Gary Silverman
Columnist
Over 1200 bills were sent to the Governor’s desk following this winter’s legislative session. Some bills followed party lines, while others had bipartisan support. It was good to see bills developed and passed that both parties supported. Nonpartisan voting used to be fairly common when legislators voted more independently rather than uniformly following the decisions of their party leaders. Many of the bills that did pass along party lines still reflected considerable input from the minority party, as the majority party clearly was looking to govern more as moderates than as progressives.
Many of the bills that passed following party lines likely reflected the minority party simply wanting to show opposition to the majority. Even if personally supporting legislation, it was a safe thing to do knowing that all of the majority were going to vote for passage. For example, legislation was passed setting up a system for legally buying cannabis (beginning Jan. 1, 2027.) Since July 1, 2021, it has been legal in Virginia to possess small quantities of cannabis, but not to buy it. For the past four years, legislation has been developed (but never passed) to deal with this inconsistency. Earlier legislation often had considerable bipartisan support to set up a legal method to control cannabis sales, but the past governor always vetoed these attempts. Now – with a governor likely to pass legislation, suddenly it became a bipartisan issue. In general, a higher percentage of Democrats than Republicans tend to favor cannabis legalization – but individual views vary widely within political parties. Perhaps a more important distinction is that a higher percentage of younger than older people support legalization. Providing a way to buy cannabis that is already legal to own clearly is not an extremely partisan issue – even if the final vote may reflect an interest in maintaining a party position. Much of the tax revenue generated from cannabis retail stores will be distributed for early childhood care and education – and it is difficult to imagine many not welcoming this use of the funds.
This November, we will be voting on three proposed constitutional amendments that largely follow partisan positions. Strong disagreements are expected on two of them 1) the right for a woman to make her own decisions about her pregnancy and 2) removing the ban in the Virginia constitution on same sex marriage (which is currently unenforceable because the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in 2015 that all states are required to license same-sex marriages.) It is good these divisive issues will not be filtered through party politicians – but instead be voted on directly by the people of Virginia. The third amendment would automatically restore voting rights to felons who have completed their sentence, a common practice in most of the other states.
