Ep. 263: California Supreme Court Blocks Tax Ballot Measure

[00:00:00] If you're a California conservative, a libertarian, a moderate Democrat, believe in common sense, or just the same person, this is the political podcast for you. It's the California Underground Podcast. What's going on everybody? Thanks for tuning in to another episode of the California

[00:00:30] Underground Podcast. I am your host Phil and as always with me is my trusty co-host, the best and fastest researcher in the West. And I know you're probably already looking behind me going, this is not your normal background. It looks like you are sitting at a dining

[00:00:44] room table and you'd be absolutely correct. I am sitting at a dining room table today because we are in the process of moving and moving sucks and it's always a nightmare when you

[00:00:57] move. So we are or at least I am broadcasting from my dining room table because that's the dedication, the level of dedication we have not missing a podcast just because we're moving and my studio and office is all screwed up. But Camille, how are you doing tonight?

[00:01:17] Good. I'm good. Are you making your wife pack while you sit here in podcast? No, we have made the financial decision that we're just going to hire people to come and help us

[00:01:28] pack. We've been doing a lot of packing. We kind of like cleared the way for the movers to come in. Like so we went through every room and throughout a whole bunch of stuff. And it's amazing the amount

[00:01:41] of like crap that you find in your house when you move. Like this is just a two bedroom apartment and we've thrown out close to 10 bags like contractor huge garbage bags full of

[00:01:58] just trash. And you go where was all this trash hiding in this two bedroom apartment? It's just like everywhere. Like you're just like, where was all this trash? So yeah, we've done a lot of

[00:02:12] that. We've gotten rid of all that stuff. So the movers come on Saturday and they're going to help come in just pack everything up and get going. We've given away or sold a lot of our

[00:02:25] furniture because we're just going to start off fresh. We got a whole new style we're going for in the new house. Old furniture won't match clean slate. So that's where we're at right now. And yeah,

[00:02:41] a lot of things are in boxes. So that's why I've been I had to like shuffle and find all my stuff and all the electronics and my microphone and all that stuff. And here I am sitting

[00:02:52] at a diorama table, but we're podcasting nonetheless. And hopefully next week, the new office will be set up in the new studio be ready to go. And we'll be back to normal. But yeah, that's my story

[00:03:04] right now. At the end of each school year, you know, since I was cool, I go through all my curriculum and decide what what do I really want to keep. And then I kind of around

[00:03:16] spring anyway, I like to do a spring cleaning. And you know, I have four kids and a husband and their six of us and a whole house. And I'm always just like, how do we acutely all this stuff?

[00:03:25] And that's when I'm like, we should just move. And I think that was a line in Will and Grace way back when like, I think she's like cleaning and she's like, we should just move.

[00:03:33] Like, yes, I get that. Like, I'm just like, let's just move and start over. Not happening. But anyway, yeah, I kind of get that. I'm like, wow, it's amazing when you actually

[00:03:43] like clean up and just go like, just go through your entire house and clean up everything. And how nice your place seems when you get rid of all the junk. And you're like, Oh, okay,

[00:03:53] it's actually what were we doing with all this stuff? But anyway, that's not the point of tonight's episode. We're not talking. We're not sitting here talking about how I'm moving. And you're not moving out of California. I'm not moving out California. I'm moving within

[00:04:08] San Diego. I for any of those who saw my post last week, I was trying to get a rise out of the followers to be like, this is the last time we'll be podcasting from this desk,

[00:04:19] because we're getting a new desk. So there'll be plenty more episodes, hopefully another 260 if not more episodes down the line. Tonight, we are going to be talking about something that I'm

[00:04:29] going to try. We do this every once in a while whenever there's like a big legal story that pops up. The legal nerd in me, the constitutional law nerd in me wants me to go over this

[00:04:42] stuff because I think it's important that people understand and break down like what actually happened. This is about the lawsuit that went to the Supreme Court of California, not the US Supreme Court. This is the Supreme Court of California. If you don't know every state has their own

[00:04:58] Supreme Court to handle state issues. State Supreme Courts are the exclusive jurisdiction usually of their state constitution. So people were asking, well, can the Supreme Court decide this? Can the US Supreme Court step in? I don't think on this issue because of the fact that is the

[00:05:19] California Constitution, the US Supreme Court can't step in in that term. So it's like an exclusive jurisdiction of the state Supreme Court they can't step in. The people who were behind this already the tax proponents of this already said they're going to try again in like

[00:05:35] 2026. So they have no kind of need or want that they want to go after this legally in court anymore. So appealing to the United States Supreme Court is a no. I think on this one, I'm pretty sure that anything state related, and this is specifically

[00:05:57] on the state constitution, the US Supreme Court cannot step in because it's one of those things that like it's the respect of the state and its sovereignty to have its own constitution

[00:06:12] and the US Supreme Court is not going to step in and kind of step all over that. I'm pretty sure that that is the rule and obviously if they wanted to appeal to the US Supreme Court, they could and they probably would have already done so.

