This is the sixth in a series of articles on Utah legislative reform proposals put forth by CitizensForTaxFairness.org.
The American system of government requires, as the Federalist Papers explained, a higher degree of virtue and participation by its citizens than any other form of government. It requires traits of private character such as moral responsibility, self-discipline and reliance, civility, respect for law and an active interest and/or involvement in the political process.
An informed and active citizenry coupled with institutional safeguards built into the separation of powers is absolutely critical to control government and to protect the Constitution for as Madison notes in Federalist 51:
“If angels were to govern men, neither external nor internal controls on government would be necessary. In framing a government which is to be administered by men over men, the great difficulty lies in this: you must first enable the government to control the governed; and in the next place oblige it to control itself. A dependence on the people is, no doubt, the primary control on the government; but experience has taught mankind the necessity of auxiliary precautions.”
The four specific proposals reviewed in this article are:
1. Stop requiring citizens to make their birth dates public in order to exercise their right to vote.
2. Standardize filing fees to encourage more candidates.
3. Actively encourage individual citizens, Tea Party, Occupy and other groups to maintain a presence at the legislature as unpaid, volunteer “citizen lobbyists.”
4. More opportunities for citizens to serve on government boards and commissions.
1. Stop requiring citizens to make their birth dates public in order to exercise their right to vote. Utah’s two major political parties require citizens to make their birth dates available to the world so the parties can have this data even though it opens citizens up to identity theft and other fraudulent activities.
The parties have consistently killed attempts to protect the birthdates of voters in spite of citizen requests to safeguard this information and pleas from County Clerks to make the birth dates private.
The two major parties do, however, support locking up a person’s e-mail address because they already have that information and they want to maintain their monopoly on it.
The bottom line of this recommendation is that no citizen should be required by any political party, or any business group for that matter, to make their birth date public in order to exercise their right to vote.
Action: Pass legislation immediately to protect the birth date (month, day and year) on voter registration records. This can be done by amending a bill put forward by the Lieutenant Governor’s Office to make e-mails a protected item in voter registration records.
2. Standardize filing fees to encourage more candidates for all offices. Filing fees for office are currently based on a combination of the length of term of office and the compensation of the office. This means that the filing fee to run for the Utah House which has a two year term and low pay is $13.20 whereas for the U.S. House which has a two year term and high pay it is $435. The filing fee for the Utah state Senate with a four year term it is $26.30; for the U.S. Senate with a term of six years it is $1,305. The filing fee for governor, a four year term, is $536. The result is that people of modest means who may otherwise consider running for office may be discourage by the filing fee. It also appears that there is clear no relationship between the filing fee and cost of administration by the Lieutenant Governor’s office.
Action: Establish a low, flat filing fee for all offices in order to encourage individuals without large financial resources or major political financiers and who do not qualify for filing fee waivers to run for office.
3. Actively encourage individual citizens as well as Tea Party, Occupy and other groups to maintain a presence at the legislature as unpaid, volunteer “citizen lobbyists.” Eliminate Washington style politics and level the playing field which currently is tilted in favor of professional public and private lobbyists.
Action. Legislators should actively reach out to their constituents and ask them to spend substantial time at the legislature. Citizens should be specifically asked to attend hearings and to provide public input on proposed legislation. In addition, citizens should be strongly encouraged to follow the progress of bills either in person or through the excellent state legislative website and they should personally visit with legislators as often as possible. Finally, during the session legislators should spend more time with constituents and less time with lobbyists.
4. More opportunities for citizens to serve on government boards and commissions. Boards, commissions and other appointed positions tend to be filled by a relatively limited number of people who represent business, political and other special interests. Many of the same people serve for years and they often come from similar backgrounds which results in a one dimension view of issues, a lack of fresh ideas, and inadequate innovation to meet the needs of all of the citizens in a rapidly growing state.
Action. Actively promote opportunities to serve in appointed positions through the media and through contacts with a wide range of civil society organizations. Require that all commissions, boards, etc. include a wide diversity of views and experience and prohibit any person from serving on more than one appointed commission, board, etc. Also, limit the number of boards and commissions that the Salt Lake Chamber leadership can serve on and prohibit employees and contractors of taxpayer funded associations from serving on commissions and boards.
As previously discussed in the fifth article of this series, requiring a double majority to pass ballot proposals would also include greater citizen participation.
At the present time, there are no more articles in this series but as other proposals come forward and as these current proposals evolve, they will be examined.
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