Our State Constitution is Safe

In Minnesota, two big election victories stand out above many big wins and they put a smile on my face this morning.
by Charlie Leck

Put on your happy face!

The Constitution of the State of Minnesota shall not be amended!
Period! I am extremely pleased this morning that two constitutional amendment referendum items were refused by the voters of the state. Neither would have had any business at all within the language of the constitution and the voters were smart to reject them. Hooray for the voters!

The Marriage Amendment
Minnesota became the very first state in the union to reject a constitutional amendment to define marriage as only between one man and one woman. It makes me very proud of my state. Marriage between anyone but a man and a woman is still illegal in the state, but it is not prohibited by the constitution – only by a state statute that can be removed and may well be after the manner in which the citizens of the state spoke last night.

The primary organization leading the fight against the amendment to the constitution was Minnesotans United for All Families. Its director, Richard Carlbom, spoke at a gathering last night when the results of the election became obvious:

“This is truly a historic night. Minnesota is now the first state in our country that has faced this question and said, ‘No!’”

In Maine and Maryland last night, voters approved the right of same-sex partners to marry. That fact gives Minnesotans great hope that they can get their own law withdrawn and changed.

The Voter I.D. Amendment
The other constitutional amendment resolution on the ballot yesterday had to do with a requirement that photo identification would be necessary in order to vote. To my pleasure, it was also defeated.* The amendment was widely seen as unnecessary in a state with consistently high turnouts for elections and a minuscule number of reports of voter fraud.

Again, such an amendment would have required inserting language within the constitution that has no business being there. It’s proper place is within the state statutes where legislators themselves would have to take responsibility for putting it there.

Within the last month, one Republican Party insider has admitted that the amendments were placed on the state ballot in order to drive a higher than usual conservative turnout at polling places all over the state. The strategy clearly did not work.

There’s a lot to be pleased about this morning, but nothing pleases me more than the results in these two constitutional amendment votes.

Democrats will control the State Legislature
The Democratic Party won control of both houses of the state legislature last night. This will give our governor a freer hand to move the state along toward solving many of its problems. For instance, look for higher taxes on those who make more than 350 thousand dollars a year. Congratulations to both WIN Minnesota and the Alliance for a Better Minnesota for driving the campaign to regain the legislature. Look, too, for the legislature to repeal the law prohibiting same-sex marriage!

Big Turnout in Minnesota
As an aside, I’m proud to also mention that Minnesota will probably lead the nation again this time for the number (or percentage) of its registered voters who actually turned-out to vote. Good going, Minnesota.

*with 95 percent of the vote counted

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Political Money Train

The Political Money Train is unbelievable. Money just keeps pouring in to capture the Presidency and other U.S. and local offices. Do you ever wonder how many people expect to be paid back in one way or another – somehow?
by Charlie Leck

The newspaper I'm reading this morning says that more than 2 Billion -- 2 BILLION -- dollars have been spent on this years presidential campaign. Oh, my!

Let’s get local!
For just a bit here, let’s focus on how some local money is being spent on a small Minnesota State Senate seat over in the community of Edina (ee-dine-a). Granted, this is one of the wealthiest suburban communities in America, but, geez-louise, this is an awful lot of money they are spending over there to win one measly, little State Senate seat.

It’s called Senate District 49. The Republicans are running State Representative Keith Downey for the Senate seat. Melisa Franzen is the Democratic candidate.

Downey has raised approximately $140,000 for the race. That doesn’t sound like a lot compared to the national races, but, believe me, it is. That’s the highest total campaign chest in the state.

Franzen has raised, easily, over 100 thousand. Exact figures will be available sometime early next week. This past Tuesday, Senator Al Franklin was the headliner at a big fund raiser for Franzen.

Now, in a quite liberal state, Edina has always been a bastion of conservative thinking – economically and politically. The chink in this is that it not conservative socially. Edina is a generous community and its people think liberally when it comes to correcting social problems and pushing education and job training. Franzen is trying to take advantage of that thinking. She’s a corporate attorney (Target Corp) and she’s known to be conservative financially; yet, she wants Minnesota to be in the fore-front of correcting societal problems.

Big Democratic dollars have poured into state races this year. Alliance for a Better Minnesota (ABM) and its fund raising partner, Win Minnesota, has raised hundreds of thousands of dollars and is spreading it around to local candidates. In the interest of full disclosure, I’ve given a significant amount of money (for me) to Win Minnesota. The idea is to capture at least one of the two houses of state government this year, if not both!

ABM is placing a number of TV spots that go after Downey. A PAC, Freedom Club, has also run TV ads supporting Downey. TV is expensive and it is unusual to see such ads for local candidates. But, in comes the big money and these little campaigns expand enormously.

The former State Senator from Edina, who gave up his seat, is Geoff Michel. He makes it clear that Democrats don’t have a tinker’s chance to elect a State Senator in Edina. Let’s see if he’s correct.

How much money has been spread around the state?
ABM’s goals are extraordinary, but they’ve raised a lot of money. It will take awhile to see just where that money went. We’ll be able to make pretty accurate guesses after the campaign financing reports come out early next week.

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Why not become a follower?
If you read my blog regularly, why not become a follower? All you have to do is click in the upper right hand corner and establish a simple means of communication. Then you'll be informed every time a new blog is posted here. If all that's confusing, here's Google's explanation of how to do it! If you don’t want to post comments on the blog, but would like to communicate with me about it, send me an email if you’d like.