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Definitions of Political Terms
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March 2, 2005
The 2005 General Session of the Wyoming Legislature is said and done at this point, and naturally we should all stop for a minute and consider what the 30 honorable State Senators and the 60 honorable State Representatives have wrought.
Under our system of state government, the legislative session that has just concluded is designed to complete the heavy lifting of law making and law amending. This 40-day general session has resulted in somewhere around 100 new laws being foisted onto the citizens of Wyoming; laws that all the people of our state are expected to know and obey.
To arrive at an objective evaluation of the results of the 58th Legislature, one needs to keep a few things in mind. The purpose of our government is to provide services; it does so by collecting tax money to pay for benefits, and the public employees that facilitate the delivery of those benefits. The Legislature takes into consideration the need for services, as well as the potential sources of tax dollars, and makes a collective decision.
We the people expect the decisions of the Legislature to pass the ‘common sense’ test, that there will be a connection between the most important issues of the day and the actions of the legislative branch of government. We expect that the citizens who have the greatest need will receive more help than those whose needs are slight. We tend to assume that those who have a great ability to pay, such as mineral companies, will be taxed more than those who are limited in their cash flow, such as disabled citizens.
We also have an expectation that the decisions made, along with the priorities that are set, will reflect a long-range and realistic view of the world. What good is it to the children of Wyoming to have a group of decisions makers that are living in the past? When a group of elected officials is passing laws and appropriating budgets for everyone in Wyoming, they have a responsibility to move beyond their own narrow view of the world and do what is the best for the common good.
Every Legislator takes an oath to uphold the constitutions of both Wyoming and the United States, so naturally we expect them to live up to their oath. They have sworn an oath to vote to protect our basic individual rights, to respect the separation of powers between the three branches of government, to guard the public purse as if it were their own, along with a variety of other constitutional issues.
In addition, the legislators have some personal responsibilities as well. We are fortunate in Wyoming to have had a legislative system almost completely free of out and out corruption, and that is what we continue to expect. Citizen accessibility to elected officials is important, and we have that, but it is also important that there is an attitude of cordiality from those same officials. Elected officials work for the citizens, and we all know that employees should never be rude to the boss! When there are conflicts of interest, the citizens see the need for the legislator to remove himself or herself from the vote.
And when we keep all of those benchmarks in mind, just what level of merit does this session of the Legislature deserve? Naturally that depends on the vantage point of the person giving the grade! Evaluators who care most of all about the corporate interest will have different points of reference than those whose primary concern is the delivery of services to the medically infirm or the victims of crime.
From my personal vantage point of advocating for a progressive point of view, a view that will work for the common good over the next 50 years or so, the current Legislature would receive a grade of ‘C’. That grade is based on the following benchmarks: new ideas, identifying the root of social and economic problems and using progressive thinking to arrive at possible long range solutions and doing so in an open and honest fashion.
The Legislature could improve its grade by heeding the words of Albert Einstein, who said something along the lines of, “the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results”.
There is a strong and unfortunate dynamic among the many traditional thinkers in the current legislature to ignore the social realities of our current culture. Instead of taking an honest look at the way life really is, and crafting laws and programs that deal with it, they continue to pretend that they can reverse cultural trends and go back to the 1950’s. There is a one-word answer to that concept…wrong!
Progress in Wyoming will come when the elected officials serving in the Legislature take a deep breath, face social reality and bravely march into the future. Let us, the citizens of Wyoming fervently hope that such a day is not too far off in the future.
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