Practical Or Partisanship?
To the Editor:
The Legislative Council is holding a public hearing to repeal several town ordinances, including what we all call “the plastic bag ban.” Let’s be clear about what is happening here. The Republicans have a 9 to 3 majority on the LC, which they earned in the last municipal election. They can put through what they’d like with only token resistance from the minority Democratic representatives.
What have they chosen to do with this power ?
They’ve decided to re-introduce culture war issues that rile up their supporters. It’s never good practice for a legislature to repeal the acts of their predecessors unless there’s a manifest injustice. It makes government look petty and only able to focus on tit-for-tat partisanship. We have no such injustice here. Once a legislature passes something, they are supposed to have acted in the name of all the people, not just in the name of the majority, otherwise these issues would never be settled.
Repeal of these recently enacted ordinances, in the absence of a compelling reason, may be good politics for some, but it’s a bad way to run a government. For those of us who want a return to a more bipartisan spirit, it’s a big step in the wrong direction.
Peter Schwarz
Newtown
Pendulum swings both ways. A wise man once said, ‘Elections have consequences.’
So, the Legislative Council’s 8 Democrat Yay vote to 4 Republican Nay vote to pass the Bag Ban ordinance in 2019 in the absence of a compelling reason (besides a well-coordinated group of activists’ say so) — that wasn’t political or partisan? Yet when the voters subsequently put Republicans in the overwhelming majority, that’s when this issue becomes political and partisan? Okay, I get it.