Is it Time for a Con Con -- Part V

Editors note: I did a lot of work researching the Illinois Constitutional Convention; I'm going to post that research that I wrote up here. It should be about five or six parts in all. I'll do a post or two a day.
Part I
Part II
Part III
Part IV

Term limits: Some people feel that there are far too many politicians in the state who have been in office for too long. If this were to gain support at a Con Con, delegates would most likely cap the number of terms an official can hold at two, or eight years. Term limits may also be placed on those officials who are appointed to their position.

Tort Reform: Although major tort liability reform legislation was passed in 1995, the Illinois Supreme Court over turned the law in 1997. Those seeking to reform the state’s tort laws, like the Illinois Civil Justice League, may use the Con Con to change the tort laws in a new constitution. The group has said as much in the past, “The League believes the reforms enacted in the Civil Justice Reform Amendments of 1995 were necessary and constitutional, and thus the League will support and lead future efforts to enact similar legislation.” Reformers may attempt to limit the ability to sue for punitive damages and how much of the damages can be shared by the victims and their lawyers.

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These will not be the only issues that will be considered prior to the referendum and if it passes, after the Con Con is called. What the Con Con will do is completely get rid of the 1970 constitution and that means anything and everything could find itself into a new constitution. And the fear is that the special interest groups, who where not that influential in the 1970 constitution, may be much more so this time around. “I think the interest groups would have considerably more influence this time than they did in the late 1960s. I think you would see strong interest group involvement in the election of delegates, and that involvement would continue into the session and on the votes on issues in the convention…And then you’d see the right-to-life and the pro-choice people. You’d probably see groups who want to advance gay marriage, and on the other side of it would be some fundamentalist religious groups,” says Lawrence.

Issues such as abortion, gay marriage, gun control, capital punishment, campaign finance, even the right to privacy, could all become focal points in a convention. “I think that there’s a real potential for a lot of mischief,” says Wayne Whalen who was a delegate in 1970. Some of these “cultural” issues could prevent a new constitution from passing. If the delegates were to take a stance on something like gay-marriage or capital punishment, it may sink the new constitution with voters. In 1970, two of the more controversial amendments were put to the voters separately, and doing that with such controversial topics may happen again during the process of writing the constitution. But of course, there is no guarantee, especially if a single special interest group was able to send a block of delegates to the convention—or if enough different interest groups were elected that they divided the pie amongst themselves.

Is It Time for a Con Con -- Part IV

Editors note: I did a lot of work researching the Illinois Constitutional Convention; I'm going to post that research that I wrote up here. It should be about five or six parts in all. I'll do a post or two a day.
Part I
Part II
Part III

Income tax: Of the 41 states that have a state income tax, Illinois has the lowest personal income tax rate and one of the lowest corporate tax rates in the nation. The state has a flat rate of three-percent for personal income and a 4.8 percent rate for corporations. According to the 1970 Constitution the income tax rate is determined by an eight to five (business to individual) rate ratio and has only been hiked twice—once temporarily—since the Constitution was written.

Obviously there are and will be a plethora of opinions about changing the income tax. Those who want to change the tax rate, especially those in favor of changing education funding, will want to raise the rate and then use that revenue to help fund schools in the state. This would lower the burden on funding from local governments for education—and may well lead to a lowering of property taxes.

Proponents of changing the income tax will also point that the poor and middle class in Illinois pay a higher percentage in taxes than those who are wealthy. These reformers will fight to change the income tax in Illinois from a flat tax to a progressive tax where people with higher incomes pay a higher rate of income tax to the state.

The current revenue system places a lot of stress on local governments to raise their own revenue to pay for services. This means that there is a dependence on property taxes, casino/lottery revenue, and sales taxes at both the state and local level. The recent hike in the Cook County sales taxes, giving Chicago the highest sales tax rate of any major city in America, will probably be used as a means of calling for a Con Con. Many will argue that by increasing the income tax and distributing the revenue from the increase will lessen the burden that the county and city governments have in funding services (not only in Chicago but across the state). Therefore they will be able to lower sales taxes and other current forms of taxation that local government’s place upon constituents.

