With a freshman group of legislators and a new governor sitting up on Capitol Hill, it's an appropriate time to consider once again the eternal question: Why do legislators wear hand-written signs on their backs saying, "I vote against government reform bills; please kick me."
Yes, as in previous years, legislators, both Republicans and Democrats (although mostly Republicans), are refusing to adopt common-sense changes to the old ways of campaign-fund-spending, lobbyist-gift-taking and so on.
These are not issues upon which Utah state government turns.
Truth be told, some of the "reform" bills may be as nitpicky as some lawmakers claim when they say: "You can't buy my vote for a $5 ham sandwich," and so on.
But I've watched legislators run bills and try to solve problems before — and in the process get so worked up over stuff like teaching agriculture production to seventh-graders that you'd think the republic would fall if you don't adopt what they want.
One would think that if 81 percent of Utahns didn't want you taking gifts from lobbyists who get paid a lot of money to try to influence you, well, you wouldn't take gifts from lobbyists.
Or if 79 percent of Utahns didn't want legislators to become paid lobbyists immediately upon leaving office, well, you'd adopt a law imposing a reasonable "cooling off" period between walking off of the Senate floor into the hallway and taking a job lobbying your former colleagues.
I mean, what's the big deal about correcting actual or perceived ethical problems? Such changes are a common-sense approach that even everyday Utahns can understand.
But, argue legislators, we are different. We stand for election every two years (for House members) or four years (for senators). And if the "people" don't like us or trust us, then they can throw us out.
True. Elections are great things. But how legislative elections actually work is also a practical function of some of the so-called government reform bills that lawmakers kill each year.
For example, if you get most of your campaign funds from the special interests who are also wooing you while in office (as a Deseret Morning News study showed was the case in the 2004 election), if you are running in a district whose boundaries you yourself helped draw (as is the case for GOP and even a few Democrats after the Legislature's 2001 redistricting), and if most of the voters can't even name you as their legislator after the election (as is the case for the 104 part-time lawmakers, polls show), then you get these kinds of results:
In the 2004 legislative elections, 92.3 percent of the senators who ran for re-election won; 93.5 percent of the House members who ran again won.
With those kinds of retention wins, are you really accountable when you vote against a government reform issue wanted by 80 percent of the people?
Clearly, you are immune.
Accordingly, advocates of such reform measures are left appealing to the general good will of lawmakers.
And that good will, in normal cases, seems to work. Utah is, after all, basically a well-managed state.
In addition, I hear legislators say things like: "When I talk to constituents, they never mention campaign finance reform, redistricting or lobbyists gifts. They don't care about that stuff. They trust me."
OK, then if it's a matter of trust and good judgment, here is an example to consider: What would you, Mr. Lawmaker, do if this happened to you:
You are sued in civil court. You show up the first day of trial and the plaintiff's attorney, just before the lunch break, says to the judge and jury: "I know how hard you work, and for little pay, so I'm taking you all to lunch, and the bus is outside to carry you all to the New Yorker restaurant where we'll each have a $50 meal. And tonight I'm taking you to a Jazz game, the next night to the Utah Symphony. We may or may not talk about this case, but we'll have a good time."
Can you imagine how fast a law would fly through the Legislature outlawing such a practice in the judicial branch of government, the severe penalties imposed on the gift-offering, gift-taking people involved? (By the way, there are laws against such court conduct already.)
Oh, I can hear the outraged floor speeches by legislators now.
Well, another year has gone by in the Legislature. Little or nothing has been done on legislative reform. And while I believe Utah legislators are honest, hard-working people trying to do the right thing, when it comes to dealing with their own ethical questions many are deaf, blind and oddly insensitive to what their constituents want.
Deseret Morning News political editor Bob Bernick Jr. may be reached by e-mail at bbjr@desnews.com