Most Louisianans instinctively would want to help widows (or widowers) of disabled veterans, and most would want to keep agents of the communist Chinese or Putin-friendly Russian oligarchs away from water and power systems.
Two questions on the ballot on Tuesday ask if those instincts should be enshrined in the state constitution. On principle, Louisiana’s constitution already is bloated, with far too many small-detail amendments already — so maybe the answer is no.
Upon further review, though, the best answer on both is yes.
For widowed spouses, what’s at issue is commonsensical fairness. With regard to foreign adversaries, well, forewarned is forearmed.
Take the latter issue first. Amendment 8 would prohibit private companies affiliated with nations that federal law officially deems a “foreign adversary” — a short list most notably including China and Russia — from expropriating private property.
In Louisiana, certain sorts of private companies such as utilities, pipelines and railroads enjoy “delegated” power to expropriate land, for “just compensation,” for (supposedly) public use. The amendment would prohibit any such companies that are “agents” (as defined by law) of one of those foreign adversaries from using that expropriation power.
Amendment opponents say it is unnecessary — that it would be constitutional detritus, aimed at imaginary problems. Sure enough, no such expropriation by adversaries has ever occurred in Louisiana, and supporters of the amendment have been unable to point to a single other state which (in the words of the Pelican Institute think tank) “bars adversary-linked private condemnation in its constitution or statutes.”
Nonetheless, we all know instances where significant harm could have been avoided via preventative measures. And corporate agents of foreign adversaries in several prominent places across the country have bought land near military bases, while other adversarial agents have provided components for U.S. energy grids that, critics say, could leave the grids vulnerable to hostile action.
Meanwhile, with public officials throughout Louisiana signing non-disclosure agreements regarding major industrial investors, it’s easy to imagine that the state could stumble unintentionally into leaving energy or water supplies susceptible to mischief.
Finally, there are those of us who think expropriation powers in general are too broad, so almost any new restriction on expropriation, even piecemeal, is welcome.
Other than having extra verbiage in the state constitution, there’s no downside to this amendment, but (on the upside) it could help protect against the catastrophe of foreign sabotage against our power, water, or other necessities.
That’s why Amendment 8 is warranted: Better safe than sorry.
Then there’s Amendment 1, which slightly modifies a special property tax homestead exemption for surviving spouses of disabled veterans. Currently, the special exemption stays with the spouse only when remaining in the same home after the veteran’s death. The amendment would allow a one-time transfer of that exemption, at no greater value than the original exemption, to a new abode.
This one is tricky.
Plenty of “good government” reformers believe taxes should be low but broad-based, with few or no exemptions. In general, this is wise. The more often a government creates special exemptions to taxes, the more often other people will seek their own special exemptions for “good causes” galore. In addition to complicating the tax code and necessitating higher rates for everyone else who isn’t in a special category, this approach also gives elected officials the power to pick winners and losers – or, sometimes, to reward allies or punish adversaries.
Nonetheless, against these good arguments against Amendment 1, basic reasonableness and fair play argue in its favor.
Consider that this amendment wouldn’t expand the numbers of people getting special exemptions, but would merely extend existing exemptions to new circumstances. The people of Louisiana already have adjudged that veterans with service-related disabilities, and their surviving spouses, merit extra property-tax exemptions.
Yet when the veteran dies, the survivor’s needs for living space may be reduced, while the costs of maintaining the same-sized home may be unsustainable. Everybody knows that senior citizens, even without disabilities, often “downsize” their living quarters when a spouse dies. This amendment would just ensure that it won’t be cost-prohibitive — via suddenly higher property taxes — for the spouse of a disabled veteran to do so by buying a different, smaller home.
The size of the exemption, and thus of the “loss” to potential proceeds for the government’s treasury, would remain no greater. The rest of the population would suffer no adverse consequences. But the surviving spouse could move into a different home better suited to the spouse’s new circumstances.
In sum, Amendment 1 is one small but admirable way Louisiana can fulfill the motto of the national Department of Veterans Affairs, taken from Abraham Lincoln: “to care for him who shall have borne the battle and for his widow, and his orphan.”
