes on corporations with exceptions."

Sen. Michael R. Knapik, a Westfield Republican, said Romney saved state government from a fiscal mess with the help of a willing Legislature. Knapik cited Romney's move to close business tax loopholes as an example of his bipartisan approach on Beacon Hill.

"It shows he is pretty moderate thinker," Knapik said. "He doesn't have any complete non-negotiables."

He said that Romney balanced the budget without raising broad-based taxes. With Romney out of office, Democrats in 2009 raised the state's sales tax by 25 percent to 6.25 percent, Knapik pointed out.

Knapik said Romney's 19 tax cuts are an achievement considering they came in an era when tax cutting was not a priority at the Statehouse. During the 1990s, Republican governors and legislators cut taxes more than 40 times when the economy was booming.

"Because we were able to do 19 more, that's an accomplishment," Knapik said. "He signed them. He gets to take credit for them."