The Missouri Supreme Court refused Monday to hear a last-minute appeal filed by proponents of a measure to repeal the state income tax seeking to revise the summary voters will see on the Aug. 4 ballot.
Acting on a request filed Sunday, the court declined to review changes made by the Western District Court of Appeals to the summary for the proposal that will appear on the ballot as Amendment 5.
The decision leaves in place the revised ballot language included in an appeals court opinion delivered Friday. Tuesday is the deadline under state law for revising ballot language for the primary election.
The Supreme Court did not give a reason for not taking the case.
With the ballot summary now final, the campaigns for and against Amendment 5 move into the final push to convince voters.
The measure directing lawmakers to set revenue triggers for reducing and eventually eliminating the personal income tax is Gov. Mike Kehoe’s top priority for the year.
In a statement issued Monday morning, Kehoe said he remains confident voters will support Amendment 5.
“It is unfortunate that three unelected judges decided to mislead Missouri voters by rewriting the legislatively approved ballot language for Amendment 5,” Kehoe said. “Missouri is falling behind other states, and it is unproductive for judges and special interests’ lawsuits to undermine policies that would make our state more competitive.”
About the case
The case was brought on behalf of Missourians for Fair Taxation, a political action committee bankrolled by the Missouri Association of Realtors that is one of two organizing to defeat Amendment 5. If approved by voters, the amendment would allow lawmakers to ignore two constitutional provisions — one banning sales tax on real estate transactions and another permanently barring lawmakers from adding the sales tax to goods or services not already covered — added by Realtors through the initiative petition process.
In a statement Monday, Missourians for Fair Taxation said it is ready for the campaign to defeat Amendment 5.
“Voters will face higher taxes on everyday goods and services they use every day, from haircuts to car repairs to health care and home sales,” said Scott Charton, spokesman for the campaign. “Amendment 5’s ‘Everything Tax’ will cost Missourians from cradle to grave — from the services of the midwife to the services of the mortician.”
The Western District court rejected the lawsuit’s call to remove Amendment 5 from the ballot while agreeing to revise the summary. Missourians for Fair Taxation decided soon after the decision that it would not seek an appeal.
The ballot summary portion of the ruling was appealed by the attorney general’s office and Missouri Promise, the Republican-backed PAC backing the measure.
Joe Lamie, spokesman for Missouri Promise, declined to comment on the Monday decision.
Attorney General Catherine Hanaway’s office said in a statement that she was pleased the Western District decision kept Amendment 5 on the ballot. The court, however, didn’t show the proper respect for legal principles that give great weight to what lawmakers write when they put measures on the ballot, her office said.
“The Western District has decided to repeatedly ignore this deference as activists against the will of the people’s elected representatives,” the statement read. “We are disappointed in the Supreme Court’s decision to not correct this mistake, but are proud of the work of our team in yet another victory against liberal lawfare.”
In the state’s appeal, Louis Capozzi, state solicitor general, argued that the appeals court judges overstepped their authority, noting that the court has revised every ballot summary it has considered this election cycle.
The rule from ballot cases in the past is that a ballot summary should not be revised if it presents the key points in a neutral way, Capozzi wrote.
“The Western District’s recent pattern of rewriting summary statements breaks this rule, and it effectively relegates the General Assembly to functioning as a junior varsity author of ballot titles, while the Western District wields actual authority over this legislative function,” Capozzi wrote. “This is improper.”
About Amendment 5
Amendment 5 would direct lawmakers to set triggers for revenue growth to reduce the top income tax rate with the goal of eliminating it. It would also give the General Assembly five years to revise the state sales tax — either by expanding the number of items taxed or by increasing the rate — to generate revenue to replace the income tax.
During the five-year window, lawmakers would be exempt from constitutional requirements that tax increases go to a public vote and that revenue from taxes on motor vehicles and gasoline be dedicated to highway needs.
Amendment 5 would also require local governments to reduce taxes if they receive a windfall of revenue from a larger list of items subject to tax. And it would direct the state auditor to lower the sales tax rate for the Department of Conservation and for state parks and soil erosion control to prevent a windfall of new revenue for those programs.
In its ruling, the appeals court said the ballot summary needed to emphasize that a broader sales tax is the main mechanism that would allow the quick elimination of the personal income tax.
“It is not fair and sufficient to repeatedly suggest to voters that various tax obligations will be reduced and eliminated without informing them, at any point or in any manner, of the expansive authority that will be granted regarding sales and use taxes, given that the expansion of the sales and use tax base and the increase in the state sales and use tax rate are the contemplated means by which the other purposes of the Resolution can occur,” Judge Thomas Chapman wrote in Friday’s decision.
The ballot language will say:
“Shall the Missouri Constitution be amended to:
- Require legislative phase-out of the individual state income tax based on revenue growth, and authorize the expansion of sales and use taxes;
- Curtail constitutional limits on taxing goods and services; and
- Require local tax rate cuts without reducing school funding if local sales tax revenue increases?”
In the Missouri Promise request for the Supreme Court to review the decision, attorney Marc Ellinger wrote that the court had “chosen to insert itself into a campaign” by putting the new authority to expand the sales tax into the first bullet point and making the second point about the exemption from constitutional limits.
That makes the purpose of the measure appear to be increasing sales tax rather than overhauling taxes in general, Ellinger wrote.
“The measure,” Ellinger wrote, “is a single, integrated tax-restructuring program with one purpose.”
This story was first published by the Missouri Independent.