The Pledge has been a fixture of New Hampshire politics for more than 30 years. It is a politician’s promise to reject a sales or income tax -- or any new broad based tax of any kind. But on Tuesday, residents in 89 towns will vote on whether they want office seekers to STOP taking the pledge. New Hampshire Public Radio’s Jon Greenberg has more.
In 1972 Governor Meldrim Thompson introduce the pledge and it’s been part of the state’s identity ever since. More important, since then, only one person – Jeanne Shaheen and only in her third term - has made a successful run for governor without taking the pledge. But Paul Henle, Executive Director of the Granite State Fair Tax Coalition, has a theory.
CUT HENLE We think that political climate has changed to one where NH voters are willing to consider a change to how we raise revenue. :09
The Fair Tax coalition has a town by town strategy to test that theory. Residents in 89 communities agreed to put a resolution on the ballot. That resolution calls on all state elected officials to quote “reject the pledge and have an open discussion that considers all options,” unquote.
The resolution is mute on what those options might be. It mentions just one tax – the property tax which it calls unfair and unjust. Henle says in the past 7 years, more and more households have been squeezed by the taxes they pay on their homes.
CUT HENLE We’re on a path now that we haven’t been on before where the property tax is rising more steeply than income. And to us, that’s a crisis.” :10
CUT BIUNDO “The way they’re portraying this is a ruse.” :02
That’s Mike Biundo, chair of a group that wants to protect the pledge. It’s called the New Hampshire Advantage Coalition and its members object to the open ended nature of the resolution. They insist that without the pledge, the only possible outcome is the imposition of a new tax. Biundo says the resolution is based on a false premise.
CUT BIUNDO You’re not going to lower property taxes by adding a new tax. The way you lower property taxes is to lower spending. :07
Biundo agrees that the property tax is a heavy burden, but he thinks supporters of the No Pledge resolution completely miss what’s unfair about the current system.
CUT BIUNDO Our way of doing government in the state of New Hampshire has served us well and I think it’s fair. What I think is unfair is the out of control spending that is happening in Concord and the out of control spending that is happening in the communities. That’s what I think is unfair. :12
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Biundo’s group has paid for phone banks that target about ten towns. In reference to the resolution, they ask residents if they favor an income tax. Backers of the resolution have cried “foul”; they say that distorts their intention and that supporters of the pledge are the ones who, at the end of the day, perpetuate higher property taxes.
In many ways, this is the traditional back and forth in New Hampshire. But that doesn’t mean there’s nothing to be learned here. The Fair Tax Coalition says in effect, it is using the town meeting process to take the pulse of the public. Democratic State Senator Maggie Hassan, who has taken the pledge twice, will be watching the outcome. But Hassan thinks some towns will be more worth watching than others.
CUT HASSAN Larger towns the tend to vote Republican or moderate and that have tended to vote for anti income or sales tax candidates. And if those towns began to show a different position, I think that might affect some people.”
But if traditional Republican towns like Salem or Goffstown went for the resolution, would that affect Hassan? Maybe. First of all, those towns aren’t in her district. And even they were, she says she would look at the number of people who actually voted and use other means to find out what her constituents think about tax policy.
That said, she says her colleagues will pay attention the results.
For NHPR News, I’m Jon Greenberg
This is a non-binding resolution. But it is the first step in the demonization of the Pledge and those who take it, under the premise that they are preventing the legislature from considering more 'fair' ways of taxation.
You cannot legislate away the 'free speech' of candidates. Candidates will continue to take the pledge as offered by CNHT as seen here: (and hopefully at our annual picnic on July 5t, 2008)
http://www.cnht.org/images/pledge.jpg
Even Governor Lynch signed our Pledge.
Taking the Pledge simply means that fiscally responsible legislators promise to reject any broad-based new tax such as a sales or income tax. Along with the goal of getting candidates to reject the Pledge, the articles may even be amended to specifically state the consideration of an income or sales tax.
Instead of asking for yet another tax, and that is just what this is, why aren't these 'fairness' crusaders of the deceptively named "Granite State Fair Tax Coalition" instructing people on how to go to their town meetings and vote NO on excessive spending? Why are they instead bent on DEFEATING SB2 - secret ballot voting? Makes no sense.
Accusing Pledge-takers of keeping taxes high, is an unproven foregone conclusion and an insult.
Studies such as the Yankee Institute of Connecticut's "Fifteen Years of Folly" proved that the added burden of a state income and sales tax made NO significant impact on the lowering of property taxes.
Link: http://www.yankeeinstitute.org/files/pdf/fifteen.pdf
Can GSFTC shows us even ONE document that proves otherwise? No.
Finally, GSFTC is NOT a bona-fide 'grassroots' group but a well-funded branch of a larger cabal of groups influenced by national and international outside interests, who are themselves tax-exempt. Because of who they are, they DO NOT belong in town meetings looking to pave the way for more taxation at the state level, even if this were an appropriate place to lobby for such taxes.
