June-July 1998 Home   Newsletters

August 1998

September 1998

Paradise in Jeopardy? (Ruth Brantley)
President's Message (Grace Furukawa)
Voter Registration (Arlene Ellis)
Candidates in Focus
Candidate Forum (Arlene Ellis)
Testimony Before the Charter Commission
Con Con Committee (Jean Aoki)
Forum for Congressional Candidates
Membership
Voter Registrars
Violence Concurrence

Con Con Committee

The League Con Con Committee has mailed out letter; to various organizations and the neighborhood boards asking to speak at one of their membership or board meetings on our positions on the Con Con call an( the proposed constitutional amendment in regard to same sex marriage.

On the latter issue, we stress that we do not have a position on same-sex marriage as such, but base our opposition or at least two very serious problems with the proposed amendment.

  1. The right to decide what rights we as a people, or a segment of the citizenry should or should not have should not be delegated to the legislature. We, the citizens, have no veto power over legislation. The Bill of Rights article in the constitution was approved by the voters of Hawaii. We should keep the power to retain or amend these rights firmly in our hands.

  2. The Bill of Rights in both the federal and our state constitutions reserve certain rights for all of our people. We do not want it used to begin to limit certain rights to certain people, or to take away rights from any segment of the population. We feel that this would be a dangerous precedent. What right will be next? What segment of the population will be targeted next?

The rights reserved for citizens in our constitution distinguish our democracy from totalitarian states or even from so-called democratic nations which, while allowing citizens to elect their government leaders, give the citizens no constitutional civil rights.

We have produced a digest of our position paper on Con Con to be distributed at these speaking engagements and elsewhere. Other plans have not been finalized as yet.

Leaguers are encouraged to write letters to the editor and to talk to their friends and neighbors on these issues. If you have any questions or comments, please call the office at 531-7448 or 949-7457 in the evenings.

Jean Aoki
Chair Con Con Committee

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