[00:06:26] But they don't have any plans of doing that anyway. So not throw you a little curveball here because I already know that we're going to get comments of people saying, but this is unconstitutional. How can we how can this be? Do you have an

[00:06:41] answer to that? Well, here's the thing. You people may automatically defer to the US Constitution and say this is unconstitutional. Now, if you are referring to the US Constitution, I'd like to know what you're citing to what makes it unconstitutional in these terms.

[00:07:01] This argument specifically is about the California Constitution because the US Constitution does not have any any amendments or anything regarding valid initiatives and propositions like we have here in California, which is the props and all that stuff that you see

[00:07:19] every November. We get to vote on these propositions. Our US Constitution does not have that as that is something that the California Constitution has. They added that in as a way to kind of

[00:07:30] it was part of the progressive movement around the turn of the century and like the 1900s. I think it was Hiram, Governor Hiram, who was a Republican, he was a progressive Republican, added this in so that people could vote on a lot of measures and help

[00:07:46] kind of shape the Constitution and shape what goes on in their state. He was a big believer in sort of like direct democracy as a progressive Republican. So this is California Constitution, and that's what I'm going to be getting into is their argument as to why

[00:08:03] they can't go forward with this. My initial reaction is that it's technical. They kind of got off on like a technicality, but we'll get into that. Do you have any other questions or comments before I launch it? No, it sounds like that very, that loaded question you're going

[00:08:22] to basically spend the podcast answering. So yeah, it's going to be like, is it unconstitutional in terms of the California Constitution? Yes. Well, it depends because it depends on how they interpreted the California Constitution,

[00:08:43] right? That's what this all comes down to. And the same thing goes for the U.S. Supreme Court is that they come out with decisions and people are like, well, that's unconstitutional. You can't

[00:08:52] do that. So, and that's what law is all about. I'm going to ask you a question. I'm going to ask you now because I don't want to forget this question, but I don't want you

[00:09:01] to answer until the end because you're going to give all the sides and viewpoints and opinions and break it down. So my question for you, the answer after, I mean like on here, but at the end,

[00:09:15] if you were on the California Supreme Court, how would you vote on this? Okay. So you want me to answer that at the end if I was on... I want you to break this all down and then that way you can kind of say,

[00:09:31] because you are a constitutional attorney, you can kind of say knowing all this information, here's how I would have voted. Unless you don't feel comfortable answering. No, I mean, I'm going to definitely give my... I think that's a good way to summarize whether

[00:09:44] I would have voted on it. And I think there's some things that are interesting in here that I notated and I specifically notated and I put in the margins like this is terrifying

[00:09:55] that our Supreme Court thinks this way. So we'll get into that and I'm going to try and break it down and get through this 50 page document as fast as possible without boring everyone to death.

[00:10:07] I'm not going to have to get more. I'm totally going to interrupt. I'm totally going to have questions. I feel like we're home. No, go ahead. That's the point of this. This is sort of the

[00:10:15] beauty of these episodes is like it's like you are playing the role of like the lay person who has all these questions and I am doing my best to answer them from the lawyer standpoint. All right,

[00:10:28] so this is the legislature of the state California versus Shirley Weber. So for... Actually, I want to start off just by saying this. A lot of people already said that like Newsom was involved

[00:10:41] in this particular case. He was not involved in this case. He was not named as a party. He was not named as the governor of California. There are... I will preface it with this. The lawyer in me

[00:10:56] immediately wants to go to this and see what their reasoning is. I don't want to just jump to the conclusion that this is because Newsom leaned on the Supreme Court because they're all in Newsom's

[00:11:09] pocket and that they all just did his bidding and that he told them to get rid of this tax ballot initiative and they did so. I could disagree with their rationale as to why they got there,

[00:11:21] but Newsom wasn't a part of this. It was the legislature of the state of California versus Shirley Weber who is the secretary of state. They sued because they wanted to stop Shirley Weber from putting this on the ballot. This measure, the Taxpayer Protection Act which is

[00:11:36] TPA for short, it qualified and it was supposed to go on the ballot. And the reason that they have this hearing right now is because there's an issue of, well, if we allow this to pass and

[00:11:53] then find out later that this wasn't valid, their issue was that it would add cynicism to the voters that we passed this, we got it on the ballot, we got the signatures and the people voted for it

[00:12:07] and the Supreme Court came in and just got rid of it. So there is this kind of balance of like, do we do pre-election or post-election reviews of a lot of these ballot initiatives?

