East Valley Tribune
When our nation’s founders wrote the language in the First Amendment guaranteeing the right to “petition the government for a redress of grievances,” there were no words describing the form of that petition.
Obviously the intent was to make sure the content of your complaints to your government would never land you in jail or to suffer some other harm.
Now, of course, common sense would say that for your petition to have any effect, your words would have to be legible and understandable to a reasonable person. Skywriting or putting a couple of thousand words on a thimble head might impede that legibility or understandability, for example.
A senate panel voted Wednesday to throw some additional hurdles in the path of Arizonans who want to write their own laws.
Existing law already has a set of requirements for putting a measure on the ballot to propose a new statute or constitutional amendment. These include for who can circulate petitions, what has to be on each page and how many names can be on each sheet.
A ballot measure allowing medical marijuana was too close to call late Tuesday night. Proposition 203 was failing by about 7,200 votes out of more than 1.2 million cast. Andrew Myers, campaign manager for the Arizona Marijuana Policy Project, the main group supporting the measure, said later returns could still pull Proposition 203 ahead. “I think the right votes will come in,” he said. The measure’s detractors also were confident.
A former Phoenix City Council candidate took the first steps Monday to have the fate of the new law aimed at illegal immigrants decided by Arizona voters. Jon Garrido picked up the necessary paperwork at the Secretary of State’s office to refer the measure, just signed by Gov. Jan Brewer, to the ballot. Garrido needs just 76,684 valid signatures by late July — the exact date is currently in flux — to put the question to voters.
The House voted 37-18 Wednesday to put a constitutional right to hunt and fish in the Arizona Constitution. Backers of HCR 2008 say the measure is designed to deter special interests from proposing ballot measures which would limit the ability to hunt, either by restricting the methods available or by deciding that certain species should not be hunted. That happened more than a decade ago when an initiative successfully banned the use of steel-jawed leghold traps.
A new drive has been launched to reduce the penalty for having small amounts of marijuana to a fine. Phoenix resident Dennis Bohlke filed the necessary legal papers to begin collecting signatures to put the measure on the 2010 ballot. The maximum penalty for those convicted of having four ounces of marijuana or less would be $300.
Arizonans will get a second chance to decide if they want residents here to be able to opt out of any national health insurance plan approved by Congress. Without debate, the state Senate on Monday voted 18-11 to put a proposal on the 2010 ballot which would constitutionally override any law, rule or regulation that requires individuals or employers to participate in any particular health care system. The House already has approved the measure.