To: CLT Activists
From: Barbara Anderson
This is the last week
of the legislative session. A Constitutional Convention is scheduled
for Thursday, July 29 at 1 pm. There is a constitutional amendment
on the agenda, Senate Bill 23, that would end the initiative
petition process for us forever.
I'll just copy for you here an excerpt from a memo from The
Coalition for Marriage and Families:
Amendment Seeks to Dismantle the Initiative Petition Process
The Legislature is scheduled to convene a Joint Session of both the
House and Senate in a Constitutional Convention THIS THURSDAY, July
29 at 1PM. While most of the proposed constitutional amendments have
received negative reports that are highly unlikely to be overturned,
there remains on the calendar a very dangerous amendment that
received a favorable report from the Joint Judiciary Committee. This
amendment would, for all intents and purposes, shut down the citizen
initiative petition process. Currently, Article 48 of the
Massachusetts Constitution does not allow an initiative petition
concerning certain specific subjects: religion, the judiciary,
petitions affecting only particular districts, or appropriating
money from the Treasury.
However, Senate Bill 23, sponsored by Senator Cynthia Creem
(D-Newton), and its equivalent, House Bill 3537, sponsored by Reps.
Alice Wolf (D-Cambridge) and Byron Rushing (D-Boston), would add the
following prohibited subjects: “The rights to freedom and equality;
the right of each individual to be protected by society in the
enjoyment of life, liberty and property, according to standing
laws.”
If approved, this broad, undefined language would guarantee that
virtually no initiative petition could pass muster, since all laws
or public policy proposals have some impact on life, liberty or
property.
In the past, attacks on the initiative petition process have been
filed with the Election Laws Committee, which we watch closely. Chip
Faulkner and other activists from across the political spectrum
testify against them and they have received an "unfavorable" report
from the Committte, which essentially kills them before they ever
get to the floor for a vote.
However, the sponsors of SB 23 have sneakily bypassed the more
sensible Election Laws committee and used the Joint Judiciary
Committee, which quietly gave the proposed amendment a favorable
report last year. And while normally the Legislature would not hold
a Constitutional Convention during this busy week, they could meet
just long enough to pass this particular amendment.
They would first have to move it to the head of the ConCon calendar,
and our legislative allies, led by minority leaders Richard Tisei
and Brad Jones, are prepared to fight this effort. Just the threat
of resistance may make the legislative leadership decide not to do
this now.
As with any constitutional amendment: even if it passed the ConCon
this week, it would need another vote in the next two years, then
would be on the ballot for the voters to decide in 2012 and we would
fight it then. But it's much safer to stop it ASAP.
Please call your legislators, both House and Senate, with a simple
"I'm not going to argue with you" message: Leave the initiative
petition process alone. You'll find their contact information on the
CLT website, scroll down to Other Information, click on Find and
contact, you'll be connected to the Sec. of State's legislative
search page.
If there is a vote, it will be a roll call, so if they think we are
paying attention they may not risk it in this volatile election
year. If they do we will post that roll call on our website.
Even if they don't, you should know the sponsors of SB 23, in case
you have an opponent for them this year. Here are the leading
legislators who want to kill the initiative petition process:
Cynthia Stone Creem, Patricia Jehlen, Martha Walz, Elizabeth Malia,
Barbara L'Italienne, and Kay Khan.
More sponsors of the House version, H. 3537, can be found here.
http://www.mass.gov/legis/bills/house/186/ht03pdf/ht03537.pdf
To: CLT Activists
From: Barbara Anderson
Wednesday, July 28, 2010
Update on Constitutional Conventon tomorrow.
Is illegal immigration the issue?
We have confirmed that
the Legislature does plan to hold a constitutional convention on
July 29 at 1 pm, and intends to take up Senate Bill 23, the
constitutional amendment that doesn't allow any petitions that
impact society. It states that "The rights to freedom and equality;
the right of each individual to be protected by society in the
enjoyment of life, liberty and property...” can't be the subject of
any initiative petition.
This would prevent any tax cut or limitation petition. However, a
CLT member suggested to me last evening that the momentum behind SB
23 may be the illegal immigration issue. Certainly this language
could prevent any initiative petition on that subject.