[00:12:17] So like I was saying, the Supreme Court goes on to say the only question before us is whether the measure may be validly enacted by initiative. And usually they give you the conclusion right away which is we conclude that petitioners have clearly established that the challenge measure

[00:12:34] would revise the Constitution without complying with the appropriate procedure. The changes proposed by the TPA are within the electorate's prerogative to enact, but because those changes would substantially alter our basic plan of government, the proposal cannot be enacted by initiative. It is instead governed by the procedures for

[00:12:52] revising our Constitution. So that's it. That's the whole thing. So we'll see you later everybody. Good night. That's our show. We'll see you next week. No, that's not the whole show.

[00:13:04] We've got a lot more to talk about. Right. So this yeah, I mean it would have been amazing if it did pass. The gist of it was that they were basically going in and making it so that the state state

[00:13:18] and local governments could not impose taxes without putting it to a vote of the people. Now there are things in the legislature and in our state statutes that say that it does have to go to a vote of the people for certain taxes, but this would have been

[00:13:35] for literally everything. So literally everything, every tax, every fee, every administrative fee, everything would have had to go to a vote of the people and they wouldn't have been able to pass any new taxes unless it was voted on and approved by the people, which

[00:13:51] sounds amazing to me. I think that sounds like a great idea, but it comes back to this issue and I'll just frame the issue right away. The issue before this, the Supreme Court is

[00:14:06] so we have our ballot measures. We all know about the propositions. We all know about the amendments. Those are valid. You can go to a proposition, you can put it on the ballot in November and it can amend the constitution. So that's why our California Constitution has

[00:14:19] like a bajillion amendments. So if you look at it as like, I don't know how many amendments at this point, but they just keep adding more and more amendments. So there's a process for amending the California Constitution and then there's a process for revising the California

[00:14:33] Constitution. And in order to revise the California Constitution, there is a procedure that there has to be a constitutional convention that the legislature has the two-thirds enacted, like that there's a process outside of just gathering signatures and just changing the

[00:14:49] entire constitution. So you can amend the California Constitution by adding like new laws to it or new amendments that would then go into effect, but revising means you're taking parts of the Constitution and just going, okay, we're gonna red line, we're gonna change this, we're gonna change

[00:15:05] that. So that's generally the question before the California Supreme Court is whether or not it would revise or amend the California Constitution. Let's see. I'm trying to find the good notes. Again, this is 50 pages, so bear with me. All right. So this is in regards to

[00:15:27] the pre-election. They say we typically review constitutional challenges to an initiative after an election in order to avoid disrupting the electoral process and the exercise of the franchise. The pre-election review is proper for challenges that go quote to the power

[00:15:42] of the electorate to adopt the proposal in the first instance and quote. The presence of an invalid measure on the ballot steals attention, time and money from the numerous valid propositions on the same ballot. It will confuse some voters and frustrate others

[00:15:57] and the ultimate decision that the measure is invalid coming after the voters have voted in the favor of the measure tends to denigrate the legitimate use of the initiative process. So like I said, that's sort of why they have to decide pre-election versus post-election

[00:16:11] because you don't necessarily want to go through this whole process of we got on the ballot, we spent all this money, we printed out the ballots for everybody and then we get to it and then

[00:16:23] people pass it overwhelmingly and then afterwards the California Supreme Court comes back and goes, not just getting changed our minds. That's not valid. It just doesn't look good for anybody. I can understand that argument. I mean, that makes sense. We don't want to waste time and money

[00:16:38] on ballot measures that aren't even going to go through and be relevant anyway. So here's what it says in regards to the California Constitution. So when you ask, is this constitutional or unconstitutional? This is from the California Constitution.

[00:16:52] It says as relevant here, article, this is 18 and I got to do, I had to add my Roman numerals up. 18 of the California Constitution provides that the electorate quote may amend the Constitution

[00:17:05] by initiative, but that an effort to revise the Constitution must proceed by the way of a constitutional convention and popular ratification or by submission to the voters from a supermajority of the legislature. So what does that mean? That means that there can be a constitutional

[00:17:26] convention and popular ratification, which again is what we know about when we put things to a vote or submission of by a supermajority and then submitted to the voters. So there's a lot

[00:17:40] of times that we'll see like the like ACA or any of these Senate constitutional amendments proposed because it's like a supermajority, and then we vote on those. Those are things that like end up revising the California Constitution. That's what they're talking about. And it's not

[00:17:59] people initiated. It's legislative initiative. Article two of the California Constitution, which pertains to voting and the initiative referendum and recall powers begins with the following principle quote all political power is inherent in the people government is instituted

[00:18:18] for their protection security and benefit and they have the right to alter or reform it when the public good may require it. And then I wrote a note except when the government doesn't like

[00:18:28] what you're doing. So that's article two of the I mean that sounds great, right? I mean that that sentiment sounds really great all political power is inherent in the people government is instituted for their protection security and benefit and they have the right to alter or

[00:18:43] reform it when the public good may require which we're going to get into a little bit why I don't think they really live up to that. That's more difference of revision and amendment.

