By MONICA DAVEY - Published: June 15, 2009

SPRINGFIELD, Ill. - If anything good was going to come out of the arrest and removal of Gov. Rod R. Blagojevich, it was supposed to be in the stack of legislation now awaiting the signature of the new governor.

A reform commission was appointed by the governor, Patrick J. Quinn, soon after Mr. Blagojevich's impeachment from office in January. State lawmakers drew up their own Joint Committee on Government Reform. And citizen-led reform groups optimistically sprouted up across the state.

Read more: For Some in Illinois, Talk of Reform Was Just That

June 6, 2009

Taxpayer victories are rare these days, so let's cheer the good news in Illinois, where earlier this week the state House in Springfield voted 74-42 against a plan to raise the income tax rate on individuals and businesses by 50%.

When Governor Pat Quinn succeeded Rod Blagojevich in January, he immediately proposed raising the personal income tax to 4.5% from 3%, the business tax rate to 7.2% from 4.8%, and expanding the sales tax to services ranging from dry cleaners to Internet hookup. The Democrat says the income tax hike is "based on a principle as old as the Bible. Taxes should be based on the ability to pay." But voters can distinguish between rendering unto God and unto Quinn, and public dismay was so widespread that even 26 Democrats voted to kill this tax grab.

Read more: Springfield Tax Revolt

Citizens, congratulations. Your relentless pressure on Democrats in the Illinois legislature has kept them from greasing a big tax increase without doing the difficult work that needs to come first. This is a moment of great opportunity: Keep demanding reform in ethics and spending from those Democrats -- and from Republicans who need to stay resolute and united.

Solidarity from Senate Minority Leader Christine Radogno and House Minority Leader Tom Cross also has helped block the tax-hike plans of Democrats -- lawmakers who don't want to wear the jacket for their years of overspending. Many Democrats had hoped that if they voiced enough threats about alleged (and often exaggerated) horrors that would descend on Illinois without fat tax increases, they could persuade their members, and some Republicans, too, to raise revenues by the gazillions.

Hasn't worked. The Republicans correctly have insisted on tough spending and ethics reforms before they even consider big tax increases. And enough Illinois Democrats have seen the Cook County Board's current agony to understand that voters won't pay more money to overextended and inefficient governments without complaint.

Thirty-one Senate Democrats, plus 42 in the House, must be asking why they went on record over the weekend as favoring major income-tax increases. Those rival proposals were so doomed that neither chamber even bothered to vote on the other's bill.

With the legislative session now in overtime, Republicans have more muscle: If Democrats want to fully fund the state budget, they'll need some GOP assistance. Democrats from Gov. Pat Quinn -- he of "cut, cut, cut" fame -- on down are correct that Illinois doesn't have enough money to meet all of its obligations. The Democrats will be tempted to score political points by slashing needed social services as a substitute for structural reforms. They'll be playing the rest of us for chumps if they don't make serious fixes to how this state operates:

• House Speaker Michael Madigan and Senate President John Cullerton need to embrace, rather than keep dodging, the many excellent suggestions from think tanks and others on how to restructure the state bureaucracy and streamline much of what Springfield does: pensions, Medicaid, education and other costly endeavors. Employees unions and clouted interest groups oppose these best-practices solutions. But Illinois can't keep spending more than recession-battered taxpayers and employers can afford.
• Pass more, and tougher, ethics legislation from the Illinois Reform Commission. Citizens have seen how Madigan, Cullerton & Co. have hidden from reforms that would diminish their power. Enough of that obstructionism. Illinois is broken -- and you, Democratic leaders, are failing us all.

Legislators eventually will face voters. The question then will be whether this session ended with dramatic spending and ethics reforms -- or if it ended in a fusillade of job-killing tax increases and little else.

THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Posted May 27, 2009 @ 02:24 PM

They have introduced a resolution calling for him to quit the job he was given by ousted former Gov. Rod Blagojevich.

House Republicans tried to get immediate action on the resolution Wednesday, but the Democratic majority wouldn't agree to put it on a fast-track.

Read more: Illinois House Republicans want embattled U.S. Sen. Roland Burris to resign

Remember last year when Democrats in the Illinois Senate robbed you of a chance to add a recall amendment to the state constitution? On Tuesday, 61 Democrats in the House did the same thing. Republicans tried to discharge a recall amendment from the Rules Committee, where Speaker Michael Madigan has buried it. They wanted to bring it to the House floor so every member could vote on the amendment, which would permit the recall of state executive officers and legislators. The vote to keep the amendment buried: 61-47. Here are the 61:

Read more: 61 Dems block recall