Senate Bill 23 on the initiative process is number 2 on the ConCon
agenda, right after the amendment for an independent redistring
commission. So they'd have to act on redistricting before they can
vote on SB 23, or vote to move SB 23 ahead of redistricting.
So they could do two bad things in one session: vote to keep
gerrymandering, and kill the initiative petition process.
CLT has sent out a news release, and an email to legislators which
is copied below.
To: The
Massachusetts Constitutional Convention, July 29, 2010
From: Citizens for Limited Taxation
Leave the initiative petition process alone.
I would normally assume that the Massachusetts Legislature,
during the last week of the session, in a volatile election year
with many angry voters, would not attack the initiative petition
process which is beloved across the political arena.
Yet, there it is, Senate Bill 23, a constitutional amendment
from Sen. Cynthia Creme and 20 co-sponsors on the Thursday
constitutional convention agenda. SB 23 would basically end the
initiative petition process by adding this language to the items
prohibited by the present initiative process:
“The rights to freedom and equality; the right of each
individual to be protected by society in the enjoyment of life,
liberty and property, according to standing laws.”
This is silly; our constitution already prohibits any initiative
attempting to change the Bill of Rights. Sen. Creme and her
allies should get over the recent attempted marriage amendment;
that issue is clearly settled here in Massachusetts; gay
marriage is the law of this land.
This new language threatens all citizens who use the petition
process: left to right and in-between. Certainly its broad
generalization could be used to argue against tax limits and tax
cuts; but it could also stop a petition like CLT's proposed
amendment in opposition to the Kelo decision. All citizens
should resent the sneaky way Senator Creme and her allies got SB
23 onto the ConCon agenda. SB 23 belongs in the Election Laws
Committee; by putting it in Judiciary proponents hoped to sneak
it through without opponents finding it. Nice try. Almost worked
but the Tea Party caught it!
Well, now that we've noticed, there will be a fight as pro-inititiative
legislative allies oppose moving SB 23 to the top of the
calendar for that quick vote. Give it up, petition-haters; the
people will not easily surrender their defense against the likes
of you. But if you must vote on this, we look forward to the
required roll call spotting all the enemies of the people's
initiative.
Today's ConCon report
Excerpts from the State House News Service
CONVENES: Sen.
Rosenberg gaveled the Constitutional Convention to order at
12:59 p.m.
Sen. Rosenberg recognized Sen. Menard, standing in the center of
the well.
Sen. Menard moved that the convention be dissolved.
By voice vote, motion adopted.
DISSOLVES: Sen. Rosenberg declared the Constitutional Convention
dissolved at 12:59 p.m.
LOL, CLT activists. The
stealth attack on the initiative petition process turned into the
fastest retreat in constitutional convention history.
I was sure that there wouldn't be a constitutional convention this
last week of the legislative session, and CLT and its initiative
allies have defeated so many of these initiative process attacks
that I wasn't worried about this one -- until a news release from
the Coalition for Marriage and Families showed me that there was
something wrong here: the bill was coming out of the Judiciary
Committee with a "favorable" report, instead of the usual
"unfavorable" report from the Election Laws Committee. The enemies
of the initiative petition process were crawling through the brush
for an ambush!
Thanks again to Christen Varley of the Boston Tea Party, CLT
activists Norm Paley, Len Mead and Ted Tripp, and Cape Cod columnist
Cynthia Stead, for keeping after me until I realized the potential
for causing trouble and embarrassing some incumbents. Also thanks to
Carlos at the North Shore Tea Party for helping us sound the alarm.
And we are very grateful to the Republican minority leaders. Rich
Tisei and Brad Jones, and their teams for preparing to fight in the
ConCon if necessary.
BTW, you won't find anything on the website about this until Chip
Ford gets back from vacation; I can do updates, news releases and
memos to the Legislature myself, but can't do the website. Chip Ford
was on his little sailboat in Massachusetts Bay using his laptop and
something called WiFi (?) to get the legislator's email addresses
off his home computer to mine so I could send the memo. Chip
Faulkner was rushing back from an Americans for Tax Reform meeting
in Kentucky. I was "home alone"! Remind me next year: NO one at CLT
goes on vacation until the Legislature does!
 |
|
Barbara Anderson |