[00:18:53] So what helps you decide whether it's an amendment or revision they go on to say from early on our case laws distinguished between amendment and revision in similar terms quote the very term Constitution implies an instrument of a permanent and abiding nature and the

[00:19:11] provisions contained therein for its revision indicate the will of the people at the underlying principles upon which it rests as well as the substantial entirety of the instrument shall be of like permanent and abiding nature. On the other hand, the significant of the term amendment

[00:19:26] implies such an addition or change within the lines of the original instrument as will affect an improvement or better carry out the purpose for which it was framed. Okay so to better kind of break that down think about it this way and amendment is like okay the

[00:19:43] Constitution already says we can do this. So now we're going to add on something that kind of adds on to what the Constitution allows us to do and carries out the initial carries out the

[00:19:58] purpose or intent of our California Constitution. A revision is when you go to the substance of the original Constitution, the original instrument and then go in and start changing things around. So that's really what that comes down to. All right trying to get through this.

[00:20:16] So they brought up the whole issue if you're wondering well we voted on Prop 13. Everyone knows what Prop 13 is. Why did Prop 13 pass but this won't pass? It goes on in a case Amador Valley we considered multiple challenges to article 13a which was been adopted by the voters

[00:20:37] in 1978 as Proposition 13. Prop 13 contained four distinct elements a limitation on the tax rate applicable to real property restriction on the assessed value blah blah blah. Article 13 represents such a drastic and far-reaching change in the nature of operation of our

[00:20:54] governmental structure that it of our government structure that must be considered a revision of the state constitution rather than a mere amendment thereof. The changes affected by Prop 13 quote operate functionally within a relatively narrow range

[00:21:12] to accomplish a new system of taxation which may provide substantial tax relief for our citizen. We declined to hold that such a limited purpose cannot be achieved directly by the people through the initiative process. So because it was more narrow that's why Prop 13 got through.

[00:21:29] Moving on, it says talks about the legislature is the supreme in the field of taxation. Basically the legislature has all the power when it comes to taxation. From the state's family legislature has had broad authority to levy taxes.

[00:21:51] So central is the authority to levy taxes that tax legislation is exempt from referendum whereas the initiative power allows voters to propose new measures and place them on the ballot for a popular vote. The referendum power allows voters to weigh in on laws

[00:22:05] that have already been passed by their elected representatives. This is the one part that I put my little note that says this is terrifying. This is from the supreme court and this is why I had to write this down that this is terrifying actually put a

[00:22:19] couple of exclamation points they say we think it clear that a voter approval requirement for any new state tax measure would constitute a significant interference with the administration of the legislature's fiscal powers and policies. To me that is absolutely terrifying. The

[00:22:38] California Supreme Court they say that again they say we think it clear that a voter approval requirement for any new state tax measure would constitute a significant interference with the administration of the legislators fiscal powers and policies. So the fact that they are saying

[00:22:56] that any measure that would be voter approved on any new state tax would interfere with that is terrifying to me because that's how they view it. They view it that you don't really get to have

[00:23:09] a say as the people it's all up to the legislature and the legislature is supreme in the area of levy taxes and therefore voters and the people really can't have a say on what

[00:23:22] goes on with the legislature and taxes in this state. So that to me is absolutely terrifying. This goes on to say further proponent argues that the tpa simply moves the taxing power from the legislature to the electorate thereby keeping that power within the legislative branch.

[00:23:40] That may be true but it is also true that such a change would significantly alter the legislative process and framework for exercising the taxing power. And this this made me crack up. The Supreme Court goes on as a quote are continuing representative and republican form

[00:24:01] of government. The legislators deliberation on tax legislation may include public hearings review by blah blah blah blah. All right so to me that is absolutely crazy that now you have remember these are the same people that had been crying about democracy. You know this is Gavin

[00:24:30] Newsom talking about the whatever is what is the campaign for democracy or something like that campaign for direct democracy or whatever his pack is whose future presidential pack that he's setting up. It's all about democracy. Democrats love to talk about they always talk about it's democracy

[00:24:49] democracy we have to protect democracy at all costs that's everything we care about is democracy. Now you have the California Supreme Court hiding behind the fact that this is not allowed because it because the fact that this is a republican form of government.

[00:25:09] I don't know where I lost you but there was a point that I made first there was a point and I want to get your input on it where they said we think it clear that a voter approval

[00:25:18] requirement for any new state tax measure would constitute a significant interference with the administration of the legislature's fiscal powers and policies. So to me that's terrifying that the fact that they think any voter approval requirement for any new state tax the fact that

[00:25:39] they think voters approve in any sort of tax is dangerous to the legislature's powers fiscal powers and policies to me is terrifying and it makes it even yeah go ahead for us they work for

[00:25:53] us I don't know we always say that but it's like they forget people forget the voters forget they work for us those are our taxes those are those are our earnings that's our money that they're

[00:26:07] playing with and burning and throwing around and having their parties with and the fact that they are like no we don't we don't want you to have any say in this if I still hear it.

