Chapter Two - Looking Ahead

time spent: 20 minutes

Continuing my project, I turned to the State site to get a view of the Proposed Initiatives to the People in 2010: http://www.sos.wa.gov/elections/initiatives/people.aspx?y=2010. This site posts initiatives filed to date with the State and provides information about the number of signatures necessary to file each petition and the deadline for submission.

There are quite a few initiatives that have been filed, so my 'assignment' for this week shall be to select the one or two initiatives that evoke sufficient interest to warrant further investigation. Already I see several intruiging candidates and some that outright surprise me.

For example, there is an initiative filed that proposes teaching and testing on the Declaration of Independence, the U.S. Constitution and the Washington Constitution. More specifically, the initiative proposes to 'define' what teaching is required and when the teaching occurs. From this I gather that the folks proposing the initiative do not feel that the current curricula or teaching methods are adequate.

Then there's the initiative about firearms, proposing a declaration that law abiding citizens have the right to self-defense and privacy. I don't own a gun, but I did have the impression that I had this already, so I would definitely need to look into this before I could understand the intent of this petition. I'm wondering if the term 'privacy' here concerns the registration of a weapon.

There's the one about enforcing immigration laws, another about placing a ceiling on state income and debt, and the marijuana law. Of all these however the one I find most intriguing is the first one posted thus far, which is a proposal to "restate existing statutory requirements" that tax increases must be approved by two-thirds majority in the legislature. What is intriguing about this is that this was already voted into law by the people and as I understand it, our legislature is currently trying to overturn it. What puzzles me is why this has to go back to the people, how the legislature can overturn something already in effect and how, if voted (again) into law, this will be reinforced this time around when the voters have already approved this once before. Why do we need a law to restate a law?

This has happened before with the infamous Monorail tax. It was put to the ballot at least three times that I recall. It passed, then the vote was put to the people again. It passed, then the vote was put to the people again. It became a joke; it was as if the measure was going to continue to be put on the ballot until the people "finally got it right" in the eyes of those against it.

Before I select the one or two items I will focus on for this project, I will conduct a more thorough preliminary review to see if I can identify at an earlier stage, which initiative I have the best chance of researching. It looks like the next election is in April so I have a bit more time this time around.