On the evening of August 25, Illinois Governor Pat Quinn did an “amendatory veto” of HB 723. That means he told the legislature he would not sign the bill unless the legislature amends the bill to add one particular unrelated election law provision that he wants. UPDATE: see this Chicago Tribune story. It appears the Governor used the same maneuver on yet another bill. The article also says the ethics initiative would be binding, not advisory.
HB 723 is the bill that makes it impossible for qualified parties to nominate someone by party meeting after the primary, unless a petition is submitted for each committee-nominated nominee.
The Governor wants the legislature to add a ballot question to the February 2010 primary ballot that asks, “Should the Illinois Constitution be amended to allow the people of Illinois to initiate, by petition, a binding referendum to adopt standards of ethical conduct for officials and employees of State government?” So whether or not the bill becomes law depends on whether the legislature is willing to amend the bill and include that idea.
Hardly a bargaining chip…the ballot question is only advisory, so even if it got 99% approval by the voters, it doesn’t mean that this will go anywhere. Pat Quinn failed to deliver real ethics reform this year, and this cheap knock-off is not going to fool anybody.
Both the Chicago Tribune story, and the language of the amendatory veto itself, say the referendum would be binding, not advisory.
There’s actually two separate bills which were subjected to an amendatory veto, and it’s the other bill – not HB723 – where the amendatory veto language creates durable language allowing for the submission of limited binding referenda. What’s in HB723 as amendatorily vetoed would only place an advisory referendum on the February 2010 primary ballot.
We’re still lost as to what’s going on here. Our press release will be out later today.
But the amendatory veto for HB 723 specifically says “Binding”.
The amendatory veto says that the 2010 referendum would be advisory.
In Illinois, initiated amendments to the constitution are limited to one article dealing with the structure of the legislature, and there is no provision for initiated legislation.
So only the legislature can propose a constitutional amendment of the form suggested by Gov. Quinn. The 2010 referendum could not bind the legislature to propose a constitutional amendment any more than one legislative session can bind the next.
So if the advisory referendum is approved, then the legislature may propose a constitutional amendment extending the initiative to matters regarding ethics. They could do this even if the 2010 referendum failed.
So conceivably you could have:
2010 Referendum on “ethics” and Gov. Quinn runs for re-election.
2011 Legislature proposed constitutional amendment.
2012 Referendum on constitutional amendment.
2014 Referendum on initiated ethics legislation/regulation and Gov. Quinn runs for re-election.