[00:26:19] Yes it's like yes we want you to be involved but we don't want you to be that involved okay don't touch the money that's all they're like you can make ballot propositions about anything

[00:26:30] else but just don't touch the money and I thought this was really funny that says the proposed argues that tpa simply moves the taxing power from the legislature to the elect electorate thereby keeping the power within the legislative branch which their argument makes

[00:26:46] sense because the legislative branch is duly elected by the people so obviously it's still basically the people and they go in our continuing representative and republican form of government I think that's where we left off before we came back from from the technical difficulties

[00:27:03] and I was just making a point that that to me is so laughable that democrats like Gavin Newsom are always going on and on and on about how we have to protect democracy and everything democracy

[00:27:17] is at stake and everything's about democracy and we love democracy and they just they go ad nauseam talking about we love democracy oh but now all of a sudden when it threatens our ability to

[00:27:30] tax you no no this is a republican form of government right like there's there's separation of powers and there's representatives that's a republican form of government this isn't a direct democracy you don't get to vote on everything so to me that's funny that they are kind of quoting

[00:27:45] how it's not a direct democracy and they're admitting this is a republican form of government so all that stuff that they always harp about democracy I guess it doesn't really make a big difference because it doesn't really matter in the end because

[00:28:01] it's really a republican form of government as admitted by the california supreme court do you have any thoughts on that yeah I just I agree with you I'd say they were there were a little uh hypocritical there okay so here's some funny points that

[00:28:17] I'm getting to the end of it a lot of this is gobbledygook so I'm not gonna bore everyone um they they do go on to argue about uh the issue of saying that uh shifting powers because this

[00:28:32] would be shifting the taxing power um oh this goes on with the legislature and they they go on to say become this is talking about the legislature we observed in 1917 that even a casual observer a governmental growth and development must have observed the ever-increasing multiplicity and

[00:28:51] complexity of administrative affairs so they start to talk about how because this measure would also go after like regulatory fees and administrative fees that it threatens the ability of those administrative agencies to raise money and raise fees so they go after that as well um

[00:29:11] and again it's not to play like conspiracy theorists here but what do you think they're they want to push that they don't want us to be allowed to vote on I think they want to continue doing what they're doing I think it's about protecting what they've been doing

[00:29:25] it's about the status quo and this is you know there's some other highlights I have about how they think this is the status quo and this is how it should be because they basically don't want

[00:29:36] agencies to be hampered in terms of being able to raise regulatory fees or any of these agency fees or anything like that um and they're saying that this tpa is taxpayer protection act

[00:29:48] because it would force every regulatory fee to go to a vote of the people it threatens the ability of these administrative agencies to raise money like they should and they won't know what what's going to be in their budget every year um and again administrative agencies are not

[00:30:05] elected so I don't think that's a bad thing that maybe we should all vote on what these administrative agencies are doing and what kind of fees they're raising because I feel like it was mentioned in an episode at some point how many of these agencies there are

[00:30:20] oh my gosh didn't we those were just like the agency it was like was it over 50 or something it was a lot and like we looked at some of them

[00:30:30] I feel like it was 80 or 180 but I don't remember now but I know we discussed it at some point or you at least discussed it at some point it was it was mentioned here and now it's

[00:30:40] I don't know off the top of my head yeah it was it was a lot there's a lot of agencies in California and we went through a bunch of them and were like there's no need for any of these agencies

[00:30:50] I think we played a game with one of our guests and we're like if you could get rid of one of these agencies would you if you were the governor I think it was like

[00:30:58] Angela McCarty when Brian Dolly was running for governor I was I wasn't on that right yes yes we played that game is you know if he was elected governor what would he start getting rid of and we went down the list so the quote goes on to say

[00:31:12] it has become increasingly imperative that many quasi legislative and quasi judicial functions which in smaller communities and under more primitive conditions were performed directly by the legislative or judicial branches of the government are entrusted to departments

[00:31:28] board commissions and agents quote no sound objection can longer know can longer be successfully advance this growing method of transacting public business these things must be done in this way or

[00:31:41] they cannot be done at all and they're doing in a very real sense makes for the safety of the republic again there's that word it's not a democracy it's a republic and is thus sanctioned

[00:31:52] by the highest law so to your point like you were saying and my note is they are basically arguing that this enormous Leviathan of a government in California is required like obviously it's absolutely we need government to be this big and we need to have all these agencies

[00:32:13] obviously government won't be able to run although I would argue disappointment that would be my gosh imagine if a lot of these agencies were gone tomorrow how would the government

[00:32:26] continue to run and that is one of those things I was saying it's terrifying and I made these notes that this is what the California Supreme Court believes like this is the way they lean it's not

