No new taxes and lots of budget cuts — that’s the formula both candidates in the state House District 51 agree is in store for next year’s session of the General Assembly. But when it comes to how the Democratic-controlled legislature tackled the budget this year, their disagreement couldn’t be stronger.

“We handled the most recent crisis after the economic collapse all over the world appropriately,” said state Rep. Jimmy Love, a Democrat from Lee County. “We saved a lot of teachers’ jobs, we saved a lot of prison guards’ jobs, and we did it in a responsible way.”

Love is one of 65 Democrats in the N.C. House who voted for the $20.6 billion budget this summer. More than $1 billion in temporary tax hikes expire next year, and the state is expected to face at least a $3 billion shortfall.

Love’s Republican challenger, small business owner Mike Stone, differs. “We haven’t been responsive to the citizens’ needs,” he said. “We haven’t treated government like the government has treated the citizens. The average citizen took a 20 percent pay cut. The government hasn’t cut anything.”

Raising taxes won’t be in the mix for legislators next session, Love said, and that means cuts — but he added a caveat. “You cannot cut your way out of these problems,” he said. “You’ve got to fire a lot of people or you’ve got to trim, so it just depends on how big an ax you want to use.”

Stone, who also serves as Sanford’s mayor pro tem, said he wouldn’t support “any agenda” to raise taxes. “We’re going to have to learn to do something that most governments don’t like to do,” he said, “and that’s cut.”

Swing district

After comfortably winning election and re-election in 2006 and 2008, Love is fighting for his political life in a strongly anti-Democratic year. The 51st District encompasses all of Lee County and parts of Harnett County south of Raleigh. A Civitas poll from early July found Love trailing Stone 47-43 percent.

Registered Democrats outnumber registered Republicans in the district 47-30 percent, with unaffiliated voters taking up the remaining 23 percent and Libertarians under 1 percent.

Love served five terms in the House from 1967 to 1976, two of those as chairman of the House Appropriations Committee. He also serves as attorney for the Lee County Board of Education and Central Carolina Community College.

Both candidates are competitive in the money race so far. Love raised $22,004.50 in the first and second quarters of 2010 and had $10,012.58 on hand June 30. Records show that Stone didn’t raise any money in the first quarter but took in $41,065 in the second, ending up with $37,427.70 on hand at the end of the reporting period.

Health care opt-out

Republicans introduced legislation during the short session that would have exempted North Carolina from federal health insurance mandates passed by Congress in March. Democratic leaders in the General Assembly prevented the measure from reaching a vote.

Stone signaled support for the initiatives. “The federal government, by mandating that we get health insurance, is causing rates to go up,” he said. “The government doesn’t provide anything efficiently.”

Getting state legislatures involved isn’t the best solution, Love said, but he supports asking fellow Democrat Attorney General Roy Cooper to join a multistate lawsuit that seeks to overturn the health care mandates as unconstitutional.

“I see nothing wrong with filing a legal action to test the constitutionality of this act, because I think we need to know now, sooner rather than later,” he said.

Ramped up rhetoric

Stone called his opponent “anti-business,” while he described himself as a member of the tea party before it was even formed.

“I’m a true conservative,” he said. “Any other year, I’m not sure I would’ve had a lot of traction in this race. But the fact that I’ve got a proven conservative record really makes it hard on my opponent.”

Love had a conservative effectiveness ranking of 15 percent during the 2010 short session, according to Civitas Action. But he pointed to character and reputation as a key difference between him and Stone.

“The difference is that I have experience,” he said, “and different papers have said that I’m effective in the General Assembly and have the ability to get things done, particularly for local constituents.”

David N. Bass is an associate editor of Carolina Journal.