Georgia Politics, Campaigns, and Elections for March 22, 2016

King George III approved of the passage of the Stamp Act legislation on March 22, 1765 designed to pay for some of the costs the UK incurred in protecting the colonies, but it would lead to the movement that culminated in the American Revolution. No word on where the Myrmidons were on this.

President Franklin Delano Roosevelt signed the Beer and Wine Revenue Act on March 22, 1933, allowing the sale of alcoholic beverages, and later that year, the federal Prohibition was ended.

The first Masters golf tournament began on March 22, 1934 in Augusta, Georgia.

The state prohibition on all alcoholic beverages ended on March 22, 1935 with Governor Eugene Talmadge’s signature of the Alcoholic Beverage Control Act.

The United States Congress passed the Equal Rights Amendment on March 22, 1972; it would fail to garner enough state ratifications.

Under the Gold Dome Today

Today marks the penultimate legislative day of the 2016 Session of the Georgia General Assembly. At 8:45 AM, a Budget Conference Committee will meet in Room 450 of the Capitol and at 9 AM, the House Rules Committee will meet in Room 341.

The Senate Rules Calendar has 86 bills on it today, while the House Rules Calendar holds some 80 bills.

Speaker David Ralston has no plans to change campus carry legislation that passed earlier this session, despite indications from Gov. Deal that changes might be required to gain his signature.

Ralston says Deal didn’t share his concerns about weapons being brought into day cares, disciplinary hearings or office space until the bill had passed. Ralston says he expects Deal to sign the measure.

Deal hasn’t committed to signing the bill or vetoing it.

We’ve heard plenty from students at Georgia colleges about the Campus Carry legislation, but here’s a question – how do employees feel about the bill. Emory University, while not affected by the bill because it’s a private institution, has 14,724 students, and 13,375 employees. I’d be interested in some coverage of how employees at the public colleges think campus carry will affect them.

The Macon Telegraph writes about a possible unintended consequence of the campus carry legislation that might affect a local airport.

State law currently allows firearms to be carried as far as security checkpoints at all Georgia airports, but the pending campus-carry bill may lift a restriction on another area at the Macon Downtown Airport.

Middle Georgia State University leases space there.

“We’re waiting to see what happens with the campus carry law currently being discussed at the state level, but based on the existing law, individuals are not allowed to carry weapons on the portion of airport property in the possession of/used by the university,” Macon-Bibb County spokesman Chris Floore said in an email. “Attorney General Sam Olens indicated license holders cannot carry a weapon on school property in 2014. However, if the new campus carry bill passes, that would likely change.”

Five members of the Georgia House held a press conference to cry wolf criticize religious liberty legislation passed by both chambers.

Rep. Park Cannon (D – Atlanta), Rep. Karla Drenner (D – Avondale Estates) and Rep. Keisha Waites (D – Atlanta) were joined by Rep. Dee Dawkins-Haigler (D – Lithonia) and Rep. Taylor Bennett (D – Brookhaven) to speak out against the bill.

“Perhaps we are no longer a fortress of Jim Crow institutionalism, but we continue to regress by passing sweeping discriminatory measures like HB 757,” Cannon told reporters. “I am sure that the state of Georgia is better than this.”

Yesterday, after I noted the National Felony Football League’s sanctimony warning to Georgia lawmakers that religious liberty legislation might scuttle the Peach State’s bid for Super Bowl 2018, a reader asked if Florida and Louisiana, the other states bidding for the Super Bowl, have religious liberty legislation. The answer, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures, is yes, Florida and Louisiana both have state versions of the Religious Freedom Restoration Act. Also, there’s a federal version. I look forward to watching the 2018 Super Bowl live from Havana, where religious freedom is not as highly regarded.

Some Georgia legislators don’t physically press the button every time they vote, occasionally relying on a seat-neighbor to do their bidding, according to 11Alive.

Lawmakers cast votes for themselves – and they can vote again on behalf of their colleagues who aren’t there.

“It keeps you from running across the width of the House chamber,” said Rep. Alan Powell (R-Hartwell), a 26 year veteran of the House, who defends the practice and says it’s justifiable. And in many instances, a member voting will also casually reach toward the desk of the absent lawmaker next to them – and push their voting button as well.  We saw it countless times during the 2016 legislative session, and lawmakers don’t deny doing it.

Whenever that has happened, Powell says he has always signaled his vote to his seat-mate when the vote is cast on his behalf — typically with a thumb raised or lowered.

“If you’re all the way across the (legislative chamber), you may not get there in time to vote or finish a conversation ,” Powell said.  “So if you raise your hand and your seat mate is watching, and you give ’em an up or down sign, that seat mate will vote your machine for you.”

