Senator Mitch McConnell of Kentucky and a single staff member had slipped into the ceremonial office of Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. to try to hash out a compromise directly with the vice president, who was accompanied by a top aide of his own, Ron Klain, his chief of staff.
The meeting was one of a number of direct conversations over the next few days between Mr. Biden and Mr. McConnell, the Senate Republican leader and a Senate colleague of Mr. Biden?s for nearly 25 years, that ultimately led to the agreement reached Monday. It was a bipartisan bargain that ? in a startling departure from the past two years in the capital ? ended with Republicans praising it and Democrats claiming they were blindsided and undercut.
According to those knowledgeable about the events that played out over less than a week, the agreement was the product of a fast-paced series of telephone contacts, conference calls and consultations with Congressional leaders. A critical negotiation on Sunday led to a surprise cut in employee payroll taxes as the men sought to wrap up the deal.
The final pieces came together Monday, when the vice president called Mr. McConnell to inform him of the White House?s price for accepting the Republican plan to provide a generous exemption for taxing wealthy estates. Mr. McConnell called Mr. Biden back late in the day to deliver the Republican sign-off on the administration?s proposed tax breaks for low- and middle-income workers.
The intense back and forth suggests a possible template for how the two parties might interact next year when Republicans control the House and have added to their numbers in the Senate.
?There is still much left to be done for the American people in the next two years, and I am hoping this won?t be the last time we can do something for the country on a bipartisan basis,? Mr. McConnell said on Tuesday, suggesting that divided government could provide an opening for tackling such explosive subjects as entitlement spending.
With hefty Democratic majorities in Congress the past two years, the White House has had little direct engagement with the Republican leadership, trying instead to win over individual Republicans on a bill-by-bill basis.
That situation seems to have shifted markedly since the midterm elections, though the White House sought to portray Mr. Biden?s role in the tax negotiations as similar to his efforts to produce forward movement on a nuclear arms reduction treaty and other issues that could benefit from his nearly four decades in the Senate.
?He has from the beginning been an über liaison to his former colleagues,? one aide said.
But the depth of the personal negotiations between Mr. Biden and Mr. McConnell was remarkable. It began with an unsolicited phone call from the vice president to the Republican leader?s office just hours after the first post-election bipartisan meeting at the White House on Nov. 30.
By that session, according to administration officials, Mr. Obama had decided not to side with those in his administration and among Congressional Democrats who were spoiling to fight Republicans on the Bush-era tax cuts for those with high incomes even though the Democrats appeared to lack the votes in the Senate. Instead, he would test Republicans? willingness to make concessions for economic stimulus measures and ?the Obama tax cuts? for low- and middle-income workers. Then, if Republicans gave him the back of the hand, he would fight.
Mr. Obama was propelled to his decision in part by a Nov. 18 meeting with Democratic Congressional leaders that persuaded him the Democrats were not unified behind a realistic plan for moving forward.
So at the bipartisan leadership meeting last week, the White House and Congressional leaders agreed to what became known as ?the six-pack? talks, with two negotiators each to represent the White House, Congressional Democrats and Congressional Republicans. At the same time, Mr. Obama made an undisclosed move that proved more conclusive: He gave a green light to Mr. Biden to pursue a parallel line of communication with Mr. McConnell.
Still, administration officials insist the six-member negotiations were pivotal as well, and early decisions on handling the alternative minimum tax and a separate array of expired or expiring tax breaks, including the credit for corporations? research and development costs, were worked out in that group.
?There was never a time when that was a fake meeting and the real thing was somewhere else,? said an administration official. ?I know what it?s like to go to a meeting that?s Kabuki theater; this wasn?t like that.?