Work for the people

Arkansas’ state motto is “The People Rule.” Our current legislators seem to think that is poor policy.

I believe this attitude shows in most of their legislation, but the most blatant was their attempt to change the parameters which instruct people on how to do an initiative or a referendum. The Constitution is plain with these instructions.

For last fall’s election people had written a ballot initiative, got the required number of names, and was approved by the secretary of state and the state attorney general to be on the ballot.

When the legislators saw the people were going to rule, apparently they decided that, if it was going to be, then someone needed to make money from it. An amendment was written, so convoluted as to be almost useless and which it would take a team of constitutional lawyers to decipher. It seems the secretary of state and attorney general were instructed to review the people’s initiative to look for errors. Like the puppets they are, they dutifully reviewed, reported errors and disqualified the people’s initiative. Now that misbegotten legislative amendment had no competition for votes. It would have lost had both been on the ballot.

We the people do not need the guardianship of legislators. We need legislators who will work for the people, not against them. MARJORIE LeCLAIR

Shirley