It seems Oklahoma's legal system is easily influenced by out-of-state groups. When an Oklahoma Supreme Court judge's wife and a few other powerful animal rights advocates in Oklahoma wanted cockfighting made illegal, out-of-state (Humane Society) petitioners were allowed to gather signatures. Then, the Oklahoma Supreme Court allowed the signatures.
The laws controlling the petition process haven't changed. However, the state district attorney's office recently arrested three people, two from out of state, for illegally gathering signatures on an initiative petition. They've been charged with defrauding the citizens of the state. This was the same thing that cockfighters appealed to Oklahoma's Supreme Court: that the Humane Society brought people into the state who illegally gathered signatures.
The referee the Supreme Court appointed to verify the signatures (Gregory Albert) found this to be true. He rejected the petition in his recommendation to the court, but was overturned by the state Supreme Court based largely on the same Supreme Court judges' insistence. It was the first time in Oklahoma history that the Oklahoma Supreme Court went against the findings of its own referee.
The court ignored the laws of the petition process and allowed a very illegal campaign and illegally written bill to proceed to the polls.
In one case the Oklahoma Supreme Court and the Attorney General stated it was legal for the out-of-state people (Humane Society) to gather signatures and influence Oklahoma laws; in the other they arrested the people (with TABOR) doing the same thing.
It's sad the leadership in the Oklahoma legal system chooses when to enforce a law by weighing how much will be taken out of their pocket, who will make the biggest donation to their re-election or what a wife demands.
B.L. Cozad Jr., Indiahoma
Letter to the Editor, originally printed in the Lawton Constitution
Emphasis added
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