•February 6, 2019•

By Jim Nowlan
NP Guest Columnist

Twenty-nineteen is the golden anniversary of the last Illinois Constitutional Convention, in 1969. This year also notes the half-century mark in elected office for Illinois House Speaker Mike Madigan, whose served as a delegate to the convention.
I think it may be time for another convention. Thomas Jefferson felt constitutions such as our deified US charter should be reviewed from time to time. Indeed, our state constitution, ratified by the voters in 1970, calls for a vote every 20 years on whether to call a new convention. Voters rejected such a call in 2010, but the present dire state of our state induces me to think it might be high time to revisit our state charter.
The 1970 constitution was considered at the time to be a relatively modern, forward-looking piece of work. For example, municipalities were accorded home-rule authority, the governor was given four veto powers, and the personal property tax was abolished.
The document also empowered the voters to amend the legislative article by initiative and referendum, but the Illinois Supreme Court subsequently interpreted the proviso so narrowly that the power is basically inoperative.     Login or Subscribe to read the rest of this story.