In both the House and Senate, small groups of Democrats have begun meeting informally with Republicans to try to come up with a bipartisan response to soaring oil prices; opening up new areas to drilling is part of the mix. Leaders of the Blue Dog coalition are openly pressing for drilling in the Arctic refuge and elsewhere.

But backers of the drilling ban have pushed back furiously and appear to have bolstered some of their colleagues. Senator Barbara Boxer, a California Democrat who has been fighting offshore drilling since the 1970s, has been cornering fellow senators to impress upon them the importance of the ban to Californians, comparing it to a mainstay of farm-state senators.

“This is our ethanol,” Boxer said of protecting the coast from oil drilling.