State Agencies to take up proposed constitutional amendments today

The House Committee on State Agencies and Governmental Affairs will take up the 13 proposed House constitutional amendments in today's meeting at 10:00 a.m. For all that pass, they'll go into a pool for prioritization. We can refer three of them out to the people, and historically, we rotate as to which chamber refers out two of them. It was the House's turn in 2007, but we couldn't agree on two of them, so of the three that were referred to the people for the 2008 ballot, two came from the Senate. The 13 proposals from the House this year are as follows:

HJR1001 (Greenberg): Modifies constitution regarding conduct of special elections
HJR1002 (Ragland): Abolishes the office of Constable
HJR1003 (Maloch): Removes interest rate limits on bonds/loans involving gov't
HJR1004 (Cheatham): Concerning interest rate limits
HJR1005 (Greenberg): Changes apportionment
HJR1006 (Shelby): Increases terms of county officials to 4 yrs; adds recall procedure
HJR1007 (Wills): Amends Amendment 82 (super-projects)
HJR1008 (Hutchinson): Changes Amendment 42 concerning the Arkansas Hwy Commission
HJR1009 (Carroll): Allows atheists to hold office and testify in court
HJR1010 (J. Burris): Equal Rights Amendment.
HJR1011 (Green): Amends Lottery Amendment
HJR1012 (Roebuck): Modifies Amendment 33 (boards/commissions governing state instutions)
HJR1013 (Wills): Promotes growth and jobs through investment in technology-based enterprises

Several are generating e-mail from constituents, particularly the constitutional right to hunt and fish over in the Senate (I have 429 in my inbox currently that need responses). This is a recycled proposal from 2007 that did pass if memory serves but didn't receive a high enough priority to be referred to the voters. My priorities from the House this year are HJR1013 and HJR1003, and I'm also in support of restructuring Amendment 82 to give us more leverage to attract "smaller" projects.

Landmine alert. Rep. Carroll's proposal to allow atheists to hold office and testify in court has also generated a ton of e-mail and would serve merely as a clean-up. I'm voting against it and am lobbying other Dems to vote against it. First, the provisions in all nine state consitutions with this prohibitive language have been struck down in violation of Article 6 and the 1st Amendment, so the proposal has no real effect. Second, if it has no real effect, why put it above some of these other needed amendments in priority while putting your own neck on the platter for groups in Arkansas to run Kay Hagan-esque ads in your next election?