[00:32:37] surprising that they lean this way that they believe that this is the function of government we have to have all these agencies this is required for us to run a functional government

[00:32:48] so to let voters have an ability to approve or deny regulatory fees of a you know bureaucrats that they don't even elect what a horrible idea that it would bring our government to a screeching

[00:33:01] halt goes on to say under the tpa the legislature would be stripped of that authority and would instead be tasked with considering and voting on a multitude of fees currently set by agencies the tpa says this approach will ensure that quote all fees and other charges are passed

[00:33:19] or rejected by a governing body elected by voters and not on a unelected and unaccountable bureaucrats and that sounds pretty amazing to me I think that sounds like a great idea see goes on to say every non-tax government for your charge would be subject to referendum

[00:33:36] amazing there was another one that I had a note on bear with me hold on talk amongst yourselves oh petitioners contend these changes would quote dramatically slow if not impede critical government operations and force the legislature and voters to become involved in the minutia

[00:34:10] of governance and I wrote in the column sounds like a selling point to me so I don't get to vote on this I wish I could vote on this this November but the California Supreme Court says

[00:34:24] no you don't get to vote on this it goes on to say as a consequence of these two changes administrative agencies would lose the power to do much of the work they today they do today under legislative delegate authority such as assessing fees for the

[00:34:41] disposal of hazardous waste at the state level and setting fees for trash collection or charges for healthcare at public hospitals at the local level and my comment and note in

[00:34:51] there was stop I'm already sold I mean it sounds like all great things I stop I mean you've already sold me okay I I think by reading this I'm like man I wish I could have gotten the vote on this

[00:35:03] this sounds absolutely amazing and yeah that's yeah yeah it's it's all these agencies that get to make money you know get taxpayer money and they they um they get to spend it however they want and we don't get to elect them they're appointed so

[00:35:25] and they don't do their job they weren't even prepared for a basic hearing on in the Capitol so that's basically it they end with for these reasons we conclude that the tpa would clearly

[00:35:35] accomplish so far reaching changes in the nature of our basic governmental plan as to amount to a revision of the Constitution so that's my rundown of the Supreme Court case why they blocked the taxpayer protection so your question was if I wasn't in California Supreme Court which way

[00:35:58] would I vote I think here's it's tough because there is a process there is a California process there is a California constitutional process that determines how this has to be done I disagree with their rationale I disagree with the

[00:36:22] rationale that this would hamper government as it is like the status quo right and that to me I think is where I read it and I look at these justices and I go this is terrifying that this is how they

[00:36:42] view government that we need an enormous government that we need a government that is you know full of agencies full of all these quasi legislative agencies as they call them quasi judicial functions I don't agree with that rationale at all I don't think there's

[00:36:59] anything wrong with the idea that if voters want to tear down their government that is their prerogative they should be able to do so they should be able to

[00:37:10] to they should be able to do so if they want to so do I say they got out on a technicality yes I say they got out on a technicality because I think they they got out on a

[00:37:29] technicality on the sense that they kind of did this whole revision versus amendment because it would change governmental structure but again I don't agree with their rationale why they think it's so dangerous so I probably I would have to do more research to give a

[00:37:50] definitive answer I would think if I were to vote on the California you get to write if you want to you can write a dissenting opinion I probably would have written a dissenting opinion

[00:38:01] saying you know I think this that voters are allowed to do this they just didn't do it the right way they should have done in a different way but I don't think voters being able to have this

[00:38:15] much say over taxation necessarily completely changes the basic function of our government because again that's the California Supreme Court assuming the basic function of government is that we need it to be this big and we need to have these many taxes and fees

[00:38:32] so that would have been basically how I probably would have voted on it does that answer your question yeah I think so you're kind of saying they based their opinion more on assumption right versus actual yeah and if you read between the lines of what they're saying

[00:38:54] I guess in a way it's it's kind of sky is falling the whole government would come to a screeching halt based on this opinion where they say like oh well if voters are allowed

[00:39:09] to vote on every tax and fee government will come to a grinding halt and then what like and obviously they believe we really need big government correct and I think that's the

[00:39:20] way they lean they lean like they've already made these they put it right there in black and white they think that this enormous style of government is the way it should be this is the status quo

[00:39:30] and this is how it should be they never really sit down and go like well if the people don't want a huge entangling Leviathan style of government the people should be allowed to change that

[00:39:44] that should be what the people want right like if the people go hey let's start tearing it all down and start all over that's what the people should want and again I think they're going against this

[00:39:55] this idea of like these progressive policies like the ballot initiative were initially put into place so that people the people of California had a more direct say in their government and they're

[00:40:07] going against that principle and again it is kind of ironic that in the end they're like well it's our republican form of government we have to protect the republic of california so it's it's not

