Posted: Wednesday, December 3, 2008 12:00 am
Bill Sizemore spent Monday night and part of Tuesday in jail. Remember him the next time somebody goes on and on about free speech in Oregon politics.
Because he keeps initiating ballot measures to break their power, Sizemore has been a pain in the rear of the unions that represent public employees. Years ago they sued him over some apparent irregularities in filing preliminary initiatives and convinced a jury in Multnomah County to find against the defendant. The court slapped him with a big damage award and an injunction.
The verdict was won under an anti-racketeering provision of the law, which now allows his opponents to call him a racketeer. But let's remember that the term has been hijacked. It properly applies to running gambling rings, prostitution and other criminal rackets.
The aim of the verdict was to shut him up. But he wouldn't. He used dubious maneuvers to get around the injunction or to ignore it. And he kept going, funded by a couple of rich men whose political goals he shares.
Now a judge in Portland found him in contempt of court and of the law and jailed him until he signed certain federal and state tax forms concerning charitable organizations.
The big issues have fallen off to the side in this case. Sizemore's initiatives are not usually wise. In the last election all five of his were rejected, one of them narrowly. But they got on the ballot not because of any racketeering, not because Sizemore runs a sham charity for channeling political money, but because his ideas, half-baked though most of them are, got the requisite number of signatures of Oregon voters.
Keep in mind that if criminal or tax laws had been clearly violated, the state or the federal government could indict Bill Sizemore and try to convict him. Instead, he has been hounded in civil court over paperwork and civil judgments won by his enemies in a political fight. That could easily scare off others from trying the initiative route to lower taxes or reduce the government's reach. (hh)