A SUMMARY OF PENNSYLVANIA’S PROPOSED CONSTITUTIONAL AMENDMENTS

For those who read the daily newspaper and go straight to the sports section, comics and obituaries, you may have paid little attention to the recurring full-page public notices detailing the proposed amendments to the Constitution of Pennsylvania.  Who can blame you? The print is tiny, and the legalistic writing style invites only the most dedicated reader to struggle through the four joint resolutions.  I will attempt to make some sense of the recommendations.

The good news is that voters need not immediately concern themselves with the proposed amendments before the November election. To amend the Pennsylvania Constitution, resolutions must pass both chambers of the legislature by simple majority in two consecutive legislative sessions.  They are then submitted to voters on a statewide ballot.

The present resolutions were passed in the July 2020 legislative session and must again pass in the 2020-2021 session.  If this takes place, the governor has no veto power, and the resolutions would appear on the November 2021 ballot.

The four proposed resolutions are the brainchild of the Republican-led legislature and may be summarized as follows:

• Limit a governor’s disaster declaration to 21 days. Currently, those declarations last 90 days. It would allow the General Assembly to extend a disaster declaration past the 21-day time-frame upon its expiration, but a governor would not be permitted to declare a new state of emergency for the same reason without the General Assembly’s consent.

• Clarify a constitutional provision to allow the legislative branch to terminate or extend a disaster declaration through a majority vote of both houses through a concurrent resolution that would not require the governor to sign off on the declaration.

• Provide protection against racial or ethnic discrimination.

• Move to regional (district) elections of Commonwealth Court, Superior Court judges and Supreme Court justices, who currently are elected on a statewide basis. Lawmakers would be in charge of drawing the judicial district regional boundaries. Judges would be required to be residents of their respective districts for at least a year of the district they represent.

The racial equality amendment was only passed by Republicans after it became part of a “two for one” resolution that also contained the disaster relief provisions. Voters would not be able to vote for one without the other.

The implications of the proposed constitutional amendments are profound. They seek to alter the balance of power between the executive, legislative and judicial branches of state government. The proposed “disaster declaration” amendment is a direct political attack by Republicans on the manner in which Democratic Governor Tom Wolf handled the public health issues surrounding the pandemic. The amendment to alter how appellate judges are elected in Pennsylvania is a brazen Republican attempt to gain additional political power through the judiciary.

Republican lawmakers were frustrated with Governor Wolf’s public health restrictions in refusing to open certain businesses in a manner consistent with some Republican governors.  The frustration was enhanced when the State Supreme Court rejected the Republican lawsuit to end the disaster declaration. 

Because Democrats now hold a majority on the Pennsylvania Supreme Court, Republicans cobbled together an unprecedented two-pronged attack on our constitution. First, decrease executive powers long held by a governor. Second, make election of appellate judges regional so that Republican rural areas with fewer voters can elect their own jurists.

There is no doubt that the proposed Republican amendments are political and are not intended to improve state government or the health and welfare of Pennsylvania citizens. As the summer came to an end, Governor Wolf was given high marks for using his executive powers in controlling the pandemic.  His approach in finding a “middle ground” permitted the state to reopen businesses while controlling the spread. According to the John Hopkins University Coronavirus Research Center, Pennsylvania was to be commended for its steady decline in cases as more and more counties reopened.

Concerning the proposal on the manner in which appellate judges are elected, it is important to remember that in 1968 the judicial system was completely overhauled as part of major revisions to the Pennsylvania Constitution. Judicial gerrymandering to give more clout to rural counties in the election of state-wide judicial positions was rejected. It was found to disenfranchise voters by limiting their vote to one member of each court.  Of the jurisdictions where voters elect statewide judges, 18 out of 22 are elected in statewide contests.

There is some hope that when the proposed amendments come before the legislature next year, the pandemic will be fading and there will be less of a reason to hamstring the governor in a public health emergency.  After all, the next governor may be a Republican. In my view it is never a good idea to change Pennsylvania’s most fundamental document for short-term political advantage.  That is what elections are intended to accomplish in a democratic political system.

 

 

 

“SHUT UP AND DRIBBLE”

                              "I'm looking for a commitment for change, even if it isn't done officially."