Asked if it’s “reasonable for the public to expect their state representatives to cast their own votes,” Powell answered:  “We are casting our own vote.”

In House District 159, former Marine Daniel Almond is challenging State Rep. Jon Burns (R-Newington), who serves as House Majority Leader.

“As I’ve watched our liberties continue to be eroded and the size and scope of government at all levels continue to expand, I began to consider running for public office myself,” Almond said.

He said he noticed “a lot of cronyism and improper influence” at the state capitol.

“I’m looking forward to standing firm against cronyism and corruption and fighting for the ideas of personal freedom and limited government as called for in all of our founding documents,” he said.

Jeffrey Sosebee, a prospective candidate for Hall County Sheriff, failed to submit fingerprints with his qualification and the time period for doing so has passed, so the Hall County Elections Board will take up the issue of his ability to run in the May 24 Primary.

“One of those qualifications is to be fingerprinted at the direction of the judge of the (Hall County) Probate Court, who will then conduct a search of local, state and national fingerprint files for the purpose of disclosing any criminal record involving a potential candidate,” Elections Director Charlotte Sosebee (no relation) wrote in a recent letter informing Sosebee of a challenge to his candidacy. “This requirement must be completed within three days following the close of the qualification period.”

The candidate qualifying period ended March 11.

Sosebee had his fingerprints taken with the Gainesville Police Department instead, a potential administrative error that could cost him a chance to run to be the top elected law enforcement officer in Hall County.

In a Facebook post March 18, Sosebee acknowledged the controversy, dismissed his critics and implied he had nothing to hide.

“Well, we encountered another day of opposing forces,” he wrote. “The complaint … is only technical, but we will go through the process. Being Sheriff is about finding appropriate solutions to issues following protocols, but common sense, as well. Fingerprints are now the issue. You can’t change them or mess them up. My prints are available and on record.”

Peach State Presidential Politics

Janet Hooks of the Wall Street Journal visited Georgia this past weekend to look at the delegate and alternate selection process that will results in Georgia sending 76 delegates to the Republican National Convention in Cleveland this summer.

MORELAND, Ga.—Sen. Ted Cruz’s campaign has been operating an under-the-radar effort to prepare for a contested Republican convention this summer, and those moves appear to be bearing fruit in places such as this Atlanta exurb.

Though front-runner Donald Trump carried Georgia’s Coweta County by 12 percentage points three weeks ago, it was Cruz supporters who dominated an early stage of the arcane process of choosing the people who will serve as delegates at the Republican National Convention.

It is at events like the Coweta County Republican Convention last weekend where Mr. Cruz must prevail to have any reasonable chance of wresting the GOP nomination away from Mr. Trump. “We started preparing to get our folks to the convention in 2015,” said Scott Johnson, a top Cruz organizer in Georgia.

Mr. Cruz’s presidential hopes increasingly rest on a convention scenario not seen since 1948, when New York Gov. Thomas E. Dewey won the GOP nomination on the third ballot. To succeed, he is relying on organizers like Brant Frost, a 25-year-old mortgage broker in Georgia who began volunteering for his campaign last July.

Mr. Frost estimates that Cruz supporters will make up 90% of Coweta County’s delegates at Georgia’s coming state and district gatherings, from which delegates to the national convention will be chosen. “We’re trying to get Cruz supporters there so when delegates can vote for whoever they want, they will vote for Ted,’’ Mr. Frost said.

Marshall McCart at The Piedmont Chronicles, wrote about Newton County’s Republican Convention.

For starters, it was the best-attended county convention I’d ever been to. We saw 74 qualified delegates and 11 guests for a total of 85 attendees. And unlike former years, there was no tension or exclusionary tactics, it was all very warm and welcoming. There was a little bit of unhappiness on both ends of the party as former establishment members felt like they weren’t give enough delegate and alternate slots, while some of the former outsiders felt like the party was being foolish for giving spots to those who “slit our throats the last several times around.”

In the spirit of full disclosure, I was asked and did indeed serve as Chair of the nominating committee for this convention. Old friend Aaron Brooks also served on that committee with a few other folks. As we discussed, to have both of the fringes unhappy led us to believe that things were handled in the right manner. It’s never perfect in this process, but I truly felt it went well.

A major emphasis for the Nominating Committee, and this was reinforced when the Assembled Body accepted all of our slates, was this – giving delegate slots to as many new folks as we could and giving fair and proportional representation to supporters of all candidates and the various modes of thought that makes up the big tent of the Grand Old Party.

When it was all said and done, 19 delegates had been sent to the 4th Congressional District; 10 to the 10th, and 22 to the State Convention in Augusta in June.