Bill to prohibit ‘initiative-buying' struck down
DENVER • The battle of the ballot initiatives was a bruiser of Colorado's 2008 campaign season.
Citizen petitions placed three pro-business, union-inhibiting measures on last November's ballot. In retaliation, organized labor introduced its own petition campaign, which succeeded in placing four amendments on the ballot that extended employee rights and employer responsibilities.
Each side feared that the opposition's amendments would pass. Some Coloradans feared all the amendments would pass, hurting Colorado's reputation among owners and workers alike.
And so a deal was done: the unions were persuaded to withdraw their ballot initiatives in exchange for $3 million, which the unions used to defeat the pro-business amendments.
It worked. Some thought a disaster had been averted.
But to Rep. Amy Stephens, such initiative-buying was the worst kind of back-room dealing, thwarting the will of the people who signed the petitions and short-circuiting the ballot initiative process. On Tuesday, she brought her bill for criminalizing initiative-buying before the House State, Veterans and Military Affairs committee.
Stephens, R-Monument, and others who testified in support of the measure argued that allowing interested parties to buy off a ballot initiative was anything but clean government.
"This is the epitome of the appearance of impropriety," Deputy Attorney General Geoff Blue testified.
Stephens said her bill didn't take sides on any issue, but merely prohibited payments in exchange for withdrawing a ballot initiative. "We don't think it's actually in the best interests of the people or the state to have money or a thing of value exchanged to do that."
Opponents of the bill focused on guarantees for campaign spending, which the Supreme Court views as enjoying First Amendment protection. "Restricting money spent is restricting speech," said Tim Quinn, who testified against the measure on behalf of the Colorado Bar Association.
The committee voted 6-5 to reject the bill. All four Republicans on the panel supported it and six of seven Democrats voted against it.
Jon Caldara, president of the Independence Institute, a conservative Lakewood think tank, testified in favor of Stephens' bill but said, perhaps only half in jest, that if initiative-buying were allowed to stand, he could make big money by shepherding ballot initiatives solely so he could be paid to withdraw them.
"I've just found a brand new profit center," he said. "I won't be the only one."
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Contact the writer: 476-1654 or dean.toda@gazette.com
