Tag Archives: Minority votes

Broad Coalition of Groups Oppose Eyman and BP’s Initiative 1053

Posted on September 16th, 2010 | Comments Off on Broad Coalition of Groups Oppose Eyman and BP’s Initiative 1053

A broad coalition of Washington State organizations has come out against Initiative 1053 which is on the November 2, 2010 ballot. Initiative 1053 was put on the ballot by Tim Eyman, BP, and other oil and banking interests in an attempt to give a minority of 1/3 of the Legislators in either house of the Legislature veto power over the state budget and raising revenue or repealing special interest tax breaks.

I-1053 is unconstitutional because it is trying to amend the Washington State Constitution. You can not amend the Constitution by an initiative in Washington State. That requires a constitutional amendment.I-1053 is trying to amend the language in Article II, Section 22 of the State Constitution which says the Legislature shall act by a majority vote in passing legislation. By I-1053 trying to require a 2/3 vote to pass revenue bills it is basically saying that only 1/3 of the Legislators in either House can overrule the vote of the majority.That is why it is unconstitutional.

Major statewide groups opposing I-1053 include:

League of Women Voters of Washington
Washington Association of Churches
Washington State Labor Council
Washington Conservation Voters
Washington Education Association
Washington State Democrats
Sierra Club – Cascade Chapter

Here is the complete list opposing I-1053 done alphabetically. More groups are joining every day.

•Adams County Democrats

•AFT Seattle Community Colleges, Local 1789

•Amalgamated Transit Union Local 1015

•Amalgamated Transit Union Local 1384

•Amalgamated Transit Union Local 1765

•Amalgamated Transit Union Local 587

•Amalgamated Transit Union Local 757

•Amalgamated Transit Union Local 843

•Amalgamated Transit Union Local 883

•American Cancer Society Cancer Action Network

•American Federation of Teachers – AFT Washington

•Asian Pacific American Labor Alliance (APALA)

•Asian Pacific Islander Coalition of King County

•Center for Social Justice

•Central WA Progress

•Childhaven

•Children’s Alliance

•Church Council of Greater Seattle

•Community Workers of America (CWA) State Council

•Cowlitz-Wahkiakum Labor Council

•Eastern Washington Voters

•Economic Opportunity Institute

•Entre Hermanos

•Equal Rights Washington

•Friends Committee on Washington State Public Policy (Quakers)

•Fuse Washington

•Futurewise

•Greater Seattle Business Association

•Health Point

•IBEW Local 46

•IBEW Local 77

•IFPTE Local 17

•Inland Empire Residential Resources

•Inter*Im Community Development Association

•International Community Health Services

•Japanese American Citizens League (JACL) Seattle Chapter

•King County Democrats

•King County Labor Council

•Kitsap County Labor Council

•Laborers Local 1239

•League of Women Voters of Washington

•Lewiston-Clarkston County Labor Council

•Lincoln County Democrats

•Latino PAC of Washington

•Lutheran Community Services Northwest

•Lutheran Public Policy Office

•Minority Executive Directors Coalition

•NARAL Pro-Choice Washington

•National Asian Pacific American Women’s Forum (NAPAWF) Seattle Chapter

•National Council of Jewish Women – Seattle Section

•New Futures

•North Central Washington CLC

•North Urban Human Services Alliance

•Northwest Progressive Institute

•Northwest Washington CLC

•Olympic Labor Council

•One America

•One America Votes

•Operators (IUOE) 302

•Organizing for Seattle

•Pacific County Democrats

•Peace and Justice Action League of Spokane

•Pierce County Democrats

•Pierce County Labor Council

•Planned Parenthood Pub Pol Network of WA

•Public School Employees of WA/SEIU Local 1948

•Puget Sound Alliance for Retired Americans

•Raising Our APA Representation

•Retired Public Employees of Washington

•Sahngnoksoo

•SEA MAR Community Health Clinic
•Seattle Human Services Coalition

•SEIU 925

•SEIU Healthcare 1199 NW

•SEIU Healthcare 775 NW

•SEIU WA State Council

•Sheet Metal Workers Local 66
•Sierra Club Cascade Chapter
•Sightline

•Snohomish County Democratic Central Committee

•Snohomish County Labor Council

•Snohomish County Young Democrats

•Southeast Washington CLC

•Southwest Washington Central Labor Council (Formerly Clark, Skamania, and West Klickitat CLC)