Yet, Chicago falls 13th behind New York, Philadelphia, Portland, Milwaukee, Atlanta, Detroit and Boston when totaling the amount of state and local taxes that a household making $75 thousand pays—or 10.4 percent of income. Based on 2003 data, the tax burden of Chicago, when compared to the largest cities of other states, is not nearly as bad as proponents will claim. Chicago did rank 4th in sales tax but what Chicagoans pay in income taxes was near the bottom and property taxes were still lower than New York and Los Angeles (coming in 12th overall).

However, those in the business community will not want to change the rate and would fight any proposed change. And they will probably gain support from an unlikely source—unions. The Illinois Education Association has already come out against the Con Con. The teachers union is afraid that they may lose pension benefits if a Con Con is called. While other unions, like the AFL-CIO, do not have a lot at stake since they do not have pensions tied to the state—they will probably stand in solidarity with the teachers union.

But to add to the twist, businesses do see the more than $100 billion in debt that the state is under. And much of that debt comes from pension benefits. Because of underfunding since the 1970s, the pension system in the state was only 48 percent funded in 2003. Unless reformed, the state will continue to owe 8.5 percent interest on the $43 billion unfunded pension liability annually—$3.7 billion a year. The huge debt created because of pensions may gain the attention of reformers. At that point it is anyone’s guess at how things would play out. If the income tax is raised, that money may go towards pensions. Or the pension system in the state may be changed to a two tiered system where new employees would see considerably less in pension benefits.

Is it Time for a Con Con -- Part III

Editors note: I did a lot of work researching the Illinois Constitutional Convention; I'm going to post that research that I wrote up here. It should be about five or six parts in all. I'll do a post or two a day.
Part I is here
Part II is here

Gerrymandering: There have been few competitive races throughout the state over the years. Each party has drawn districts so that the Democrats have their seats and the Republicans have their seats. It has allowed the politicians to choose their voters. The 4th and 17th Congressional Districts are probably the most infamous cases of gerrymandering in the state. Supporters of such a change would scrap of the current method of redistricting and would most likely support one of two other systems: an independent redistricting commission or a system similar to that what Iowa uses where a “nonpartisan legislative staff develop maps for the Iowa House and Senate as well as U.S. House districts without any political or election data including the addresses of incumbents.”

Home Rule: One of the major reasons that the 1968 Con Con occurred was because the 1870 constitution, according to some, did not provide local governments enough autonomy. The state had been operating under Dillon’s Rule, which requires state legislative and executive approval for any changes local governments would like to make no matter how small. The famous example that was given in 1970 was that the City of Chicago had to get approval from Springfield to change the color of the lights on its squad cars. Home rule, which freed cities that had populations of 25,000 or more, was written into the 1970 constitution and it liberated cities from the child/parent relationship that had been created. It gave municipalities more authority to raise taxes and borrow money.

The Illinois Municipal League sees little reason to revisit the issue unless delegates want to lower the population threshold. However, the recent financial problems and the tax increases in Cook County and Chicago may, although unlikely, create a grassroots effort to rid the state of Home Rule and go back to Dillon’s Rule.

Open ballots access: If granted, open ballot access would give every person equal access to being on the ballot no matter what party affiliation. Right now, independents and other third parties are often required to obtain more than 10 times the number of signatures that established parties do.

Recall elected officials: According to recent polls, 2 in 3 constituents in Illinois would like the right to recall elected officials. However, the right to recall is denied to voters under the current constitution. Considering dislike with Governor Rod Blagojevich among citizens and the dysfunction in Springfield, the right to recall elected officials figures to be a popular means of selling the Con Con. A majority of states in the U.S. do not allow for the recall of statewide officials.