CNHT is a true user-driven NH-only taxpayer advocacy group that gets no outside funding or influence. It's truly grassroots and funded by small donors in the state of NH.
You can explore GSFTC's list of supporting groups here:
http://www.nhfairtax.org/aboutus/organizations.php
The last link on that page should be updated to: http://www.uuactionnetworknh.org/
Kick these outsiders out and vote NO on their silly warrant articles if they suggest the rejection of the Pledge. The Pledge is our NH Advantage.
Current Reality: costs are rising. For towns and schools, just as for individual households. Bought any gasoline or heating oil lately? No reasonable budget cuts can make up for these increased costs.
Another reality: the assessed "market value" of a home is not in any respect a fair way to determine a fair burden of taxation. We have people with 7 figure incomes who are paying less in taxes than people who make minimum wage, or have been laid off.
Many of those who are in favor of "The Pledge" are those who have been benefitting by taking advantage of infrastructure paid for in large part by those who are less well off than themselves. In other words, in NH under the current system, here's the "Advantage": the rich benefit at the expense of the poor.
This is not only morally reprehensible, it is a system strained to the breaking point. It is not a sustainable state of affairs. It is not healthy for our towns, it is not healthy for our school children, it is not reasonable for the tens of thousands of us who are paying over 10% of our income in property taxes.
Which is why you see the list of organizations concerned with social justice on the supporters page. And I have news for you: social justice is something that is desired by many, many Granite Staters. You don't have to be an "outsider" to want a fair taxation system and a sustainable budget plan. We are NH citizens, we are all around you, and we are working for the common benefit and greater good of all our citizens, not just the wealthy. Please join us.
Gov. Meldrim Thomson was not the first New Hampshire politician to take the pledge -- which was a promise to veto any broad-based income or sales tax. The veto pledge would have required supporters of any broad-based tax to attract the nearly impossible legislative majority of two-thirds in support of any such tax in order to override a gubernatorial veto.
The pledge has been an element of New Hampshire politics for more than half a century. When he was governor from 1948-1952, Sherman Adams commissioned a study from the Brookings Institution that concluded the state's revenue problems could be solved with a new tax, one that would be fairer than the congeries of taxes and fees and liquor sales that existed at the time.
Hugh Gregg succeeded Adams in 1952 and was first to take the pledge. William Loeb, just getting started as publisher of the Manchester Union Leader, whooped up the anti-tax rhetoric. Loeb promoted the Sweepstakes, which became the state lottery, in the 1960s. In contrast to the present crop of Republicans, these GOP leaders would have been perfectly happy with gambling. Loeb called them "sin taxes." The Union Leader editorially supported the state's politically influential liquor
monopoly, which not incidentally ran double-truck ads in the U-L. A
groundbreaking Monitor series in 1972 or so detailed widespread corruption among politicians, liquor brokers and the State Liquor Commission.
The pledge survived through successive Republican governors, even guys like Wes Powell, who was alternatively allied with or feuding with Loeb. Manchester Democrat John King took the pledge and was in office four terms.
Walter Peterson was elected in 1968 with the pledge. In those years Peterson was a mainstream Republican conservative, who sought to balance the budget, even if it meant taxes had to be increased. In 1970 Peterson danced around the pledge, promising to "go to the mat" against broad-based taxes, a circumlocution the Union Leader found a way to put on Page One nearly every day.
During Peterson's administration a collection of regressive state business taxes, including the stock-in-trade tax and the inventory tax, were replaced by the Business Profits Tax. The BPT was designed to be accompanied by an income tax, which Peterson campaigned for during the 1972 legislative session.
Mel Thomson, his every utterance repeated and magnified by the Union-Leader's front page,defeated Peterson in the 1972 GOP primary with Day-Glo smiley face stickers that virtually hollered, "Ax the Tax." Up until this point, the pledge was a New Hampshire political weapon. Thomson elevated New Hampshire's antipathy toward taxes to national prominence.
At this same period, Sanders Associates and other defense-related tech outfits began moving into southern NH. Revenues from the BPT, plus the new engine of accelerating growth, saved the state economy from recession, and Thomson benefited.
By 1978 Thomson's political eccentricities had worn out their welcome. Democrat Hugh Gallen was elected, with the pledge. There was a bit of recession in 1980, and Gallen did not believe the state's economy could survive a downturn, so he declined to take the pledge in 1982, and pledge-taking Sununu won.
Judd Gregg, Stephen Merrill, Jeanne Shaheen, Craig Benson and John Lynch all pledged.
I think you can say that Thomson/Loeb dragged the pledge onto the national stage and were influential in shaping the message of Ronald Reagan, who turned distaste for taxes into a political religion.
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John Milne
I should not be amazed that you will not print anything counter to these snake oil salesmen at GSFTC despite how many times you are advised. I was thinking NHPR was a fair media outlet, but no more..
Why not expose them for who they really are?d Outsiders, with an outside agenda, with big money from outside interests.