•Spokane Regional Labor Council

•Statewide Poverty Action Network

•Teamsters Joint Council 28

•Thurston, Lewis, Mason Counties Labor Council

•Twin Harbors Labor Council

•UA Local 32 Plumbers and Pipefitters

•UFCW 141

•UFCW 365/WPEA

•UFCW 21

•UNITE Here Local 8

•United Faculty of Washington State

•Washington Association of Churches

•Washington Association of Community and Migrant Health Centers

•Washington Bus Education Fund

•Washington Chapter American Academy of Pediatrics

•Washington Community Action Network

•Washington Conservation Voters

•Washington Education Association

•Washington Federation of State Employees

•Washington State Council of Fire Fighters

•Washington State Democrats

•Washington State Labor Council

•Whatcom County Democrats21

•Yakima South Central Counties Labor Council

•Yakima County Democrats

•2nd Legislative District Democrats

•5th legislative District Democrats

•28th Legislative District Democrat

•30th Legislative District Democrats

•32nd Legislative District Democrats

•33rd Legislative District Democrats

34th Legislative District Democrats

•36th Legislative District Democrats

•38th Legislative District Democrats

•41st Legislative District Democrats

•43rd Legislative District Democrats

•44th Legislative District Democrats

•45th Legislative District Democrats

•46th Legislative District Democrats

•47th Legislative District Democrats

•48th Legislative District Democrats

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Posted in Elections, Initiatives, Washington State Legislature

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Snake Oil Salesman Eyman Tries to Revive Dead Initiative and Republicans

Posted on January 8th, 2007 | 1 comment

Perennial Con Artist Tim Eyman has something new he wants you to buy. No, it’s not a fraternity or sorority watch. He been digging in his graveyard of old money making initiatives and schemes and discovered that applying Clark Stanley’s Snake Oil Liniment to his scalp has really helped increase his mental acumen and insight. Or so he thinks.

He thinks it’s worked so well for him that he’s reviving another initiative to the people of Washington State that he has already failed to get support for in the past. (Initiative 807 in 2003). He’s been sending fundraising letters around the state telling people of his dead but now revived vision for Washington State without tax or fee increases. Seems all this snake oil could do was revive old Eyman schemes , not generate new ones.

He and his fellow traveling salesmen from Spokane – the Fagan Brothers – have filed an initiative today (Initiative 953) with the Washington State Secretary of State to give a minority of 1/3 of the State Legislature the ability to stop any tax and fee increases.

He thinks it’s a brilliant idea – just because the state voters overwhelming elected Democrats by a wide majority to run the Legislature and write and pass the state budget doesn’t mean that the losers still can’t win. Keep the faith. Rather than the majority passing the state budget, he wants a minority of 1/3 of our elected legislators to decide.

Yes, let a minority or one third of the state legislators decide what is or isn’t in the budget. That way the Republicans can still be in power to decide on the critical issues of what’s in the state budget and who and what gets funded or not. We all know Democrats stole the Governor’s race . It only follows that they must have stolen the Legislature also.

And all Tim has to do is convince you to do is sign and vote for his measure to put the Republicans back in charge. But he won’t tell you that it’s an attempt to overturn the vote of the majority and give a minority of 34 members out of 98 in the Washington State House of Representatives or 17 out of 49 members in the Washington State Senate veto power over running the state.

No he won’t be talking about this attempt to put the Republicans back in charge. His scalp treatments tell him that its not really what’s in the medicine you try to sell to people, it’s what you convince them to think is in it. Eyman is planning on come out with his own line of snake oil – Eyman’s Own Scalp and Hair Remedy

Rumor has it that Eyman has been trying to convince losing Republican Gubernatorial candidate Dino Rossi to buy some bottles of Stanley Clark’s Snake Oil Lineament. Eyman says he has plenty in his garage but unfortunately for some of us he is restricting sales to Republicans only. Rossi wishes he had only started taking it before his last election.

Eyman’s previous attempt on this initiative was filed as I-807 filed in 2003. At that time we wrote how Eyman had printed up invalid initiative petitions that did not have the correct text on the back . He also tried to falsely sell the initiative as “No Income Tax”. The Legislature subsequently changed the law to stop petitioners from falsely representing what an initiative was about.

But let Eyman go ahead and try to con people again. The fact is that the initiative is patently unconstitutional and like others he has written, it would be thrown out in court.

Why? We also wrote about this previously  because any attempt to give one third of the Legislature veto power over the state budget is unconstitutional. Article II, Section 22 of the Washington State Constitution gives the legislature the power to pass laws by a majority vote. Eyman can not change the state constitution by initiative.

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Posted in Economy, Elections, Initiatives, Washington State Legislature

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