Campaign Watch: Constitution on the Line
Multiple parties have filed lawsuits asking North Carolina’s courts to block deceptively-worded descriptions of proposed state constitutional amendments from this fall’s ballot.
Gov. Roy Cooper filed one lawsuit asking the court to nix two of the General Assembly’s six proposed amendments from the ballot. His lawsuit asserts that the wording dictated by legislators is so deceptive that voters would never see what they were actually being asked to approve. Cooper targeted the two amendments which would take away from the governor and give to the legislature the powers to appoint members of boards and commissions and to fill judicial vacancies between elections.
“These ballot questions do not fairly describe either of the ballot amendments that they would enact,” the attorney representing Cooper told the court. “Both of them would take a wrecking ball to the constitution’s separation of powers principle … and would strip the governor of core constitutional powers.”
All five of North Carolina’s living former governors (two Republicans and three Democrats) have announced their opposition to the two amendments being challenged by Cooper. Former two-term Republican Gov. Jim Martin announced that the five will gather in Raleigh today (Monday, August 13) for a news conference to discuss their opposition.
A coalition of citizen advocacy groups filed another action, against those two proposed amendments plus two others—the one mandating photo identification for voting, and the one lowering the personal income tax cap. Leading this coalition are the North Carolina chapter of the NAACP and Clean Air Carolina, represented by attorneys with the Southern Environmental Law Center (SELC).
“The supermajority’s proposed amendments to the North Carolina constitution represent one of the greatest threats to our state’s democratic institutions since the Civil War,” said NC NAACP President Rev. Dr. T. Anthony Spearman. “Misleading voters to seize power and deny access to the ballot through discriminatory photo voter ID is not only a dangerous threat to our state’s future, it is also illegal. The U.S. Supreme Court limited the powers of this unconstitutional, gerrymandered legislature, and so the legislature must be stopped from carrying out this extraordinary attack. NC NAACP will not rest until we ensure that the voices of the people who have been directly affected by egregious discrimination by this NCGA are present in the courtrooms, in the streets, and at the ballot box.”
SELC’s Derb Carter added, “This legislature has carried out extraordinary attacks to strip fundamental clean air and clean water protections that North Carolinians have been assured of for decades, breaking with our state’s long history of bipartisan support for environmental safeguards. At the moment we are poised to re-establish fair representation that will accurately reflect voters on environmental issues, they have attempted a desperate and unlawful power grab.”
The judge who initially heard plaintiffs’ requests for an order in the case declined to rule immediately, concluding that the case raised constitutional questions which needed to be heard by a special three-judge panel. State Supreme Court Chief Justice Mark Martin subsequently appointed such a panel, which announced that it would hold its initial hearing on the case this Wednesday, August 15.
In another development, Attorney General Josh Stein agreed with Cooper’s position that the proposed ballot questions were illegally misleading. In a split vote over the weekend, the state elections board concurred that Stein had authority to take that position as the board’s attorney.
NCLCV applauds the governor and citizen groups who are challenging these deceptive amendments. The legislature is attempting to maintain and expand its ability to promote the interests of corporate polluters by gaining the power to appoint judges and the members of key regulatory boards. Destroying the balance of powers between the legislative, executive, and judicial branches and seeing the legislature gain control over boards like the Environmental Management Commission and the Utilities Commission would be extraordinarily dangerous to the health of North Carolinians and our natural environment.
As NCLCV spokesperson Dustin Ingalls put the matter, “Judges and EMC commissioners protect our right to clean air and water. Legislators are hoping to stack our government with polluters’ puppets.” It’s time to fight back against that threat. Friends and supporters of NCLCV can speak up on this issue here.