Selection of Judges: Currently judges are elected to the bench. However, there is a lot of support to change this system to one where judges are chosen by merit. There are quality concerns over electing judges and many feel that partisan politics plays too great of a role in choosing and electing judges. Also the amount of money spent on judicial races is concerning—millions are being spent on some of these races and people worry about where the money comes from especially since judges are expected to be neutral.

However, there would be resistance to changing from the current system to a merit system. In Cook County there is a laundry list of judges and the public does not know whom they are electing because there are so many. This has lead to some unqualified judges being elected. But downstate, the electorate is much more informed about their judges and would resist changing the current system.

If the Con Con changed to a merit based system it would most likely be based on what is called the Missouri plan. The plan calls for a non-partisan judicial commission who chooses three candidates to fill a bench seat. The governor then selects one of three candidates. Yet such a system would face a battle over who would select the commission. Also and whether the governor, legislature, or the state Supreme Court would be given the power to select the judges would have to be decided.

Is it Time for a Con Con -- Part II

Editors note: I did a lot of work researching the Illinois Constitutional Convention; I'm going to post that research that I wrote up here. It should be about five or six parts in all. I'll do a post or two a day. Part I is here.

If a constitutional convention is called, the entire constitution would have to be rewritten. This obviously would have a major impact on the state and future governance. In effect, what calling a convention would do is open every political and policy topic up for debate. Calling for the Con Con could be the first step in opening up the political equivalent of Pandora’s Box. Some popular outcomes from the 1970 Constitution, like home rule, could be changed; while currently unpopular powers, like the amendatory veto, may not be amended. Opponents to the Con Con, like the Illinois Business Roundtable, say that “a constitutional convention cannot be limited to specific issues.” And they are right, as a single issues there appears to be little need to call for a convention. But when all the issues are taken as a whole, some voters may conclude that a Con Con would be the easiest way to fix all the problems the state is facing. The major issues that will be debated prior to the vote and if a Con Con is called are as follows:

Amendatory veto: This power given to the governor came up most recently when Governor Rod Blagojevich gave free rides to seniors during the CTA funding saga. The amendatory veto allows the governor to return a bill to the house it originated from with specific recommendations for change. According to the Constitution “The bill shall be considered in the same manner as a vetoed bill but the specific recommendations may be accepted by a record vote of a majority of the members elected to each house.” In effect, this allows the governor to initiate legislation independently of the legislative branch. “I think that power was abused though the years… I don’t think the governor is a legislator,” said Mike Lawrence the former press secretary to Jim Edgar. A bid to limit the amendatory veto was on the 1974 ballot; however, voters refused to limit the veto power.

Ballot initiative process: Illinois is considered to be a non-initiative state. An initiative is a public vote on a proposed amendment, law, or ordnance. The ballot initiatives from California are probably the most famous examples and there have been a wave of ballot initiatives concerning gay marriage in the last five years across the country. The gridlock in Springfield has created the perception that very little is getting done while the state faces increasing challenges. Many feel that citizens should be able to bring up solutions to these problems directly through ballot. However, the current initiative process in Illinois is limited and difficult—there has been only one successful ballot initiative in Illinois history, which was in 1980 and reduced the size of the state legislature from 177 to 118 members.

Cumulative Voting: Used by the state from 1870 until 1980, when the ballot initiative reduced the size of the legislature by a third it also eliminated cumulative voting. For those delegates who long for the days of cumulative they may fight for it to be used again in the state. Cumulative voting allows for multiple winners in an election and is used to foster proportional representation. The old three member districts had ensured each party had at least one seat—a few people feel that the move to the current system began “the consolidation of power among legislative leaders that has facilitated the current gridlock in Springfield.”

Education Reform and Property Taxes: In the upcoming months, expect to hear more about education than any other issue having to do with a potential Con Con. Illinois ranks 49th in the nation in the amount of funding the state provides for education. The state, on average, only covers 34 percent of the cost of educating a student (the national average is 50 percent). As a result, property taxes are extremely high—the ninth highest in the nation in 2005. This puts a heavy burden on local residents—especially seniors.