[00:40:19] democracy anymore it's it's democracy in limited terms right like it's democracy when we agree with it it's not democracy on their terms it's democracy as long as you vote for the things that we like

[00:40:30] right it's kind of like what's going on with prop 47 we had sheriff Bianco on last week where he's like okay we got the people got this ballot measure on and now they're playing games where they

[00:40:42] want to like scare people off and they you know nuisance working behind the scenes to strong arm it so that the ballot initiative goes away like it's like we believe in people being able to vote in

[00:40:52] in democracy but it's just not on the stuff we don't want you to vote on like if he really believed in democracy he should just go okay well the people got it on the ballot and

[00:41:02] let's see where it goes like the people should be able to vote but um yeah that's that's california right now we believe in democracy as long as it's what we want you to vote for and believe

[00:41:14] in so any thoughts do you want to talk about the judges sorry yeah go ahead i yeah um i saw you put them in the notes so uh if you want to take that away while i take a drink of water because

[00:41:26] that was a lot of yammering by me so um let me let me pull up my notes just just to pat myself on the back here phil asked me to research who the judges the california supreme court

[00:41:39] judges were appointed by and i'm like oh did you think i didn't already do that um so offensive i'm just kidding where's my notes okay so something i don't understand that i did not research is um

[00:41:54] i'm confused about their terms because some of them were appointed appointed recently like more recent obviously than others but they term out sooner than others and so i don't i don't know

[00:42:03] what the reasoning for that is but um we have seven california supreme court judges right one two three four five six seven and um patricia guerrero who i believe she's the what's her title is chief justice

[00:42:21] yes yeah i think she's the first she was appointed by gavin newson uh carol corgan was appointed by arnold schwarz nigger goodwin lou was appointed by jerry jerry brown leandra krueger by jerry brown joshua grovin by jerry brown martin jinkett spike avan nuesome and kelly evans

[00:42:41] spike avan nuesome not the opera singer josh grobin what oh no no no i laughed when i saw that not not the opera singer josh grobin yeah so yeah not you know and i imagine these these jerry

[00:42:54] brown appointments are from his second time being governor not his first time because that was like the 70s so i they probably still wouldn't be on the bench so i had it in front of me and i closed that

[00:43:06] town so the the oldest one is carol carrigan who was appointed by schwarz nigger yes so she is almost 76 so i was mentioning this to you earlier um it's possible she could be retiring the next

[00:43:21] years i wouldn't blame her and then there's two others that their term ends at the beginning of january of 2026 gavin newson will still be in office we have a possibility of three new california

[00:43:36] supreme court justices being appointed by gavin newson and the way that things have been going i wouldn't be surprised if they are just as far left as you can go yeah and that's again

[00:43:50] that's um i don't want to just jump to the conclusion of like these judges did it because gavin newson was leaning on them judges do just like attorneys and i know people laugh at this idea

[00:44:03] of like attorneys have professional responsibility and they have these rules of ethics and stuff like that that they have to abide by judges also have rules of ethics and professional responsibilities that they do have to abide by that doesn't change the fact that judges

[00:44:19] who are appointed by a certain governor or president are going to have certain leanings on how they view government's role and it's very clear from this supreme court opinion that you have basically an entire supreme court this was unanimous the whole supreme court

[00:44:38] voted for outside of schwarz nigger was the last republican appointed by governor moonbeam and then his predecessor gavin newson they all lean the same way so their worldview and how they

[00:44:50] approached the law it's not surprising they support it this way um and again this is something that we we always talk about when it comes to like the u.s supreme court and who's conservative who's liberal and stuff like that it's not really conservative liberal political parties it's

[00:45:06] how they view their role as a judge um so but to your point having gavin newson appoint more radical judges who believe what this supreme court believes which is that the voters can't have a

[00:45:25] say in how radical the government has changed and that the threat i mean that's what you take away from this opinion is that the threat of voters the threat to the power that the government currently

[00:45:40] has by voters is unacceptable we can't allow that to happen and i'm not being hyperbolic here that's basically what this opinion says this opinion says that we can't allow voters to radically come in and change the government the way it functions right now like this is it

[00:46:00] the government is big we love having a ton of unelected bureaucrats we need them because this is what we believe society needs we need a big government they can't fathom the idea of maybe we need a much

[00:46:14] smaller and limited government so to them that's their rationale in their worldview is we need this and we can't allow voters to threaten it um and i'm sure that's if gavin newson any more people they're gonna believe the same exact thing they're gonna believe that government is good

[00:46:35] and that we should protect government and like yeah let the voters vote on all this other little silly stuff like you know gambling and you know vapes and all that stuff because that's what we end up voting

[00:46:44] on anyways like you know our flavored is flavored tobacco okay okay flavored tobacco we're gonna outlaw is sports gambling okay well we're not gonna last sports gambling okay let the let the

