See Gun-Totin' Foster Parents

My comment:

Green says -- "There's no right to be a foster parent,"

Would any conduct by any state agency (even under the color of law) be recognized as "state action" subject to application of any of the Bill of Rights and the 14th Amendment? Of course it would. Pick nearly any factually-describable-category as a topic.

There is no right to public funding of candidates either.

"Colorado contends that because the power of the initiative is a state-created right, it is free to impose limitations on the exercise of that right." . . . to which the court answers . . . "That reliance is misplaced. [because . . ]" Meyer v. Grant, 486 US 414 (1988) (felony for payment to gather signatures on an initiative in Colorado, to remove mere temptation to pad petitions for placement on the ballot).

What may be "innocuous" to Kari or even Mr. Green can indeed be a fatal position to take?

I should not be too surprised that the design of Portland's VOE scheme imposes two distinct tracks for categories of candidates based only on a voluntary unenforceable candidate pledge not to be the top spender. I have wondered what it was that gave some folks the confidence to do such odd things? Perhaps now I know.

Care to guess whether I can use the pay-per-signature ban in the Oregon Constitution for initiatives (to eliminate the temptation to commit signature fraud) to attack the Portland signature "requirement" as a precondition for getting public funds in a candidate election? 145-bucks-plus per signature is far more temping than what would be offered by any initiative campaign. The legal force of an initiative versus an ordinance are identical, and are just alternative means to get something enacted. (See Meyer again, as to alternatives.) Can anyone today claim that getting 145 bucks per signature for running a candidate campaign has any lower temptation of fraud than for an initiative?

I plan on getting only a nominal amount of public funding, say one dollar, but I will insist that all candidates obtain the 1,000 or 1,500 signatures so as not to run afoul of the ban on pay for signatures (among other reasons). It would be hard for any candidate to assert that a requirement to get 1,000 signatures, if generally applicable to all, is too burdensome on their First Amendment rights to obtain ballot access. The alternative position is that one need not obtain any more signatures than necessary to merely file to also make the non-top-spender pledge and get some public funds. Surely I could insist on any mix between public and private sources so long as it is capped as per the pledge. (The list of vulnerabilities from the two track scheme is much longer than just this one point, including arbitrary demand for return which would be rather odd in a private campaign except where there is a funny loan with funny puppet strings attached. I would like to see all unpaid loans automatically converted to a donation at the conclusion of a campaign. The spending freedom should be identical.)

Oh yeah . . . guns.

I have not seen the AG opinion but I do not buy the apparent argument that the legislature did not delegate to the DHS the authority to assure a safe environment, which would most certainly include addressing gun issues even if not expressly referenced in the legislative grant. The later addition of any legislative findings of fact would really add nothing to the validity of the rule because the court here in Oregon will entertain after the fact ad hoc presentation of some supportive rationale.

The AG can't stop the legislature from enacting the gun prohibition for foster parents, nor avoid the duty to defend it, but the AG's office does review agency rules for legality (as they see it) before they are passed. It is a fine distinction.