Disappeared News

I still haven't convinced myself that a constitutional convention would be a good thing, but if we could use it to bring democracy to these islands, maybe it would be worth it.

Richard Borreca wrote about the attempted palace coup (not the one at Iolani Palace, the one next door at the Capitol) in his column this morning.

It's a good read, very revealing of the annual game the House plays each year trying to unseat its leadership and install a new regime.

A silly game? Perhaps, but think of it this way: imagine Calvin Say as the Dictator of Hawaii. The guy who determines what bills will be heard or not, which laws will be passed, which vetoes will be overridden, who gets money and who does not. He and the Senate President can overrule your vote and my vote. We are nothing in the shadow of their power.

Read Borreca's last paragraph:

But remember in the Hawaii Legislature, when it is time to decide what bill lives, what program is cut or even how much money there is to spend, the last two coming out of the back room are the speaker of the House and the Senate president.

For those of us who spend hours at the Legislature giving testimony, the end-of-session conference committee meetings demonstrate that democracy has yet to take hold here. Indeed, the decisions are made in those back rooms and merely announced at the conference committee meeting.

We need reform very badly. If a bill has sufficient testimony it should be heard. Committee chairs (probably working under orders from their leadership) should not be able to refuse to hear a bill.

Committee members should be required to be present if they are to vote on a bill, no selecting a compliant quorum of members who never heard the testimony and directing them how to vote.

No "secret" amendments should be sprung on the selected quorum that have not been the subject of proper notice and receive testimony.

There's more that could be done, of course, and let's not forget replacing the conference committees entirely with joint meetings, in the open, to work out differences between bills.

Maybe we should have a unicameral legislature. Who needs two versions of each bill anyway? And who needs two dictators in the Legislature?