MISSOURI WATCH: TIME FOR A `TURNUP DAY' SESSION

"I am, therefore, calling this Congress back into session July 26, which out in Missouri we call 'Turnip Day.'" -- President Harry S. Truman in 1948

With these words, President Harry Truman announced his plans to call a special session of the Eightieth Congress to enact several much-neglected measures that had languished for some time in the federal legislature. A little known fact about the Missouri president's announcement is the distortion it contained: Turnip Day is actually observed on July 25, but back in 1948, that was a Sunday and thus was not a religiously correct day to open a special session of Congress. So HST changed the date to coincide with the day following Turnip Day.

The point is, whether the official day was July 25 or July 26, the special session served its purpose: highlighting the failure of a legislative body to enact important legislation that was of major importance to the nation's citizens and, for a change, was neither frivolous nor designed to meet only the needs of special interests.

There has not been another Turnip Day Session in the intervening 48 years, but when the Eighty-eighth General Assembly adjourned sine die on Friday, May 17, there were at least a handful of Missourians who believed 1996 was an appropriate time to convene a Turnip Day Session in the Show-Me State.

Since Americans have long grown accustomed to the acceptance of only a portion of an annual session's agenda, this year's General Assembly was no worse than numerous ones in the past. There were, after all, several important measures enacted in Jefferson City between the first of January and the middle of May. Being grateful for small favors is how citizens are able to cope with less-than-adequate legislative sessions, and while many feel more could be done, there is recognition that human institutions are subject to human limitations.

Unfortunately the 1996 General Assembly failed to resolve numerous issues that extended beyond business-as-usual agendas. There was no resolution of how to provide tax relief to Missourians in a time of swelling general revenue collections. While there was no shortage of ideas on how some $150 million in excess revenue could be returned in the most effective manner, there was no resolution of this problem. Unfortunately, there was only limited debate on the question, since lawmakers had already used up their allotted time by debating frivolous matters and politically infused issues that were designed to enhance political parties and their leaders. It is the price we pay for a democratic society, although we believe it only fair to warn lawmakers that the public's tolerance for highly partisan dogma is wearing a bit thin and is destined to become thinner.

While tax relief was ignored, far too many members were even more cavalier in the treatment of improved ethical standards for elected officials. Again the matter was not really discussed with real remedies in mind. Too many legislators treated the subject as if it were a hilarious joke or arrogantly deemed ethical rules were beneath their serious consideration.

Laws to rule in excessive campaign expenditures were also ignored this year, after a Keystone Kops performance a couple of years before when Missourians wound up with two separate and diverse campaign reform laws. The tactic then seemed to be that the more laws we have, the less likely reform will be. Now the consensus seems to be that change is impossible since past attempts have failed. This is not a rational approach and should not be accepted by Missourians who have a tradition of skepticism when it comes to partisan, patrician politics.

Pretending not to notice they even exist, except as income supplements for politicians, lobbyists were again made immune from any kind of reform aimed at halting outlandish special interest spending to curry favor with key members. Lawmakers who addressed the problem by boldly, and no doubt truthfully, proclaiming they could not be bought for the price of a meal, slipped past the much more odious practice of currying favor with paid vacation trips and other expensive gifts. Some lawmakers have become so adept at accepting gifts, such as free tickets to professional athletic contests, that they more closely resemble scalpers than statesmen.

There was little effort made to continue the state's highly successful program to fund state parks and soil conservation projects, so we are now witnessing an initiative referendum effort to place the issue on the ballot, something the General Assembly could do on its own. The citizen petitions should be an embarrassment to laconic, indifferent legislators.

The session also failed to get around to such other important measures as granting witness immunity in return for testimony in criminal prosecution cases and the long-neglected problem of dealing with excessive auto emission in urban areas, a subject that could cost millions of dollars in the future.

Except from a punitive standpoint, the session neglected badly needed programs for children, and while there was at last a remedy taken for inadequate child immunization, this came only after a long series of past neglectful sessions. It almost goes without saying that the state once again moved not one inch closer to meeting the unmet medical needs of some 600,000 Missourians who have no health insurance.

The tendency of incumbent governors who are seeking a second term is not to rock the boat or provoke any segment of the voting population. Such tendency will no doubt preclude a special session of the General Assembly in this, an election year. Gov. Mel Carnahan has on past occasions demonstrated leadership in areas that were less than popular but, most often, were also politically safe.

A special session of the General Assembly to address problems recently neglected would be almost as dramatic as HST's Turnip Day call for action. Such a move might be neither popular nor safe, but it would be the right thing to do. Turnips, anyone?

~Jack Stapleton of Kennett is the editor of the Missouri News and Editorial Service.