Commentary: A State That Works, A Government That Doesn’t

By John Krull
TheStatehouseFile.com 

INDIANAPOLIS – Our leaders like to proclaim Indiana “a state that works.”

They festooned websites, social media, roadside billboards, advertisements and mass mailings with that message. They wanted to use the campaign to attract new business and investment to the state.

There’s some truth to the advertising.

Indiana’s people do work, perhaps even harder than they have in years past. The state is close to achieving what economists call full employment, meaning that most unemployment can be attributed to relocations, changes in family status or other factors that aren’t tied to the availability of work.

That said, many Hoosiers now find themselves laboring for more hours or at more jobs simply to maintain their standards of living. Labor and employment statistics show that bottom of the middle-class is under tremendous pressure – and is, in fact, in danger of sliding into poverty.

So, Indiana’s citizens are working.

That’s why it’s such a pity that the state’s government isn’t working.

The fact that Gov. Eric Holcomb finds it necessary to call the Indiana General Assembly back for a special session for no other reason than that the state’s lawmakers cannot read either calendars or clocks is but the latest example of our government’s dysfunction.

Hoosiers – understandably – are upset, even enraged, that the state’s lawmakers will come back to Indianapolis in May at a cost of $30,000 per day to do work legislators could have completed in March if they possessed the time management skills of the average third-grader. That the issues prompting the governor – upgraded school security and regulation of driverless cars – to reconvene the assembly at such expense weren’t exactly legislative heavy lifting adds insult to injury.

But the problem goes deeper than having legislative leaders sleep through math class and personal responsibility training.

At least one of the roles of a legislative body in a civilized, self-governing society involves resolving differences. The founders saw legislatures as mechanisms through which enlightened interests could be balanced and, thus, tensions alleviate.

Our legislature doesn’t do that.

Instead, our lawmakers often exacerbate differences and elevate disputes or quarrels into full-fledged battles.

We have seen as much with the way the legislature has pitted Hoosier against Hoosier in all-out conflicts over a right-to-work law, a proposed constitutional amendment banning same-sex unions and a misnamed religious freedom restoration act.

Instead of figuring out ways for Hoosiers with different views to live and work together, our lawmakers too often have opted to pit us against each other.

The why of that is not hard to determine.

It involves another thorny issue, one our legislators have done their best to avoid confronting.

Gerrymandering.

Somewhere between 55 and 60 percent of the state’s voters generally cast their ballots for Republican candidates for the state legislature. Because Republicans have gerrymandered legislative districts so surgically, though, that translates into a House of Representatives that is more than 70 percent GOP and a Senate that has 80 percent Republicans.

(Please do not think I’m blaming Republicans alone for this. Democrats would do the same thing if they could. This is why politicians should not be entrusted with certain tasks, such as doing basic math and practicing clock management.)

The result of this disproportionate representation is that we have lawmakers who feel they aren’t accountable in any way to citizens. They feel like they only need to listen to or talk with people who already agree with them, which is why they so often become captives of special interests.

The legislature could have dealt with this problem this past session by passing redistricting reform.

Or the session before that.

Or the session before that.

But doing so would have involved work. It would have meant listening to competing ideas, balancing varied interests and seeking out common ground.

You know, the kind of stuff lawmakers are supposed to do.

We don’t do that here in Indiana.

You see, we’re a state where the government doesn’t work.

And, because of that, the people do work, harder than they should have to.

John Krull is director of Franklin College’s Pulliam School of Journalism, host of “No Limits” WFYI 90.1 Indianapolis and publisher of TheStatehouseFile.com, a news website powered by Franklin College journalism students.