State representatives voted Monday to put a measure on the 2008 ballot asking citizens to make it harder to change the Colorado Constitution.
Fueled by dislike of the state’s new ethics-in-government law, the proposal made it out of one chamber of the legislature for the first time in four years.
The measure now goes to the Senate, which failed to pass a similar proposal last year by one vote.
Supporters said the too-easy process to amend the state constitution has made it a “doormat” and a “laughing stock,” a document cluttered with conflicting fiscal policy, hog farm rules and a section on the trapping of fur-bearing animals.
“We don’t change the constitution like we change an undershirt,” said Rep. Spencer Swalm, R-Centennial.
The measure needed 44 votes, two-thirds of the House, to pass. It was approved 46-16.
The proposal from Rep. Al White, R-Winter Park, would require a margin of three-fifths of votes – 60 percent – to change the constitution. The standard now is a simple majority, 50 percent plus one.
Some critics, including House Speaker Andrew Romanoff, were not against making it harder to change the constitution. But they said that because the measure can’t go on the ballot until 2008, lawmakers should spend the next year gathering citizen input.
But White said lawmakers should use that time to explain to the public why the proposal is necessary.
“The time is now,” he said, noting public confusion over whether Amendment 41 bans inheritances or scholarships to the children of government employees. “I’m not sure what will happen to the public a year from now.”
The ethics amendment passed with 62 percent of the vote last November. But White believes Amendment 41’s backers likely would have sought a new state law instead of a constitutional change if the threshold had been 60 percent.
And if Amendment 41 was a statutory measure and not carved into the constitution, the legislature could have clarified its scope this year, White said.
But community activist groups argued it’s unfair to snatch power from the people at the ballot box.
“Today’s vote shows that the legislature doesn’t trust voters to make decisions about laws that govern their lives,” said Will Coyne with Environment Colorado, which has run several ballot initiatives.
Senate President pro tem Peter Groff, a Denver Democrat who is sponsoring House Concurrent Resolution 1001 in the Senate, said he was uncertain whether he had the necessary 24 votes to pass it.
Colorado voters have added 21,000 words to the state’s constitution since 1990. That’s almost three times the size of the U.S. Constitution.
Voters struck down a 1996 ballot question to require a 60 percent threshold to amend the constitution.
Staff writer Jennifer Brown can be reached at 303-954-1593 or jenbrown@denverpost.com.
