| Subject: news of the day 3/2/05 |
| From: Rick Hasen |
| Date: 3/2/2005, 8:14 AM |
| To: election-law |
Dirk Olin offers this New
York Times oped
on the expected upcoming battle to confirm a new Supreme Court Chief
Justice. His point appears to be that even such a bruising battle is
better than what he sees as the alternative, judicial elections. I'll
be writing more on the blog later today or tomorrow about judicial
selection mechanisms and independence.
Amid news
reports
that Gov. Schwarzenegger plans to raise $50 million from
across the U.S. to support his proposed ballot measures, Bob Bauer continues
to argue against limits on contributions to candidate-controlled ballot
measure committees. To Bob, there is more self-interest involved when a
candidate raises funds for her own reelection than for a ballot measure
committee she controls. I'm not sure what evidence Bob uses to reach
this conclusion and my view of the historical evidence in California
(detailed in this
forthcoming Southern California Law Review article)
provides ample evidence that politicians in California have used the
initiative process not out of some altruistic desire to promote good
public policy in California, but rather to advance the politician's
desire to remain in office and get reelected.
-- Professor Rick Hasen Loyola Law School 919 Albany Street Los Angeles, CA 90015-1211 (213)736-1466 - voice (213)380-3769 - fax rick.hasen@lls.edu http://www.lls.edu/academics/faculty/hasen.html http://electionlawblog.org