Time to remind lawmakers of obligation

Article II of the state Constitution vests all legislative authority in the Legislature and specifically reserves supplementary power in the people as regards the legislative process.

For the last several years, however, the Legislature has shirked its responsibilities and thereby caused a troubling accretion of supposed power in the executive and judicial branches of our government. The Supreme Court – relying on a single word in the in the preamble to Article IX – found that it had the power to not only hold the Legislature in contempt (raising a troubling issue as to the constitutional definition of co-equal), but could then a fashion state wide rule for the funding of our educational systems.

All this was done while denying that the court was a "super Legislature. "

Apparently, glad to have unloaded their constitutional obligation, the Legislature neither said nor did anything in response. More recently, the court opined, without providing their legal authority to do so that all non-vaccinated state employees and those in a business relationship with the state would lose their jobs if not vaccinated by a given date.

Again, we hear nothing from our elected representatives, nor does there appear to be any effort on the part of the Legislature to amend or repeal the grant of emergency powers to the executive branch.

Perhaps, it’s time to remind those we send to the Legislature that along with their obligations to protect the health and safety of our citizenry they enjoy an equal duty to preserve and protect the constitutional balance of power inherent in our founding document?

Larry Ziegler

Kennewick