Conservatives Blast Term Limits Initiative Group Says Initiative Really Calling For An Unlimited Constitutional Convention

The recently-qualified initiative to pressure adoption of congressional term limits has picked up opposition from a conservative group that many would have assumed to be a supporter.

The Save the Constitution Committee warned voters on Monday that the initiative essentially sets the stage for an unlimited constitutional convention that could result in dramatic and potentially devastating changes in the constitutional rights of Americans.

“The term limits issue is a classic bait and switch deception on the public,” committee Chairman George Detweiler of Twin Falls said in a statement.

The initiative on the November ballot, if adopted by voters, requires the state to place behind candidates names a statement on whether incumbents did everything possible to force congressional action on a federal constitutional amendment to limit congressional service and whether challengers support such action.

The attorney general has said the proposal, known by critics as the “Ballot Clutter Initiative of 1996,” is probably unconstitutional because it essentially requires the state to campaign for candidates taking a pro-term limits stand by advising voters of that stand.

Among those sponsoring the Save the Constitution Committee are former state Health Division Director Fritz Dixon, who endorsed the 1994 term limits initiative.

That initiative slaps limits on every office from Congress and governor to school board.

But the U.S. Supreme Court voided the state interference in congressional service, leaving only the state office limitations in effect.

The new initiative is intended to build pressure for overriding that high court ruling with a constitutional amendment.

But Detweiler contended that what initiative backers really want is a constitutional convention that would open up the entire constitution - including the Bill of Rights - to change without any guarantee that term limits would be addressed.

Among other committee sponsors are major National Rifle Association supporters.

Detweiler claimed initiative circulators tried to hide that fact from signers by folding the four-page petition so the specific wording could not be read.

On pages two and three of the initiative, candidates for state Legislature are required to support a call for a constitutional convention in every way possible or be labeled on the ballot as having “Disregarded voters’ instructions on term limits.”