The United States shall guarantee to every state in this union a republican form of government …
— U.S. Constitution
DENVER — Progressives have long lamented the fact that the Framers designed a Constitution replete with impediments to federal government activism — fetters such as federalism itself, enumerated powers, three branches of government, two rivalrous wings of the legislative branch, supermajorities, judicial review, presidential vetoes. Colorado progressives, however, have decided the Constitution has a redeeming feature — the infrequently invoked Guarantee Clause (see above).
Their argument, which some conservatives here embrace, is that when Colorado voters passed an initiative circumscribing their Legislature’s ability to increase taxes, they violated this clause. The plaintiffs in their lawsuit — state legislators, local government and education officials — want a judge to resolve “the contest between direct democracy and representative democracy.”
In saying that the former attenuates the latter, progressives are not entirely mistaken. They may, however, be mistaken in thinking this is a justiciable issue.