State Budget Votes
Re “Majority Votes May Be Best for Conservatives,” Column Right, June 18: Judging from his endorsement of majority approval of the state budget, Assembly candidate Tom McClintock must be banking on a continued Republican majority in the state’s lower house. In point of fact, McClintock’s former and perhaps soon-to-be Republican colleagues have served as the recalcitrant minority, preventing the passage of an on-time budget.
McClintock is half right, majority approval is appropriate in a democratic system. However, in the interest of balanced policy-making, majority approval of the budget must be linked to majority approval of measures addressing the sufficiency of state tax revenues. Only five other states, none of them of the size or diversity of California, require super-majority votes for approving tax increases.
JEAN ROSS, Executive Director
Calif. Budget Project, Sacramento
ROY ULRICH, Calif. Tax
Reform Assn., Santa Monica
Get the L.A. Times Politics newsletter
Deeply reported insights into legislation, politics and policy from Sacramento, Washington and beyond. In your inbox three times per week.
You may occasionally receive promotional content from the Los Angeles Times.