[00:46:54] plebes vote on the their like little their little vices but we can't let them dare come at the treasury and how much money we make that's just that's just ridiculous we can't let them do that um i don't

[00:47:07] know where i was going i was just rambling about the the appointments and the current judges so what are your thoughts i mean i i don't know maybe but i also think like do do you think people

[00:47:22] who vote in a presidential race are gonna be worried about who the governor appointed to their state supreme court like i'm not sure i don't think that would make a big difference i don't think

[00:47:32] yeah i don't think a lot of people are gonna dig that deep to be like well you know you appointed this radical to the california supreme court uh yeah i mean it's it's a bit i think it's a big

[00:47:42] deal when you're running for president who you appoint to the supreme court um like it's gonna come up like well look at who trump appointed and look at kentan g brown jackson who

[00:47:54] biden appointed so that comes up because that's more of a national issue but i think if you're running for president i don't think anyone's looking at who you appointed to the state supreme court

[00:48:03] um i think they're gonna look at obviously the issues of like homelessness and crime and all that stuff um but yeah that's that's basically there was an article that i did want to read

[00:48:16] really quickly um and actually there's there's two articles and one of our favorite people commented on this ruling and i want to read the quote and let's see if you can let's see if you can

[00:48:31] guess who it is oh i hear you so can you see me okay uh let's see where did it go i had this um this is a quote and let's see if you can decipher who it is are you ready okay quote we

[00:48:50] applaud the supreme court's decision to remove the taxpayer deception act from the ballot this unconstitutional measure was another cynical and self-serving effort by corporate interests to put their greed ahead of the needs of all californians you would be right

[00:49:07] it is loranikans loss yep um yeah so loranikans loss of course uh loves the idea it's those greedy corporations yeah it it's not the fact that the unions get you know so many

[00:49:24] kickbacks from the legislature and all that um in terms of contracts and stuff like that they don't get directly paid but in terms of the power and the scope of the government so of course

[00:49:36] the unions want a big government that's going to give them nice fact government contracts with taxpayer money i mean why wouldn't loranikans loss love the idea of you can't you can't say what

[00:49:46] people get taxed on um this is from your hometown paper the orange county register uh basically it is an opinion piece that says california supreme court tax decision casts economic uncertainty

[00:49:59] over the state uh we already talked about what it does um basically it goes on to say this is why companies need certainty in the tax code prop 13 gave them that certainty on property taxes the tpa

[00:50:12] would have done so for all state taxes state local taxes for example if a business knows taxes will rise five percent it could plan for that might be able to absorb the increase by passing

[00:50:22] out to customers or cutting pay and benefits to employee or it might cut unprofitable product lines but what if a business can't know if taxes will rise zero five ten fifteen percent then it

[00:50:32] can't plan abham smith wrote in 1776 and the wealth of nations quote the tax which each individual is bound to pay ought to be certain and not arbitrary a very considerable degree of inequality from

[00:50:46] the experience of all nations is not near so great and evil as the small degree of uncertainty so makes a good point yeah if you don't if the legislature as it is can just tax with impunity

[00:51:03] and people don't have a really say about it um then businesses can't really do anything so i hate to be a broken record but again this is why make sure you pay attention this november

[00:51:16] who you're voting for in sacramento for assembly and senator don't just go don't go into that ballot box and just check off president trump and then just leave you gotta or whoever i'm not assuming

[00:51:27] you're all voting for president trump or president by i'm just saying don't go and vote for just the president and then just walk out um so these things matter and you know if fine if they

[00:51:38] want it to be a republic like a lot of people will always say it is a republic then we have to make sure our representatives in our republic are actually listening to what we want them to do

[00:51:48] and not these uh you know the scott weeners and the buffy wicks and the ebb and lows and the alex what's his name alex lee's of the world like we don't need them making our tax policy so

[00:52:02] yeah any final thoughts before we log off after okay so that's that's basically what happened at the supreme court take from it now at least hopefully everyone who tuned in listened to the

[00:52:16] whole thing hopefully my hope is that you have a better idea of like why it happened and you can agree or disagree with my analysis or my opinion on it but at least you have the backing of like

[00:52:26] why it actually happened rather than just being like oh it's because nuesome went ahead and just leaned on all the supreme court justices and they were all you know bought paid for or whatever

[00:52:37] and yeah um they came up with they have a legal argument they have 50 pages of it so you can go read it for yourself um it's good bedtime reading um so with that said uh make sure

[00:52:50] you as we always say when we end the episode make sure you like share subscribe or review and all that and if you'd like to support this show the best thing you can do that is absolutely free is

[00:53:02] share it with somebody else and that's the best way to support this show and we will see you all on the next one have a good night later and hopefully the next time i'm not standing in front

[00:53:11] of a curtain see you on the next one later thank you for listening to another episode of california underground if you like what you heard remember to subscribe like and review it and follow california underground on social media for updates as to when new episodes are available