Excerpts from The Daily Call, by Mark Taylor

Recall amendment would only serve legislators

Say Yes to Recalls, No to GOP

Effort to Limit Our Right to Recall

The Racine Journal-Times
Editorial (8/22/11)

It is unsurprising to see legislators working on a state constitutional amendment to restrict recall elections, and it is a poor postscript to recent political events in Wisconsin.

We hear a vapid rationale for limits: Like poor little deer, legislators will be frozen into inaction by the irate glare of angry residents. So we must restrict the use of recalls so that our Legislature can make decisions - although it seems to have had no trouble avoiding decisions in previous years when recalls were far from being an issue.

The amendment proposed by state Rep. Robin Vos, R-Rochester, would require residents to provide a specific reason when starting a recall drive. There would have to have been a criminal act or ethics violation, he told a reporter. That would seem to rule out the recall of former state Sen. George Petak who upset residents with a late-night flip-flop on the authorization for a special tax to fund a new Milwaukee Brewers stadium. In other words, breaking trust with voters may not be a reason for recall, and voters might have to wait as long as four years in order to redirect the course of their government.

Let us be very clear: This is not the legislators' government. It is the residents' government, and if that means issuing a drastic mid-course correction, residents should retain that power.

In the past few months, we have been through no turmoil run by special interests. Though a favorite target of politicians, in fact they do not have that much power. Residents deserve more credit for their intelligence. Only real, deep anger brought tens of thousands of people to the Capitol for weeks to protest legislative action.

Consider the effect the recall elections have already had. In the wake of the first set, with Republicans losing a couple of seats, Gov. Scott Walker announced that voters showed they want more bipartisanship. That's what we call a correction, and that is what residents should be able to do whenever they wish.

This amendment would also mark another move along the same path that the Legislature took when it redrew voting district lines. Those new apportionment rules make seats safer for politicians by shifting the political demographic of districts so that they are more likely to regularly vote Republican or Democrat, and this limits the ability for shifts in the direction of government.

Limiting recalls will also restrict the ability of residents to shift their government. Politicians protected from recall can look forward to years of sitting comfortably in Madison, unless they engage in conduct egregious enough to sustain voter anger for the months or years until the next election. This amendment would make the world safe for politicians but not for democracy.

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