| The sound
of unaccountability: "Trust us" |
| Some of the City Council members who
oppose Ballot
Issue 2A and want the unelected
Louisville
Revitalization Commission to retain its extraordinary
powers say, "Trust us," in response to
citizen
concerns about an unelected body having so many potent powers,
including the power to control $77 million.
Members of the LRC have also said this. "Trust us" is one of the scariest phrases in the American democratic lexicon. Government officials who say "trust us" in response to concerns raised by citizens evince a remarkable—and disturbing—lack of understanding about American history and our constitutional form of government. The American Revolution resulted in no small measure from the colonists' repudiation of King George III's view that they needed no representation in Parliament because they could "trust" the King and Parliament. Freedom, in the eyes of the colonists, was incompatible with a form of government in which the governed had to rely on—trust—government officials to forbear the improper use and arrogation of power against them. The United States Constitution is a monument to the American people's distrust of government. The Constitution's premise is that the People hold all power, and that government has no power except as the People choose to confer in the Constitution. That's true of the Colorado Constitution. Originally the federal Constitution contained no Bill of Rights because its authors believed there was no need to guarantee, for example, free speech from government intrusion because the government had no power to intrude on free speech. The Bill of Rights amended the Constitution because, notwithstanding this underlying theory of the Constitution, many Americans feared the government would infringe on their rights unless there were explicit guarantees. The entire system of checks and balances embedded in American government is grounded on distrust of government: each branch of government serves as a check on the other two. As Madison wrote in Federalist No. 51, defending the need for checks and balances, "If angels were to govern men, neither external nor internal controls on government would be necessary." In the City of Louisville, the Louisville Home Rule Charter is an analogous monument. Its purpose is to limit power and to limit the discretion of city government and government officials. The Charter's Ethics Code is a prototypical example. The requirement that the governing body of Louisville must be elected—must ask the People for permission to govern Louisville citizens—is another example. If our form of government really were based on the "trust us" model advanced by some Council and LRC members, no constitution, charter or other document limiting government would be needed. The "trust us" mentality of government officials misunderstands another cornerstone of our democracy: citizen participation in government. "Trust us" is a synonym for "leave us alone and let us do our work"; that is, citizens have no role—they should sit down in front of the TV and relax—because "We Government Officials will do all the driving." It is a deeply troubling view of how American government functions under our organic charters limiting government at the national, state and municipal levels. Our work is not done once we leave the ballot box. Citizens have a role—a civic duty—to participate in government, to petition the government, and to influence government decision-making. This puts citizens as much in the driver's seat of government as their elected representatives. In virtually all cases, at the end of the day citizens ultimately defer to their representatives. But not always. When elected officials disregard the People's will, those officials will find themselves in the back seat. Government is a shared responsibility. To be sure, when we elect our peers to represent us in government, by definition we are entrusting to them a measure of political power to serve our needs. That is to say, we "trust" them to do our will and to exercise prudently—and modestly—the political power we loaned them. That is different from saying that their election supplants our right—and duty—to participate in government. That we "trust" our elected representatives in this qualified way is leagues away from the notion that we are required to "trust" their minions and bureaucrats, let alone defer to them. The LRC's seven members are accountable to no one; they propose to divert up to $77 million from the City, Boulder County, Boulder Valley School District, and Louisville Fire District to fund its as-yet-unspecified activities; the LRC's control over the up to $77 million will be for 25 years; and its at-times inconsistent ethics rules are unenforceable by citizens. To ask citizens to "just trust" these seven unelected persons is an undemocratic leap of faith few citizens would make. |
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