Former Georgetown basketball coach, John Thompson, 1/15/89

 

In February of 2018, on her nightly Fox cable news program, The Laura Ingraham Show, the conservative host attacked comments made by the 14-time NBA All-Star LeBron James on his Uninterrupted website. James had stated that Trump “doesn’t understand the people.” Ingraham blasted James and other socially active Black players as “barely intelligible,” “ungrammatical” and “ignorant.” This episode has gained notoriety as the “shut up and dribble” rant.

In fact, Ingraham was not expressing anything new.  There is a long history of White Americans criticizing Black athletes for expressing their views on important issues of the time.  

Early on, Black athletes were symbols of social justice and civil rights rather than spokespeople like track star, Jesse Owens, at the 1936 Olympics in Nazi Germany. In addition, baseball great Jackie Robinson quietly became the first African American to break the color barrier in 1947; Kenny Washington, the same, in the National Football League.

In the 1960s, Black athletes shifted from being silent emblems of social justice to becoming participants in the conversation. Muhammad Ali went to jail for his outspoken anti-war beliefs.  He received vocal support from Jim Brown, Bill Russell and Kareem Abdul-Jabbar.  Medal winners Tommie Smith and John Carlos gave the black power salute at the 1968 Olympics.  Curt Flood challenged the Major League Baseball reserve clause in 1969 on behalf of all players. More recently in 2016, NFL quarterback, Colin Kaepernick gave up a lucrative professional career by kneeling during the National Anthem. (In 2020, many players in all professional sports, Black and White, chose to kneel before games.)

The political awareness of Black players has increased exponentially with each new generation of professionals. Today’s athletes understand the power each holds through social media to make their opinions heard. They are grateful for those who came before them to make their careers possible.  Many stay connected to their old neighborhoods where the scars of inequality are everywhere.  Most importantly, Black athletes continue to experience systemic racism in their own lives.  

While Black awareness has become more open and vocal, the White response to Black athletes involved in social issues remains “shut up and dribble.” The widespread view is that Black athletes are paid large salaries to entertain the sports fan and that their opinions are irrelevant.

With this background in mind, a critical landmark in American social justice took place on August 26, 2020 when the NBA Milwaukee Bucks cancelled a scheduled playoff game against the Orlando Magic. The action was taken in response to yet another shooting of an unarmed Black man in, Kenosha Wisconsin, only miles from the Buck’s home court.  All NBA players were  confined in an isolation bubble at the Disneyland sports complex to gain protection from the pandemic. They looked each other in the eyes and realized that basketball was not the priority until the NBA could reach a collective agreement on how to respond.  The consensus was; if not now, when.

Within hours the NBA was effectively shut down for several days giving the players, coaches and owners time to reflect on racism in America and to develop a plan.  In solidarity, games in other major professional sports (WNBA, MLB, MLS and NHL) were also cancelled. Many professional and college football teams suspended practices to show their support.  White players backed their Black teammates without hesitation.

Prior to the shut-down of professional sports, the main event for the week was the Republican National Convention.  While President Trump and Laura Ingraham attempted to ignore the events under the NBA bubble, Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner could not help himself. He was quoted as saying that the NBA players refusing to play in protest of the police shooting “are lucky to be rich enough to be able to take a night off from work.”

For two days, I divided my attention between the NBA channel, ESPN and the sports talk shows on SIRIUS-XM during the afternoon hours and the Republican Convention at night. The sports talk was profound, emotional and cathartic. One after another, strong, proud, normally stoic athletes bared their souls and explained what it is like to be a Black man in America. Five time NBA all-star and now businessman/sports analyst, Chris Weber, gave a powerful message and had me close to tears.

The Republican National Convention was well described by Esquire Magazine as “an entire break with the world of observable reality. A matrix designed by and for those with Fox News brain poisoning where the COVID-19 pandemic is over, where the recording of all economic data stopped in early March—but also, the president is single-handedly bringing jobs back—and yes, where Donald Trump is a loving family man.”

As Laura Ingraham feared, there was a great deal of barely intelligible,

ungrammatical and ignorant discourse on display the week of the

Republican convention. However, it was coming from a host of Trump family members and supporters, not from the NBA bubble. The kind of gibberish that exemplifies right-wing politicians and not Black basketball players sharing a profound message with America. 

After the Republican convention the new slogan for those in the White House and Republican Senate could easily be: “Shut Up and Govern.”