Currently in Illinois there are about 1,000 schools that are failing to meet the federal standards set out by No Child Left Behind. On top of that, eight in ten school districts are facing budget deficits and the number of schools on the financial watch list increases every year.

Reformers will want to lower the reliance and burden on property taxes and local taxpayers for education funding. They will probably fight for an increase in the income tax and take some of that revenue and place it towards education. Noting that Illinois has the second worst per-pupil-spending gap in the nation, others may fight for a property tax and education system like California.
Proposition 13 (or Serrano v. Priest) was a ballot initiative passed by California voters in 1978. The proposition capped property taxes at one-percent of the asset value of the property. The result has been two fold; funding responsibilities have become centralized making local governments more reliant on funds from the state, and education funding has also become both centralized and equalized. However, by making the state more responsible for education funding, it has reduced public school quality. California schools are now ranked among the worst in the nation. This may have driven families to send their children to private schools or find other means to improve local education.
The decision has been fiscally regressive and local governments, without the stream of revenue from property taxes, have turned to other means of taxation like sales taxes or fees. Proposition 13 has also made local governments more reliant on state funds, which has given the state more control over local matters.

Continue to Part III

Is it Time for a Con Con? -- Part I

Editors note: I did a lot of work researching the Illinois Constitutional Convention; I'm going to post that research that I wrote up here. It should be about five or six parts in all. I'll do a post or two a day.

Many people will say that the most important vote that Illinoisans will cast next month will be for President—Barack Obama, John McCain or a third party candidate. While others may argue that the race for the U.S. Senate seat between Dick Durbin and Dr. Steve Sauerberg is the most significant. But according to polls both of those races appear to be open and shut cases. Therefore, it may just be that the most important decision that the electorate makes is if we should, as citizens of Illinois, rewrite the Illinois Constitution. Every twenty years Illinois voters are given the opportunity to call a constitutional convention, and on November 4, 2008, the people of Illinois will have that chance for the first time since 1988.

Illinois has had four constitutions in its history—the original constitution of 1818, and then three rewrites 1848, 1870, and finally in 1970 (a convention was called in 1918 but the constitution was rejected by voters in 1922). The current document came about after a convention was called in 1968 due to the fact that the then constitution was seen as outdated and reflected a state that no longer existed. “In ’68 there was a long developed consensus to change the constitution,” says Jim Nowlan, a former member of the Illinois House of Representatives and Senior Fellow with the University of Illinois Institute of Government and Public Affairs. The 1970 constitution reformed may things including increasing the power of the governor and granting home rule to cities with a population over 25,000. The constitution also guaranteed freedom from discrimination on the base of race, color, creed, ethnicity, and sex, and revenue and finance articles were rewritten creating a flat income tax rate for both personal and corporate income.

The current Illinois Constitution has an automatic call for a constitutional convention every twenty years written into it, starting with 1968 the last time a convention was called. A super-majority of 60 percent of those voting on the question or a majority of total voters is required to call a convention. When the question was last on the ballot in Nov. 1988, voters rejected the question by a three to one margin (900,109 voting in favor of a convention, 2,727,144 voting against it and just over 1 million voters skipping the question).

If voters this time around decide to call for a convention, the General Assembly is required to call for and fund the constitutional convention. It would also set the date for the election of delegates and what type of election would take place—possibilities include a single general election or a primary followed by a general election. Whether candidates would run on partisan or nonpartisan ballot would also be settled by the General Assembly. Any person can run to be a delegate, however, candidates must be at least 21 and have resided in their district for at least two years (and be a U.S. citizen). Legislators most likely will not run, but chances are people close to them would run instead. In 1970, the delegate elections were non-partisan with a single general election. This prevented party insiders from capturing all the delegate positions. However, if it were a nonpartisan election, special interests groups would likely run their own candidates.

