Attorney general strongly sides with group hoping to repeal tax hikes

The referendum petition being circulated to repeal taxes passed by the Legislature is valid, and a protest filed by the Association of Professional Oklahoma Educators should be rejected, the Oklahoma attorney general's office argued Friday to the Oklahoma Supreme Court.

In written arguments, Oklahoma Attorney General Mike Hunter's office said the state Constitution has always afforded broad protection to the right of citizens to seek a referendum on legislation. That right was strengthened when voters approved State Question 640 and barred the Legislature from attaching an emergency enactment clause to bills that raise taxes.

The state Supreme Court should "zealously guard the right of referendum" and deny the protest filed by the Association of Professional Oklahoma Educators, Hunter's office argued.

The high court asked the attorney general's office for its opinion on the protest filed by the Association of Professional Oklahoma Educators and on a separate protest filed by the Oklahoma Education Association and other education groups.

Briefs in the second protest are due next week. That protest concerns the wording of the referendum petition summary and whether it accurately reflects the legislation that Oklahoma Taxpayers Unite! wants to repeal.

The protests are on a fast track at the court, with oral arguments in both scheduled for June 11.

Oklahoma Taxpayers Unite! is circulating petitions to repeal House Bill 1010xx, which raised taxes on motor fuels, cigarettes and the production of some oil and gas. It also modified the taxation scheme for little cigars and imposed a new tax on hotel room stays. The hotel room tax was later repealed with separate legislation.

Oklahoma Taxpayers Unite! has until July 18 to collect about 42,000 signatures to place repeal on the state ballot. The threshold is much lower than that for initiative petitions.

The Association of Professional Oklahoma Educators said the referendum petition process was not intended for bills affecting the "immediate preservation of the public peace, health and safety."

The group argued that the tax bill was inextricably linked to the legislation raising teacher pay and that education was critical to the public peace, health and safety.

Hunter's office argued that it was "legally unsound" to claim that a tax bill could be immunized from the people's power of referendum just by linking it to other legislation.

The clear effect of State Question 640, approved in 1992, "is to forbid the Legislature from preventing a referendum vote on revenue bills," the attorney general's office brief states.

Oklahoma Taxpayers Unite! filed its own brief on Friday making similar arguments to the Oklahoma Supreme Court.

"The Oklahoma Constitution makes crystal clear that the people have the power to accept or reject at the polls any act of the Legislature," the group argued to the court.

"This right is sacred and is to be carefully preserved.

"Because HB1010xx is a revenue-raising bill, it cannot ... contain an emergency clause that would otherwise strip a referendum vote from the people."

In Tulsa on Friday, former U.S. Sen. Tom Coburn, who is helping Oklahoma Taxpayers Unite!, said at a news conference that he thinks teachers should be paid a lot more. He said raises could be funded with the growing surplus in the state budget and that the petition drive to repeal the taxes should proceed.

"Let the people decide if in fact what the Legislature did was appropriate in terms of the tax increase," Coburn said.