Maine, Washington Defeat Referendums on Tax Extremism

by Mike Hall, Nov 5, 2009

In Maine and Washington State, voters Tuesday overwhelmingly told the extremist right-wing, anti-worker crowd to take their efforts to cripple state governments and slash vital services and shove them.

In both states, the so-called Taxpayer Bills of Rights (TABOR)—long a part of the reactionary holy grail—went down by double-digit margins. Maine voters said “No” by a 60-40 margin and TABOR was defeated in Washington 55-45. It was the third time in recent years Mainers saw through the hype and said “No” to Tabor.

According the Ballot Initiative Strategy Center (BISC):

The Grover Norquist, Club for Growth, Glenn Beck, Tea Party crowd tried to use the bleak budget picture as an opportunity to ratchet down even harder as states look to find the revenue necessary to protect priorities, create jobs, and get their economies going—but voters rejected that failed approach again….

These votes in Maine and Washington prove that the tea party anger that has been hyped for months doesn’t translate into majorities and election victories. The right wing base remains out of sync with moderates and independents.

In Maine, union activists and voters rallied around the effort to put another stake through the heart of a TABOR initiative. As Matt Schlobohm, Maine AFL-CIO Public Policy & Political Mobilization director, says:

The work that our affiliated local unions and councils did educating and mobilizing our members and the general public was a significant reason we so soundly defeated TABOR.

The Washington State Labor Council AFL-CIO (WSLC) mobilized its members and was part of broad coalition that sent a TABOR ballot measure (Initiative 1033) to defeat. Had TABOR passed, says the WSLC, it would have

capped revenue for state, county and city governments, making it illegal for local lawmakers to spend more than the previous year’s budget on schools, police, fire protection, roads, libraries, parks, hospitals and other services. I-1033 was deliberately timed to lock in the budget cuts forced by the recession.

BISC notes that TABOR measures have been a central tenant of the extremist agenda for several years, but voters and state legislators have seen through the charade and, except in Colorado in 1992, defeated the initiatives.

In 1992, Colorado became the only state—before or since—to approve TABOR. The damage was severe. Colorado dropped to 49th in the nation in education funding and the percentage of low-income children with no health insurance doubled. In 2005, voters in Colorado suspended the revenue restrictions.

In a column on Huffington Post, BISC’s Kristina Wilfore warns that Tuesday was not the last time we’ll see the TABOR crowd try to disguise itself as some sort of populist uprising.

They’ll be back. The irony is that those who supposedly are speaking for the people—and positioning themselves as representatives of the populist outrage in this country—don’t hold themselves accountable to what the people actually want and vote for. They lost this central test to their agenda, and it doesn’t matter to them.

For more on previous TABOR battles click here, here, here and here.

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