Illinois voters still need recall power

Another election, and the voters have spoken. But what if those they've elected don't listen?

What if the promises made during the campaign aren't kept? What if vows of honesty and integrity made by candidates are cynically violated by shady dealings once they're officeholders? What if they wind up having to answer to numerous counts of malfeasance in a federal corruption indictment, while never having answered to you?

Sound familiar? This, of course, has happened all too often in Illinois.

But voters shouldn't have to wait for federal prosecutors to end the careers of criminals in public office by locking them up. Or have to wait four years to the next election to kick the clearly incompetent out of office.

In 18 states, voters can undo mistakes at the ballot box. They have the power to throw bad public officials out of office, during their terms, through a recall provision.

Earlier this year, the Illinois House approved giving this same opportunity to the people of Illinois, by voting for an amendment to the state constitution that would allow for recall of elected officials. But the state Senate rejected this reform measure. It refused to even give the public a chance to vote on a recall measure this November.

It gets to be so pathetic, this lack of will to change things for the better.

Illinois' entrenched reputation as one of the most corrupt states demands that everything be done to encourage and enforce accountability in public office, and that includes a recall measure. Trust that a candidate will not get in the long line of corrupt officials once elected has been violated time and time again. Recall is not only a tool to remove the worst of our elected officials from office before the next election. The threat of recall just might keep elected officials on their best behavior.

We do have reservations about applying recall to judges. There are times they make unpopular but legally sound rulings that could find them unfairly targeted in a recall campaign. Judges need protection from such retaliation.

Still, the reasons for recall in Illinois are far more numerous and powerful than any argument against it.

Cook County voters certainly agree. In an Election Day ballot proposition, 60 percent favored a recall amendment.

But this was an advisory referendum. It doesn't change a thing.

A constitutional convention, which was rejected by voters on Election Day, is not the way to recall.

It has to come from Springfield, from elected leaders who, with no reason to fear recall, will keep pushing for enactment of this needed reform. Those reformists need to knock down the obstacles put up by those who seem to relish in preserving a long history of corruption and incompetence in Illinois.