NC Constitution. Article 5. The General Assembly shall have no power to authorize any county, city or town, special district, or other unit of local government to contract debts secured by a pledge of its faith and credit unless approved by a majority of the qualified voters of the unit who vote thereon…

Vs.

Amendment One: House Bill 1293. Sponsor David Miner. An Act to Amend the North Carolina Constitution to Permit Cities and Counties to Incur Obligations to Finance the Public Portion of Certain Economic Development Projects. SECTION 1. Article V of the North Carolina Constitution is amended by adding a new section to read: “…these instruments of indebtedness may be issued without approval by referendum.”

At his recent speech introducing the mission of the new North Carolina Institute for Constitutional Law, former Supreme Court Justice Bob Orr was trying to describe the constitutional crises in North Carolina in a way that the members of his audience at the Locke Foundation could understand. He tried the old story of how the mice, who were being terrorized by the cat, decided to put a bell around the cat’s neck so they could hear the cat coming before he pounced on them and ate them. “It was a great idea,” said Orr, “but, after the mice had reached their agreement, they looked around at each other and asked: But, who will bell the cat?”

In Orr’s metaphor, North Carolina government, under the political control of legal, financial and real estate elites, is represented by the cat. The citizens are represented by the mice, who are routinely devoured for the benefit and pleasure of the elites.

To give concrete meaning to his story, Justice Orr mentioned the upcoming amendment to the constitution on the ballot in November where the governmental elites (the cat) are trying to get the citizens (mice) to give away their constitutional rights, so the cat can eat more of them. It’s like putting the bell around the cat’s neck, but in reverse. The cat is saying to the mice, “This amendment is an opportunity for me to get my hands around your neck so I can eat you better.”

I enjoyed Justice Orr’s story immensely, but at the end was a little troubled by a loose end. “What do you call a cat (government),” I asked Orr, “that has no accountability to the citizens and is free from worrying about the consent of the mice in using the power of government to reward political insiders?”

The political crises in North Carolina is not limited to the stealthy cat’s ability to put an amendment on the ballot without the mice knowing about it, and trying to hide the amendment from public debate. The amendment is buried in the text of House Bill 1293, and the text of the amendment is not readily available for public discussion. The constitutional crises concerns the ability of the mice to make the cat adhere to the rule of law in a democratic republic.

This assault on citizen’s rights has been a growing cancer in North Carolina politics, ever since the Democratic Party lost it’s monopoly and has been forced to seek extra-legal means to keep control. An example of this “extra-legal” activity is the new scam of issuing state debt via a process called “Certificates of Participation.” (COPs). Governor Easley, in 2001, created an entirely new bureaucracy to issue the bonds, beyond the limits of the Constitution. Since the Certificates were issued by the extra-legal agency, the bonds did not require a vote of the citizens. In 2004, the COPs were used to fund the $500 million in debt to build Senator Basnight’s research centers at his favorite universities. There is no stopping the elites now, or as our forefathers would say, no check against the power of the elites, to put the citizens in debt for any political activity the elite cats choose.

Another example of the “extra-legal” activities is the use of non-profits to implement politically corrupt activities. In 1992, Senator Frank Ballance, decided that forming a non-profit organization would be a good idea. Over the next 12 years, he funneled over $2 million tax dollars to his organization, with no oversight or accountability. Today, in North Carolina, the elites use this same technique with over 6,000 politicized non-profits to “pass-through” over $750 million tax dollars each year to extra-legal partisan political organizations. In the case of Ballance, he used the tax dollars to fund his political campaigns.

In 1996, N. C. Supreme Court Justice Willis Whitchard decided that the North Carolina Constitution contained a definition of the public purpose that allowed agents of government to give away unlimited tax dollars to private corporations in secret meetings, and to take away, through eminent domain, the private property of ordinary citizens in broad daylight. There is no such definition in the Constitution, but in the exclusive hands, or paws, of the cat, the government agents can engage in this extra-legal practice, and therein lies the constitutional crises of making the cats adhere to the rule of law. If the cats control the constitution, there is no rule of law, there is only the rule of the political jungle.

The cat’s new gambit on the ballot this November, called “Amendment One,” would provide constitutional cover for current unconstitutional acts of the elite lawyers, bankers and commercial real estate developers who have managed to get a hold of the reins of power in Raleigh. Common citizens, not plugged into this network, do not have a fair chance to achieve prosperity in this state. The elites, over the past 25 years, have created an economic and financial disaster for the common citizens by their centralization of power over the economy and their manipulation of the law and constitution.

Justice Orr declined to answer my question of what you call this new cat of government in North Carolina. To me, the new form of government has the appearance of a system where tax dollars are used to enhance the profits of private corporations, and the costs of private development are shifted to the citizens. Since 1998, over $100 million of taxes has been shifted away from the politically selected corporate industrial recruitment targets on to the backs of citizens, with another $750 million in accrued corporate tax benefits to be taken in the future. So, we could call the new form of government in North Carolina a “state corporate welfare system.”

But, the constitutional problems in North Carolina associated with the rule of law are deeper than just corporate welfare. I think the correct description of what is happening in North Carolina is in the example of Italy. By 1934, Mussolini had settled on 22 favored corporations, each dealing with a politically favored industrial sector. Mussolini hoped to control the direction of the economy and to direct production, just like the elite cats in North Carolina are trying to do today by secretly picking and choosing which of their industrial recruitment favorites will get the tax benefits, or picking a favored industrial sector, like biotech, to receive over $1 billion in tax subsidies.

Of course, in Mussolini’s economy, citizens had to give up their rights to obtain the more and better jobs promised by their corporate fascist leaders, just like citizens in North Carolina are being asked to give up their rights in exchange for the promise of more and better jobs delivered by our kindly and benevolent elites. The name of the political group of elite cats pushing Amendment One is called, “North Carolinians For Jobs and Progress.” To compensate for their loss of freedom, workers in Italy were assured of such benefits as free Sundays, annual holidays with pay, social security, sports and theatre facilities and cheap tours and holidays. And, according to some accounts, Mussolini made the trains run on time. But, the cost of giving away their freedom was horrible, and the mice in Italy were devoured by an all-powerful cat, named Il Duce.

As the historical example of Italy shows, what ever else you would name this new cat of a government that is emerging in North Carolina, “representative democracy” would not be one of them.

Voting in favor of Amendment One in November will only tighten the grip the cat has around the necks of the citizens, making it much easier for the cat to devour the mice, but in a constitutionally-sensitive way. And, no matter what happens on Amendment One, the mice in North Carolina still need to confront the awful truth over what North Carolina government is becoming, and to look around at each other and ask: “But, who will bell the cat?”