Republicans Legislate End Run Around Locke Threat Of Voter Referendum Neutralizes Governor’s Veto

Gov. Gary Locke is beginning to resemble an orangevested school crossing guard who can only shout unheeded as the Legislature zooms by.

Giddy Republican lawmakers have seized a way to neutralize the Democrat’s ultimate weapon - the veto pen.

Rather than passing bills Locke detests and hoping in vain that he’ll sign them, legislators are trying to bypass him completely and appeal directly to voters.

From partial birth abortion bans, to measures making English the state’s official language, to the GOP’s $2.4 billion transportation package, legislators this biennium are proposing bills with referendum clauses in record numbers.

Friday, the mere threat of a referendum on a proposal to ban gay marriages led to a quick GOP victory.

Many Democrats feared the measure would be a magnet for conservative voters this fall.

So lawmakers of both parties made a deal in which Locke quickly vetoed the ban, and the Legislature overrode his veto in a bipartisan vote.

The politics were convoluted and atypical, but the result was the same: A measure opposed by Locke became law.

“The founding fathers gave him the right to veto, but they gave us the power of referendum,” said Senate Majority Leader Dan McDonald, R-Bellevue. “I think it causes the governor to be less frisky with his vetoes because he knows we can go around him if he forces us to the wall.”

Locke repeatedly has complained that referendums let lawmakers shirk their responsibility to negotiate tough problems through a divided government. He made the point three times in a Friday news conference.

“We should decide the issues,” he said. “We should step up to it.”

But that’s a frustrated call-to-action that often falls on deaf ears, said former Gov. Mike Lowry.

“You can work on them (lawmakers) 365 days a year, but it’s very difficult when you’re up against the other side’s ideological causes,” Lowry said.

Historically, referendums have been used sparingly. Only 46 that began in the Legislature have made it to the ballot since 1919. Nine of those failed.

In the past seven bienniums, the number of bills introduced with referendum clauses has risen steadily, from 11 in 1985-1986 to 24 in 1997-1998.

While still a minuscule portion of the thousands of pieces of legislation filed each year, several of them are hot-button topics. Political observers point out that many of the early referendums were designed more to run a questionable idea past voters, rather than to make an end-run around the governor.

McDonald maintains that’s what’s happening this year with the GOP’s transportation package. Because the measure seeks technical changes to a voter-approved spending cap, Republicans want voters’ OK.

“It has nothing to do with the governor,” McDonald said.

But even he concedes that’s not the case with measures such as the abortion ban.

“If we run up against a stone wall time after time, and we believe a majority of people agree with us, I think that’s what referendums are for,” he said.

McDonald also is quick to point out that it’s too early to tell how many - if any - will pass this year.

But the volume of proposed referendums is enough to incite Democratic legislators.

“It’s absolutely ridiculous,” said Senate Minority Leader Sid Snyder, D-Long Beach. “I think people are disgusted that we’re not down here solving the problems.”

Sen. Eugene Prince, R-Thornton, a friend of the governor’s and a social moderate who often feels marginalized by his own party leaders, called it “legislating by edict.”

“What we’re getting into is ‘We want it our way or nothing,”’ he said.

When Locke quickly vetoed the gay marriage ban Friday so lawmakers could override it the same day and put it behind them, “that’s the closest we’ve come to cooperation,” Prince said.

Still, McDonald insists it’s difficult to even get lawmakers of the same party to approve a bill with a referendum clause.

“Just because they introduce it doesn’t mean it’s going to happen,” he said. “We had a whole flurry of them last year. We ended up passing only one.”

, DataTimes ILLUSTRATION: Color photo