How the Texas Legislature Can Ignore a Mandate

OH, now I see. I’ve been wondering these past few months how the Texas legislature can ignore a constitutional mandate to provide adequate funding for public education. By passing budget bills that shorts public education by a whopping $4 billion, the legislature seemingly has violated Article 7 Section 1 of the Texas State Constitution which says:

“Sec. 1.  SUPPORT AND MAINTENANCE OF SYSTEM OF PUBLIC FREE  SCHOOLS.  A general diffusion of knowledge being essential to the preservation of the liberties and rights of the people, it shall be the duty of the Legislature of the State to establish and make suitable provision for the support and maintenance of an efficient system of public free schools.”

Seems pretty clear to me that what they did and what they are still trying to do is unconstitutional.

But now I have my answer. It seems that the lawmakers were cognizant of the fact that their budget is unconstitutional, because one of the bills they are working on in the special session is to pass a law making it okey-dokey to underfund public education.

From the Austin American-Statesman:

“Written into law is a guarantee that schools would get enough money to provide a basic, foundational education for each student. That obligation has dictated what the state has put into the Foundation School Program to cover growing enrollment and a changing student population.”

“But the school finance plan now under consideration by legislators wipes that guarantee out and makes future appropriations dependent upon how much money is available rather than how much is needed.”

So, OK, they make this constitutional by changing the law that mandates that they fully fund public education. After the fact, but that seems to be the plan.

Now I have a new question and pardon my ignorance. This is a part of the constitution. Changing the wording in the constitution is essentially amending it. Don’t constitutional amendments all have to be approved by the voters?

Barbara Radnofsky: Texas AG Abbott Oversaw Nullification of Texas Marriages

Texas voters, it seems, in their zeal to deny to their gay neighbors rights and privileges that they take for granted, may just have shot themselves, and their marriages, right in the foot.

Apparently, according to Barbara Ann Radnofsky, who hopes to unseat Republican State AG Greg Abbott, the constitutional amendment that Texas voters came out in droves to vote for in 2005, as urged by their priests and preachers, the amendment to deny gay men and women the right to a state-sanctioned marriage, went a little too far.

You see, in their zeal to deny gay Texans the right to marry, the framers of Proposition 2, a constitutional amendment to ban same sex marriage in Texas, actually banned all marriage. And, as Radnofsky points out, Greg Abbott oversaw the whole process.

Said Radnofsky in the Fort Worth Star-Telegram:

“You do not have to have a fancy law degree to read this and understand what it plainly says.”

Oh really? I had trouble believing it, that these people could be that dense, but then I went and read the entire thing as it sits right now as Section 32 of Article 1 of the Texas State Constitution (scroll all the way down):

Sec. 32. MARRIAGE. (a) Marriage in this state shall consist only of the union of one man and one woman.
(b) This state or a political subdivision of this state may not create or recognize any legal status identical or similar to marriage.

(Added Nov. 8, 2005.)

Clause (b) says it all.

Said Radnofsky:

“Whoever vetted the language in B must have been asleep at the wheel.”

For “whoever” read Abbott.

Not true says Abbott’s staffer Kelly Strickland (who helped draft the amendment), from the same article:

“The Texas Constitution and the marriage statute are entirely constitutional.”

In saying this, the staffer appears to be defending Texas’ ban on all marriages, saying that this ban is “entirely constitutional.”

What is truly ironic here is that Radnofsky is not the first person to point this out. It was pointed out 4 years ago by the group “Save Texas Marriage.”

From the Austin Chronicle:

“A newly formed group, Save Texas Marriage – a blood relative of the No Nonsense in November campaign – has mounted a full-on attack on Prop. 2 that ncludes a massive rollout of automated calls to nearly two million homes across the state. In one call, the Rev. Tom Hegar, a Presbyterian minister, warns that because the second part of the proposed amendment, prohibiting the recognition of "any legal status identical or similar to marriage," fails to distinguish between same-sex couples and heterosexual couples, a ‘liberal activist judge’ could see fit to void all marriages. ‘Don't risk it; vote against it,’ Hegar says, and ends with ‘God bless you.’”

Now you just know that someone is going to take advantage of this ill-written law. What better way to get out of a property settlement in a divorce case than to make the case that the marriage was never legal?

I am wondering one step further. If marriage in Texas isn’t legal, what does that do to divorce decisions? If there no marriage is recognized in Texas, how can the state grant divorces?

Never mind how many people are there out there having sex out of wedlock, I want to know how many bigamists there are out there as a result of this snafu.

Early Voting on Texas Constitutional Amendments Begins Today

On every odd year the state government of Texas throws a little party for 181 part-time state employees. A party that lasts 140 days. And these are part-time because they only work for those 140 days every other year.

This past year the 150 state house legislators and 31 state senators worked semi-feverishly to pass eleven laws that need your endorsement before they become the law of the land. Eleven laws that become permanent parts of the state constitution of Texas.

A document that can be found online here.

So on these off-off years between presidential and mid-term elections, we Texans are duty-bound to show up at the polls to give these amendments to our constitution an up or down vote.

And as you can well guess, unless the constitutional amendment is a hot-button issue with social conservatives, these elections are poorly attended.

You know, like the constitutional amendment that was added to the Texas constitution in 2005 that banned same sex marriage and civil unions. That one I well-remember because the line to the poll went out the door and halfway to the street at my Election Day polling place on November 8th 2005. And everyone in line knew each other because they all attended the same church. That amendment, encapsulated in Proposition 2 that year, passed in Fort Bend County by a vote of 35,695 in favor (82.55%) to 7,542 against (17.44%). Statewide, it passed by 75% to 25%.

Texans that vote in off-off year elections hate gays, you see.

Anyway, the time has come again to vote for your favorite constitutional amendments and I have done the homework for you. One of my favorite state representatives, State Rep. Scott Hochberg (D - Houston), has put up a very good and informative website on the 11 propositions. The first page gives you the short blurb on the subject matter of each, but then if you click on the individual proposition hyperlink you get a separate web page for each proposition, including background and arguments for and against the proposition.

I found it hugely informative.

I think, for instance, that you’d be crazy to vote against Proposition 11.

Anyway, as the title of this piece says, early voting for the Constitutional Amendment Election starts today, with Election Day being on November 3rd. The Fort Bend County Elections office has Early Voting locations and hours posted at its website, or you can just click here to get to the website. You then click on the individual polling location on the map to get a listing of the days and hours of operation (they differ from place to place).

Here, you can see the Election Day voting locations in Fort Bend County. All polls open at 7AM and close at 7 PM on that day.