A special joint legislative panel has been formed to look at two issues: changing the way that the decennial redrawing of legislative districts takes place, and the potential of changing the way California’s legislative term-limits work. Both are issues that ultimately would have to be brought to California voters before any change can take place.
There is no doubt that the current system of redistricting for the Golden State is flawed, producing an ultra-liberal legislature that has little regard for the notions of individual liberty and responsibility, and respect for the concept of a more limited role for state government in the lives of Californians. That said, there is a political graveyard filled with the ‘dead bodies’ of countless attempts to move the redistricting process out of the hands of legislators. It’s an issue easily made complicated to voters, who then seem to vote against it. We’ll see if something can come out of this committee that fares any better. Ready to pounce on any worthwhile proposal will be liberal Democrats who stand to gain from the status-quo which locks in their legislative majorities — and let’s not forget that our Republican Congressional folks totally sold-out to their own self interests (led by FR friends John Doolittle and Ed Royce) and came up with their own set of excuses for opposing an independent redraw of their (currently very safe and cozy) House seats. It will be a daunting task to get a bi-partisan redistricting measure out of the legislature, but I applaud any efforts!
That said, it is apparent that the ‘political price’ that may be exacted by Democrat leaders to bring them to the table to engage in the redistricting reform debate is a serious discussion about loosening California’s term limits for State Legislators. Currently an individual is capped at no more than three 2-year terms in the Assembly and two 4-year terms in the State Senate. It will be hard enough to convince California voters to sign off on redistricting reform, but to tie it to loosening of term limits? You may as well just drop the whole discussion.
We can enter into a whole debate about the pros and cons of legislative term limits. I have had a lot of conversations with people who make a lot of great points as to some of the challenges that have emerged because of them. But of course there are many good reasons to keep them. But let’s have a little talk about political reality:
In March of 2002, $11 million was spent by proponents on Proposition 45 to add four years to the term of every incumbent. The "idea" was to require incumbent legislators to get signatures in their districts in order to pick up the four years. Proponents of this ill-fated idea spent $11 million where opponents spent a fraction of that – $1 million – and the measure failed receiving only 42% of the vote in favor.
Looking beyond California, as term limits is a nationally popular reform of state legislatures:
In November of 2004, the Montana legislature referred a measure to the ballot to go from eight years in both houses to twelve years. There was a vigorous campaign to pass the measure, and virtually no campaign against it. Nevertheless, the finally vote in favor was a paltry 31%. Then the Arkansas legislature referred a measure to go from six and eight terms in their Senate and Statehouse, respectively, to twelve year term-limits in both houses. Proponents ran an a credible TV campaign. U.S. Term Limits countered this with an ad campaign of their own. The measure faired even worse than Montana, coming in with a 30% yes vote.
Early this year the Florida legislature referred a measure to the ballot by overwhelming majorities of both houses to hike term limits from eight years to twelve years in either house. After public opinion polling showed the measure with such low support among the electorable, the legislature voted to pull the measure off of the ballot all together!
Of course, earlier this week, on Tuesday, there were two measures on the Kansas City, Missouri ballot to loosen term-limits for city officials. The first would have extended the maximum length in office from eight years to twelve years, and the second was to repeal their term limits outright. Well, those measures did horribly, with the first getting 31% and the second 28%.
Back here in California, let’s not forget three very important factors that present huge challenges:
- Term limits are popular and a previous attempt to relax them failed miserably.
- Just having legislators place this on the ballot (versus an initiative driven by citizen-signatures) frames this as self-serving (especially since I have not heard of any clause to ensure that current incumbents must abide by the current limits).
- Finally but most singificantly, U.S. Term Limits has pledged to spend heavily to oppose this measure (and they would need to spend a fraction of the money that proponents would need to spend) — and their President, Paul Jacob, was just in Sacramento pledging to ‘counter’ a ballot measure to loosen term limits with one to restrict legislative per diem and require voters to ratify any legislative pay increases.
To add to the challenge, especially for Republicans but for Democrats, too — with term limits being so popular with voters, do you really want to cast that vote putting yourself on record as opposing the existing terms? Especially when the end result of placing a loosening of terms on the ballot seems a fool’s errand? It won’t be reelection to their safe seats that will be problematic for legislators that vote to place this on the ballot — but when they next get in a real, competitive primary or general election…
We’ll see what happens with this committee — but hopefully a dose of reality will set in sooner than later.
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