Associate Dean Amar Comments for Media on Anti-Gay Ballot Proposal
Vikram Amar, Associate Dean and Professor of Law at UC Davis School of Law, commented for media including National Public Radio programs All Things Considered and It's All Politics, Southern California Public Radio station KPCC, Sacramento television station KXTV, and the Sacramento Bee on a proposed California ballot initiative that would legalize the killing of gays and lesbians.
Though analysts agree that the shocking proposal has little chance of actually reaching state ballots, it has called into question California's initiative process, which lacks provisions to prevent illegal or unconstitutional proposals. Amar told the Sacramento Bee that the anti-gay proposal "drips of evil, so the instinct is to say ‘Well, there's got to be a way to avoid wasting everybody's time.' But in the law we often have limitations that are built not for the easy cases but because we are worried about the hard cases."
In an interview on NPR's All Things Considered, Amar explained the initiative process. Elected officials such as California Attorney General Kamala Harris are not entrusted to make decisions about the legality or constitutionality of voter initiatives, he said, but Harris possibly could go to court to ask a judge to make that determination and prevent the measure from going forward. "We have a strong preference in California for judges making these determinations rather than elected political officials," he said.
Though some have proposed raising the filing fee (presently only $200) as a means of discouraging frivolous or illegal proposals, Amar said that such a move could be seen as discouraging more legitimate grass roots political activity. "It does send a problematic message to the world about the openness of democracy when you raise filing fees," he said on All Things Considered. "And in this area of the law, I think symbols are important."
Vikram Amar, Associate Dean of Academic Affairs and Professor of Law with the UC Davis School of Law, is a national authority in the fields of constitutional law, civil procedure, criminal procedure, and remedies. His biweekly column for Justia.com, a leading provider of online legal information, centers on his expertise in constitutional law.