PAY RAISE REVISITED: VOTER MOOD TO BE MEASURED
October 2005
If ever the stars were favorably aligned for a massive voter revolt in Pennsylvania, that time is now. Whether an electorate reputed to be soured beyond description by the infamous summer pay raise enacted by the Pennsylvania General Assembly for all three branches of state government will seize on the moment, however, is a matter to be determined Nov. 8 when voters trek to their polling places across the Commonwealth.
The immediate question they will confront when they arrive is whether state Supreme Court Justices Russell M. Nigro of Philadelphia and Sandra Schultz Newman of Montgomery County should be retained to new 10-year terms on the high court.
The more compelling question they will have to answer is whether an angry electorate can ever sufficiently mobilize itself to send a stark and unequivocal message to their elected state officials. “We’re mad as Hell, and we’re not going to take it any more!” (from the 1976 Paddy Chayefsky Hollywood satire of network television, entitled not so coincidentally, “Network”) comes quickly to mind. It would seem to do quite nicely.
Justices Nigro and Newman have good reason to be concerned. Here’s why:
1)—The proposition before the voters has never been more simple or straightforward. Should Justices Nigro and Newman, respectively, be retained for new terms on the Supreme Court? “Yes” or “No.” That’s the question, and the only question. No polls, no point-or-counterpoint electoral rhetoric, no spinning by political strategists to cloud the issue. “Yes” or “No!” That’s it.
2)—The rally cry to energize the campaign is just as simple and straightforward: “Remember the Pay Raise! Vote ‘No’ on Nigro and Newman!” Lacking in eloquence, perhaps. But right on point. A photo prominently displayed in the Oct. 12 edition of the Harrisburg Patriot-News caught a marcher in the Mechanicsburg Halloween parade dressed as a pig, carrying a hand-made sign, “Vote No to Newman and Nigro.” That’s not very hard to decipher.
3)—Seldom has a political controversy been timelier. The voters go to the polls just four months almost to the day that the pay raise was enacted in the wee hours of July 7. While Pennsylvanians are notorious for their short political memories, four months is just not enough time for even them to forget.
4)—Finally, seldom has a controversy been more pronounced. The angry, daily call-ins on talk radio throughout the state…the hostile letters to the editors appearing, again almost daily, in newspapers across the state…the continuing news coverage the “anti” campaign is garnering in the print and broadcast media throughout the Commonwealth…the anti-pay-raise rally on the steps of the Capitol the last week in September (not to mention photos of “pigs” marching in Halloween parades)…all of this and more serve as constant and continuing reminders of what this fight is all about.
In short, this should be a dream scenario for any hot shot looking to establish a reputation in political or grassroots mobilization. He or she should sign on in a minute—pro bono, if necessary. The opportunity is just that appealing. And the audience seems ripe for the picking—61 percent demanding an immediate repeal of the pay raise, if the latest public opinions surveys are to be believed.
Justices Nigro and Newman, incidentally, are not innocent or unwitting victims to this turmoil. It was, after all, the Pennsylvania Supreme Court which rendered the decision some 30 years ago that allowed the legislature to skirt the constitutional ban on mid-term pay raises in the form of non-accountable, unvouchered expenses. No successor court since has seen fit to revisit the issue.
Additionally, each came in for some mention in a fine example of journalistic enterprise by Patriot-News Capitol Bureau Chief Jan Murphy on the uncapped, publicly funded expense system of the Pennsylvania Supreme Court—Nigro for filing for reimbursement for $1,254 in meal charges over a four-day period, Jan. 11-14 of this year (some might consider that excessive); Newman for seeking reimbursement for a $3 bag of peanuts purchased from a hotel gift shop (some might consider that petty).
Finally, it was none other than Chief Justice Ralph Cappy who injected the Supreme Court publicly into the thick of this battle when he, in a published opinion commentary, called the opposition to the pay raise “knee jerk,” and praised the legislature for its political courage in passing the plan. Some within and without the legal community might argue that this, coming from a member of the court which might be called on to rule on the validity of the pay raise, came very close to crossing the line of judicial propriety—if, in fact, it didn’t cross it.
Make no mistake about it. It’s no easy task to take out sitting members of the judiciary. As my friend John Baer of the Philadelphia Daily News noted in a recent column on the subject, the last Supreme Court Justice to run on a retention question, Ron Castille of Philadelphia, was retained by a margin of 2-1/2-to-1 with only 1.5 million votes cast from a registered electorate of 8 million.
But organizations such as PACleanSweep and PA Democracy Rising have taken on the challenge. The pros are betting they will fail. A “Yes” vote essentially means a continuation of business-as-usual in the state Capitol. A “No” vote, on the other hand, would send shock waves throughout the Pennsylvania political community the likes of which it has never experienced before. If it’s true that the best way to get the attention of a reluctant mule is to hit him square between the eyes with a four-by-four, then, in a political context, a “NO” vote would be that four-by-four. It’s there for the taking. Whether the electorate will grab it and use it is another matter. We’ll all know in less than a month.
Copyright (c) 2008 VPC, L.L.C.