State Bill Colorado
State lawmakers may once again ask voters to make it harder to get constitutional amendments on the ballot, an idea Coloradans rejected in 2008, The Denver Post reports. This time, though, there may be no attempt to encourage groups circulating initiative petitions to only change state statutes instead of the constitution. “This is a simplified Ref. O,” said Sen. Abel Tapia, D-Pueblo, referring to Referendum O, which voters shot down 52.5 percent to 47.5 percent in 2008.
Is Amendment 54 a valid way to fight pay-to-play politics or an unconstitutionally overbroad limit on political speech? The state’s highest court will hear oral arguments tomorrow in a case that will resolve that controversy. Passed into law as a ballot initiative last year, Amendment 54 was widely seen as a move to curtail political contributions from labor unions. The amendment forbids recipients of large sole-source, or “no-bid,” government contracts from contributing to any political campaign in Colorado, except campaigns for federal office.