Two delegates from each of the 59 state senate districts, a total of 118 delegates in all, would then travel to Springfield and write a constitution, probably late in 2009 and into 2010. The new convention must meet within three months of the delegate’s election. After the delegates have finished writing the new constitution, it will be presented to the voters in a special election and must be approved by a majority of the voters.

The 1970 convention lasted nearly nine months and cost $13.9 million. Delegates were paid a monthly salary for what was typically a four-day workweek. Experts predict that a convention held today would cost $78 million.

The political scene in Illinois today is much different than it was in 1988. Voters are fed up with what is (or rather what is not) going on in Springfield. Recent budget crises at the state level and in Cook County have constituents frustrated. In Cook County, the sales tax was recently increased to the highest rates in the country. The legislature in Springfield appears too busy fighting amongst themselves to pass popular bills, like the ethics reform bill, and it takes far too long to pass necessary bills, like funding for the CTA. And when a bill is finally passed, the highly unpopular governor uses powers granted to him to not only veto the bill but also legislate from his desk by adding to the bill in consideration. To say voters are unhappy may be an understatement. “There was a positive attitude towards a Con Con,” Nowlan says about the efforts in 1968 but today there is a negative and sour outlook on the state government. Governor Rod Blagojevich was found to be the least popular governor in the U.S. this summer according to Rasmussen. And a recent poll in The Chicago Tribune had his approval rating at 13%.

Continue to Part II

McCain's Energy Plan -- Part III

Part I of the analysis on energy policy – How did we get here?
Part II of the analysis on energy policy – Obama’s plan

And finally, it’s the last time I have to write about a whole bunch of bad policies ideas that would, if implemented, only make things worse. Read McCain’s proposals in his own words here.

We all heard the chorus of Republicans at their convention chanting, “Drill Baby, Drill!” The idea behind this is that drilling offshore and in Alaska will lower our need for foreign oil and at the same time bring down the price of oil (by increasing supply). But let’s clear this up right away—it won’t. While both of those statements are technically true, the impact is extremely small. First, it will take years for that oil to reach consumers and more importantly, oil is traded on worldwide market. That means that oil from Nigeria, Saudi Arabia, Venezuela, Canada, etc, is bought and sold on the same market. If U.S. production was to increase and every other country was to keep output at their current level (or at least rising with demand) then yes, the price of oil would drop. But not a lot. “Drill baby, drill!” won’t have the impact that people seem to believe it will.

This isn’t to say that drilling offshore (or in Alaska) is a bad idea or bad policy—it isn’t. And McCain does support offshore drilling. However, there are some environmental concerns and of course there is always the risk of a spill or some sort of disaster.

Let me quickly go through the rest of McCain’s energy plan.
-- Unlike Obama, McCain is against ethanol, something that not only I’m in agreement with, but the quicker this country moves away from corn based ethanol the better (for reason’s I’ll chronicle another day).

-- McCain wants to build 45 new nuclear power plants by 2030. Nuclear power is cheap. But plants are very expensive to build, so McCain would probably be offering subsidies and tax credits to companies who build nuclear plants. And then there is the issue of what to do with the nuclear waste. No one wants the waste in their back yard because it’s radioactive thus disposing of the waste has been a problem for years. Burying it usually means it ends up in the water supply. Shooting it into space is very, very expensive and a launch failure would probably be a Chernobyl like disaster. So what it really comes down to is that we haven't really figured out what to do with nuclear waste. Anyway, here is some info on what France does with all their radioactive waste.

-- McCain also favors a cap-in-trade system to lower carbon output. A cap-in-trade system is fairly simple: the government creates credits or permits that allow a certain amount of carbon usage. It then sells those permits on the market to carbon producing companies (or speculators). But many economists prefer a carbon tax, were companies are taxed at a fix rate for the carbon they produce. (again, this would be a good post a few weeks from now).

