Tag: Senate President John Morse

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initiative, referendum, and recall Second Amendment rights

Two-​Way Communication

Tonight Americans have an opportunity to listen to President Barack Obama as he directly states his case for a U.S. military attack on Syria. Wouldn’t it be nice if, for one day, instead of Americans listening to the president, the president had to listen to us?

Not just on Syria … on anything.

Well, Eureka!

The polls will be open in Colorado all day before the Big O’s big oration, from 7:00 am to 7:00 pm Rocky Mountain Time, enabling voters to do the talking in the first recall elections of state legislators in Colorado history.

This is no mere politician monologue, but a real democratic dialogue. And you can bet politicians will be listening — from state legislators to the gun-controller-in-chief.

The conversation started this past legislative session, when Senate President John Morse (D‑Colorado Springs) and Senator Angela Giron (D‑Pueblo) moved two laws through the Colorado Legislature. Anti-​gun laws. This angered Second Amendment activists. The conversation continued when a group of citizens decided they weren’t willing to suffer silently; they drew up recall petitions and then gathered tens of thousands of voter signatures, triggering the recalls.

That’s a lot of hoops to jump through. The president can simply call up the networks and almost instantly communicate to millions. But citizens have to work harder for their talk time.

So, listen respectfully to the president tonight, by all means … but remember that, if you want politicians to listen, the initiative, referendum and recall constitute one heckuva megaphone.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

Categories
initiative, referendum, and recall Second Amendment rights

A Voter Revolt

The signatures are in: 16,199 of them — twice as many as needed to initiate the first recall election of a state lawmaker in Colorado history.

The target of voter ire? Senate President John Morse. He ticked off his El Paso County constituents by spearheading the recent triple whammy of gun control legislation that neatly bypassed Colorado voters earlier this year.

You may remember the controversy. The three bills in question, signed by the governor as emergency legislation so that no voter referendum was possible, elicited widespread negative reactions in the state, including nearly every county sheriff in Colorado publicly opposing the bills.

So, why did the sheriffs oppose the legislation, while Democrats in the legislature passed the bills?

Like state legislators, sheriffs are elected. But, unlike legislators, sheriffs deal with self-​defending citizens qua citizens, as well as criminals and victims, on a regular basis. Such experience brings a different perspective, and makes sheriffs more skeptical of blunt legislative solutions.

Traditionally, Democrats — despite the fondness demonstrated by their party constituencies for increased government control over private weapons — tend to treat the issue of “gun control” with some modicum of care. At least, those in the mid-​west and western states tend to.

But Senator Morse did not.

Morse won the senate seat back in 2010 by fewer than 350 votes, with a Libertarian Party candidate racking up 1,320 votes — almost 5 percent. Libertarians are strongly pro-​Second Amendment. Yet, Morse treated his narrow victory as a call for sweeping change. A mandate!

He may reap the “reward” for such “courage.”

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.