According to this story, California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger has secured several millions of dollars in pledges to the campaign to pass Proposition 14.
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Connecticut HB 5021, which eliminates the discriminatory aspects of the state’s public funding for state candidates program, has already passed the Joint Government Administration and Elections Committee. It is now in the Office of Legislative Research and the Office of Fiscal Analysis, for improvement of the wording. It will emerge from those offices on March 30, and at that point will either return to the Joint Committee, or go straight to the House floor.
The Sacramento Bee has verified that Jerry Brown, Meg Whitman, and Steve Poizner, the only major party candidates for Governor of California with substantial campaigns, oppose the initiative that will be on the November 2010 ballot to legalize and regulate marijuana. See here. If Proposition 14 were already policy in California, voters (who may comprise a majority of the electorate) who favor the measure, and who wish to vote for a gubernatorial candidate in November who favors the measure, would be unable to do so.
On March 25, the California Supreme Court issued a very narrow opinion in International Society for Krishna Consciousness of California v City of Los Angeles, S164272. This very old case, which is also pending in the 9th circuit, deals with whether the Society for Krishna Consciousness should be permitted to ask for donations at the Los Angeles Airport.
The California Supreme Court had been asked by the 9th circuit to decide whether the Los Angeles International Airport is a public forum under the California Constitution. But the California Supreme Court majority chose not to answer that question. Instead, it ruled that regardless of whether the airport is a public forum or not, the California Constitution does permit the airport to ban asking people for money at the airport. The majority said that prohibiting persons from soliciting the immediate receipt of funds at the airport is a narrowly tailored regulation of expressive activity, different from any broader ban on leafletting. In other words, soliciting funds causes bigger problems than other First Amendment activity, because soliciting funds requires willing persons to stop, fumble for and perhaps drop money; also soliciting funds can include the targeting of vulnerable and easily coerced persons, misrepresentation of the solicitor’s cause, and outright theft.
Cases involving public fora are of vital interest to groups that circulate petitions. Airports, of course, are almost completely useless for circulating petitions, because people at airports are generally not local residents and their signatures wouldn’t be valid. But a broad decision, saying that government-owned airports are not public fora, would have been a bad precedent for other government-owned places with a great deal of pedestrian traffic.
All seven justices agreed that the ban on soliciting funds is valid. One justice would have included in the opinion a conclusion that airports are public fora, and three justices wanted to include in the opinion a conclusion that airports are not public fora.
On March 22, the Maine Senate passed LD 1730. It requires paid circulators for ballot measures to register (before working) with the Secretary of State. The fine for working before registering is $1,000. Entities that hire paid circulators must also register, and the fine if they fail to register is $10,000. The bill now goes to the House.