George Lakoff's 14 Words That Could Fix California

Here's the little-known truth about California: Since 1978, the state has been subject to what is essentially minority rule. Proposition 13 -- mostly packaged as a property tax law change -- was passed that year, altering the state constitution to read that a two-thirds super-majority is needed in the state legislature to pass any revenue increases. But what this has turned out to really mean is that one-third plus one vote, or 34 percent, of the state legislature can control all legislative decisions.

You thought filibustering on Capitol Hill was bad? This is worse. And California is the only state with such a rule in place, now or ever.

As the state faces a growing budget deficit -- now estimated to be $20 billion -- the tyranny of the minority has grown more apparent to voters who have hardly noticed the two-thirds requirement all these years, but who now see public programs and schools being shut down or underfunded left and right in order to close the widening budgetary gap.

"This is an issue about democracy and most people don't know it," says renowned Berkeley linguist and Democratic consultant George Lakoff. "That is the reason we have a budget crisis, which in the end is really a crisis of democracy."

Lakoff and a few other groups have their eyes set on reforming the two-thirds budget trainwreck via the November midterm elections. Let the majority of voters decide whether a minority should rule Sacramento.

The state of the Golden State

Californians are proud of the fact that the state's economy, when compared to entire nations' GDPs, is the eighth largest in the world, eclipsing rising global powers like Brazil, Russia and India. Though when you're up that high, you have a long way to fall, as evidenced by the world's largest economy -- the United States.

Solving the massive budget problem in Sacramento has seemed even more politically impossible than the situation in Washington. And many think the two-thirds requirement is to blame.

Currently about 63 percent of the state legislature, comprised of the State Senate and State Assembly, is Democratic. Ordinarily, this would allow Democrats to pass a state budget easily, but the two-thirds rule lets Republicans control the game, by holding the budget hostage until they get what they want.

Indeed, most GOP legislators in California have taken the Taxpayer Protection Pledge, championed by Grover Norquist's Americans for Tax Reform. Those who sign the pledge "solemnly bind themselves to oppose any and all tax increases." Thirty-four percent of California's assembly members have signed on, as have 30 percent of state senators.

So while two-thirds of voters say they support paying higher taxes to fund K-12 education, and 50 percent support higher taxes to pay for higher education and health and human services, their elected representatives cannot act, due to the one-third minority who won't vote for any bill that involves raising revenue.

It's little wonder that a majority of Californians report feeling anxiety or disappointment when asked to describe the emotions elicited by their state legislature; or that a whopping 74 percent of them believe California is headed in the wrong direction.

The measures

The groups working to get their proposed initiatives on the November state ballot share at least one thing in common -- they know the state's budget problems will only get worse if the two-thirds budget vote threshold stays in place.

Perhaps the measure to receive the most press, if not money, is the California Democracy Act, composed of 14 simple words: "All legislative actions on revenue and budget must be determined by a majority vote."

Written by George Lakoff, who has long consulted for Democratic campaigns, it goes straight to the point, by simply substituting "two-thirds" for "majority," while the measure's title frames the issue around democracy. Lakoff, who as a linguist and political activist has for years urged Democrats to use their own language in politics rather than succumb to using Republican framing, took great care in writing his initiative.