Court Ruling on State Term Limits

With reference to the recent striking down of California’s term limits law by U.S. District Judge Claudia Wilken, California’s Secretary of State Bill Jones said, “For one federal judge to step in and overturn the position of the people is inappropriate” (April 24).

Concerning the preliminary injunction issued against the implementation of Proposition 209 by U.S. District Judge Thelton Henderson, The Times (April 9) quotes Judge Diarmuid O’Scannlain of the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals: “A system that permits one judge to block with the stroke of a pen what 4,736,180 residents voted to enact as law tests the integrity of our constitutional democracy.”

Elementary civics courses inform us that one of the responsibilities vested in the federal judiciary is that of determining the constitutionality of measures enacted by legislatures or by voters, when such constitutionality is challenged. Since constitutional questions were raised in their courts, were not Judges Wilken and Henderson obligated to act? Whether or not one agrees with their judgments, one must surely acknowledge their duty to render opinions, based on their interpretation of the law, on the respective constitutional issues brought before them. The system provides the opportunity for appeal.

JAMES K. KNOWLES

Sierra Madre

Jones’ statement betrays either a perilous ignorance of the American system of government or a thorough disregard for the U.S. Constitution. The simple fact is that the number of votes any initiative may have received is, and must be, immaterial to its constitutionality, or what’s the point of having a Constitution at all. Any judge who took vote totals into account in rendering a decision would be seriously derelict in his or her duty and in obvious violation of the oath that all judges take.

Perhaps our elected representatives should be required to pass a high school civics class before being allowed to take office.

SKY JOHNSON

Los Angeles

I voted for term limits principally for three reasons: The most obvious being to get rid of the entrenched legislators who were keeping themselves in power by virtue of their being able to dispense favors they had accumulated in their many years in the Legislature. The second reason was that it did not seem reasonable that lobbyists and wealthy individuals would find it irresistible to dispense huge sums of money to a legislator who would only be in for a maximum of six years.

Lastly, I believe most politicians begin their careers as idealists and we need idealists with enthusiasm as lawmakers. In six years, the likelihood of their being corrupted would be curtailed.

MARY LOUISE LOPEZ

Montebello