COMMUNITY COMMENTARY:Two-thirds vote shields minority

The state budget, before being passed Tuesday, was once again deadlocked for a time in the Legislature. Every year when this happens, the majority party labels the minority party as obstructionists. The main culprit, they say, is California’s two-thirds vote requirement for adopting the state budget.

Recently, both Assembly Speaker Nunez and Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger have suggested the two-thirds voting requirement for passing a budget should be eliminated.

I could not disagree more.

California’s Constitution requires that at least two-thirds of the state’s legislators must agree on the budget in order for it to pass. That means at least 27 of the 40 Senators must vote for the budget, which the current liberal majority sees as an unreasonable obstacle to their desire to pass a budget that contains millions of dollars of new spending for some of their pet projects.

On the other hand, I see the two-thirds requirement as a prudent protection of taxpayers’ pocketbooks. It’s also consistent with the philosophy of our nation’s Founding Fathers, who wanted to protect the minority from the tyranny of the majority.

As recently as 2004, California voters by an overwhelming majority rejected the idea of eliminating the two-thirds vote requirement to pass the state budget. That was Proposition 56 and it was quite properly opposed by Schwarzenegger.

Now he thinks it is a good idea. So, why does he all of a sudden publicly support an idea that the public overwhelmingly rejected just a few years ago? Good question!

I believe that it is entirely logical to make it more difficult to increase state spending when such increased spending will almost certainly mean that California’s citizens will have to pay more in fees or taxes. The two-thirds vote requirement not only places a hurdle in the path of a potentially runaway majority, it ensures that the minority has some input into the budget process.

When Gray Davis was governor, the liberal majority had consistently ignored and undermined the minority’s recommendations and warnings about state over-spending. Unfortunately, it appears this sort of behavior has carried over into the Schwarzenegger administration. The current budget proposal is built of a house of financial cards. It is not balanced and spends nearly three-quarters of a billion dollars more than it receives.

In short, this budget has been predicated on too much borrowing, too much spending, unrealistic revenue projections and a great deal of smoke and mirror accounting gimmickry. This budget does not contain a single reduction in spending and has actually grown more during this administration than during the previous administration. Is it any wonder that the state will face a $5 billion deficit next year?

The true culprit in California’s annual budget impasse is the majority’s inability to say “no” to the well-financed special interest spending lobby who are constantly pressuring government to direct more and more of your tax dollars into their pocketbooks. While it isn’t failsafe, the two-thirds vote requirement is our only hope for curbing continued out-of-control spending.

All of us need to watch out for ongoing attempts to lower the constitutional requirement for a two-thirds vote requirement for the budget. Rest assured that I’ll do everything I can to block those attempts and protect your wallet.

SEN. TOM HARMAN represents the 35th District, which includes Huntington Beach, Newport Beach and Costa Mesa.