NFIB helped win passage with a well-thought out strategy and well-timed-tactics, reports State Director Candace Daly.
States, which have to balance their budgets, are tired of waiting for Congress to balance its.
The U.S. Constitution allows states to bypass the refusal of Congress to balance the federal budget by allowing them to request an Article V convention, but it takes 34 states to pass such a resolution.
With strong lobbying support from NFIB, Utah became the 26th state to pass such a resolution calling for an Article V Convention—limited solely to a Balanced Budget Amendment. NFIB members strongly support a balanced budget amendment in the U.S. Constitution. Utah members have said, “If we have to balance our budget why shouldn’t the federal government have to balance its.”
When a 34th state concurs (27 so far have), Congress must call for a convention of states, If any amendment is proposed in the convention, it would then takes 38 states to ratify to ratify it.
NFIB/Utah worked with Rep. Kraig Powell to shepherd House Joint Resolution 7 through the Legislature—but it was an arduous journey. A similar resolution failed in 2014. Strategy was the key to victory this year.
NFIB created a matrix to see who had been re-elected to the House during the 2014 elections, who voted in favor of a Balanced Budget Amendment last year, and who opposed it. This matrix gave us valuable information, including how many votes would be needed to reach the 38 votes necessary to pass. NFIB spent time with newly elected legislators to determine who would be with us in passing HJR 7.
Passing legislation takes cooperation and coordination. There were three Constitutional Convention resolutions sponsored in the House of Representatives this year. All three of the sponsoring legislators agreed to help each other try to get these bills passed. NFIB only took an official position in favor of HJR 7.
First Bill Falters
The first bill to have a hearing was HJR 3 Joint Resolution. Sponsored by Rep. Merrill Nelson, it called for a Convention of the States for the sole purpose of proposing a Countermand Amendment to the United States Constitution. NFIB’s matrix predicted it would struggle to get out of the House Judiciary Committee, and sure enough, it failed by it failed on a five-Yes-to-six-No vote.
NFIB reviewed its matrix and determined that if HJR 7 went to the new 2015 Government Operations Committee, it would fail. It took us two weeks to get it recalled from that committee and reassigned to the House Revenue and Taxation Committee. I believe this worked to our advantage, because we were able to determine which legislators on the committee would be with us and who would need additional information.
The third Constitutional Convention resolution was HJR 14 Joint Resolution calling for a Convention to Amend the Constitution of the United States, sponsored by Rep. Ken Ivory. Both bills were put on the same agenda in the House Revenue and Taxation Committee. Both bills passed out of committee.
NFIB Bill Advances
The next vote would be by all 75 members of the House of Representatives. This is when the opposition against proposing any amendments to the Constitution kicked in big time. We were very sad when HJR 14 failed on a vote of 34 yeas to 38 nays. Representative Powell asked that our bill, HJR 7, be put on hold, which allowed us to analyze the vote taken on HJR 14 and prepare an amendment for HJR 7 that would help us gain the additional votes needed to pass. The following day HJR 7 passed with a vote of 40 yeas, 30 nays.
Victory
The Senate did not let any grass grow under its feet. HJR 7 was assigned to the Senate Business and Labor Committee where it passed. Afterwards, Senate President Wayne Niederhauser and Senate sponsor Curt Bramble were very careful to make sure they had the 15 votes needed for full passage. NFIB helped by educating all 29 Senators, and on the 6th of March, the bill passed with 15 yeas, 13 nays.
