'Traditional' Republican values

"Chicago, Chicago, that toddlin' town" … Oh, excuse me. I was thinking about the leadership in the Utah State Republican Party and this tune kept popping into my mind. Then to my dismay, I realized that my party has stepped closer to "Chicago-style" politics and never left the Beehive State. I am speaking of the political antics at our state Republican Convention.

In the last legislative session, our State Legislature passed an immigration bill, much to the dislike of certain politicians and ultra-conservative activists. Our state Republican Party leadership, in order to curry the favor of the far right, encouraged a resolution requiring the state Legislature to repeal the bill and replace it with something much more stringent. I am not writing to speak to the salient features of the immigration bill, but to the manner in which our state GOP reacted to this situation.

Please do not misunderstand. Any political party has the right and privilege to approve as many resolutions as it wants. I am concerned that our party bosses will try to retaliate against the legislators that voted for this more moderate approach to immigration. They have done it before much to their own detriment and the disgust of rank-and-file Republicans.

True, the candidate selection process does lie with the delegates as our election laws state, but the purpose of this process is not to make public policy. Our lawmakers are the ones to make laws and set public policy, not the political party. Political parties should be concerned with public policy, but there are processes already in place to change laws that the people feel are unfair or unjust.

Vindictive action on the part of party leadership is uncivil and will squelch any open dialogue and divergent opinion that should be allowed in our political process.

Now to the matter of changing the law: In our state, the people have the opportunity, when they think a law has been passed that is unjust, to get the signatures of like-minded people, turn the petitions in and refer the matter to the voters of this state in the next general election. The referendum process does work and has been used in the past most effectively (despite the attempts of some legislators to make the process much more difficult).

The problem I see at this time for the leaders of the Republican Party is that if they put this immigration bill before the people, it will probably be sustained by the voice of the people, and it will still remain law. The Republican Party leaders know that and want to take care of it in their own way by circumventing the reasonable and lawful way and using warnings of reprisal to pull their own legislators back into line.