Finally, McCain didn’t want Obama to be the only one with bad energy ideas. McCain has suggested suspending the tax on fuel. (Personally, I think it should be raised). This is a horrible idea because it would manipulate the price of gas. Supply is not being increased, however suspending the tax would lower the price of gas which would encourage driving, leading to an increase in demand… which only increases the price of gas. All the while, Uncle Sam is receiving less money but the oil companies are pocketing more (since the price of gas has increased). In other words, suspending the fuel tax would increase the price of gas and make Big Oil even richer while making the U.S. government poorer.

McCain’s energy plan isn’t as bad as Obama’s, but it is not as environmentally friendly and is very short sighted. Obama’s plans, for all its faults, does look a bit towards the future. McCain’s ideas aren’t exactly fresh, and while he gets major points for being anti-corn ethanol, there also isn’t a ton to really get behind here.

Obama's Energy Plan -- Part II

Read it in Obama’s own words here. And I covered the back ground of the U.S. and energy policy yesterday.

Let’s start with the bad—Obama wants to increase the tax on oil companies and then take that money and give Americans a rebate to cover the increased costs of oil, gas, electricity, heat, air condition, etc. In theory this sounds great, a bit like Robin Hood even—the oil companies are reporting record profits, why not help out the very people they’re making their money off of?

Well here’s the catch—increasing the tax on oil companies will boost the price of production. All the oil companies will do is pass on their increased costs to the consumer AND the higher taxes will discourage investment which will lower domestic output—increasing the U.S.’ dependence on foreign oil and maybe even decreasing supply. The end result? Higher gasoline prices for consumers and the world. While in theory the government’s tax revenues should increase, Lord knows where and how that money will be spent, but if production drops eventually the increase in revenue will turn into a decrease.

Unfortunately, but not unexpectedly, Obama also supports the use of corn ethanol as an alternative fuel. At this point there is little reason to support corn ethanol—that’s a post for another day—but it’s not as efficient as other bio-fuels, it takes as much energy to produce as it saves, it uses a lot of water, and on and on.

His website also wants to put a million plug-in hybrid cars on the road by 2015. Sounds like a great idea and I’m sure GM is happy to hear that, but how will this be accomplished… well I’m not sure. He says he’ll hand out a $7,000 tax credit, but the odds of Congress approving that are pretty small. You know what, let’s give this proposal an OUTRAGEOUS CLAIM.

Is there anything good in Obama’s energy proposals? Well, he would like to raise fuel standards for cars, something that the U.S., because of the Detroit lobby, has been reluctant to do. While one could argue that the market and consumers have rejected more fuel-efficient cars for big SUVs, Greg Easterbrook wrote a very good op-ed about this very topic last summer and the relationship between building cars with better fuel-efficient and horsepower and fatal car crashes (which I can’t find but he touches on here). Sometimes it is necessary for the consumer to be regulated (Marshall Field be damned). Obama is also more likely to support and seek public transportation funding.

Although details are a bit sketchy, Obama would also like to invest about $150 billion of government money on scientific research—most of it going towards green collar jobs. Obama claims that this will create 5 million jobs, but I’m not sure were his team came up with number. Therefore I’m a bit skeptical.

Obama would like to up grade the electricity grid and make it more efficient for using renewable energy. And the same time, he wants 10% of all the U.S.’ energy to come from renewable sources by 2012. T. Boone Pickens is on board with this and it’s not a bad idea. The problem will be getting the funding—especially after the bailout and War in Iraq.

Finally, Obama does not want to drill off shore for oil, but reasons as to why this is remain unclear. Back in August he kind of sort of said he’d consider it, but that’s about it.

Overall, Obama’s energy policy leaves me with more questions than answers. Other than raising the fuel-standards for automobiles, it’s hard to find good policy in here. From a policy perspective, this is probably Obama’s weakest issue. But as you’ll see later, McCain’s isn’t much better.