Letter: One philosophy can suppress will of majority

Tuesday, July 15, 2003 | 8:55 a.m.

The two-thirds constitutional requirement to pass new taxes, term limits and the national electoral college are all methods of taking power away from the people.

The two-thirds constitutional requirement to pass new taxes gives way too much power to one political philosophy. Jim Gibbons knew that when he spearheaded the initiative. How does it make sense to allow eight senators to overrule 13 other senators, or to allow 15 members of the Assembly to overrule 27 other members? Should all legislation require two-thirds approval or should all elected officials be required to garner two-thirds of the votes cast? It is oppressive and it is impractical.

Even more oppressive, though, is what happened this year. Several of the 15 holdouts in the Assembly were on record as saying they did not believe any new taxes were necessary. "Our guys started for the most part at zero increase," Assembly Minority Leader Lynn Hettrick said. No increase is an extreme position and an irrational starting point for a compromise.

This group believed that if they held out long enough through the regular session and into expensive special sessions that eventually they could override the will of the governor and a majority in the Legislature. The state Supreme Court decided that they were not executing their duties in good faith and provided an opportunity to end this embarrassment that has played out on the national news.

Now Rep. Jim Gibbons, R-Nev., is at it again. He wants to spearhead another constitutional amendment that favors his political philosophy. Gibbons would probably love to rewrite the whole thing. Maybe Nevada should reexamine the two-thirds requirement on taxes, term limits and how its Legislature operates, instead of passing another Jim Gibbons constitutional amendment.

JEREMY M. CHRISTENSEN