ustxtxb_obs_1981_03_13_50_00016-00000_000.pdf

liLeriti lunch Austin’s only open-air dance floor is now open every day and night for live music and homestyle meals. Come enjoy our laid-back tropical garden atmosphere. Fine wines & beers 405 West Second Street 477-0461 -,r vJt can be won and realize that in the Texas legislature, we’re not gonna change the world, but we can make a little progress a step at a time in preventing some of the worst of the bad things that are proposed . . . . Wiretapping Speaking of those, what would you say are two or three of the most dangerous . . . Well, I’ve outlined some of those, being the attempt to limit the rights of consumers who are injured by defective products, changes in our election system to fortify those who are currently in, and a series of bills that I anticipate will be filed and have been filed concerning personal rights where we’re going to have the government interfering all the more. Another example’ of the latter is of course the Governor’s wiretapping bill, which I think would be a very dangerous precedent. I think we’ve had a good bit of wiretapping going on already, illegally, I don’t want to legalize it. I don’t think it will be effective in dealing with drug trafficking. Florida has had a wiretapping law for a good period of time. It obviously has not been effective in preventing drug traffic there. It would set a very bad precedent for government intrusion into the lives of Texans. How would you characterize it, nonlegalistically, as to what it would authorize? the Clements bill. Well, it basically would authorize the issuance of a permit for electronic surveillance, wiretapping or other forms of electronic surveillance, any time a law enforcement officer could get a judge to authorize that. And if you combine it with some of the other “War on Drugs” legislation, some of which is good, but one provision of which makes it now a crime to invest the profits from the drug traffic, you basically provide a mechanism where any lawyer, banker, realtor, person who is involved in investment of any kind, their office and all the calls that go through it can be the source of government intrusion. What’s the foundation of the permit, is it probable cause or something that could be readily understood by a nonlawyer? It’s there’s supposed to be probable cause, but it’s amazing, in many of these proceedings, and I understand this was true with reference to some of the surClayton’s recent case, that the officers who were signing those affidavits later admitted in court that they never listened to or read the transcripts of the first conversation. So sometimes the process becomes one where people start signing papers attesting to things that they don’t really have personal knowledge of, and judges get in the habit of approving them because there’s a law enforcement officer there saying this will help retard crime and there’s no one on the other side. What’s it like to have so many of the stalwart reformers gone? Have new ones come up, or is it lonelier? Well, I think there were some people who were replace,d in the last election who can’t be replaced. On the other hand, there were some positive changes in the spring election. I think that there are new personalities at play at the present time, and we’ve got to again try to on those issues that involve Democratic politics cut across some philosophical lines and try to unite some Democrats. We’ve been successful in doing that thus far this session on several issues, one being the state employee pay raise over the objections of the Governor, another being an endorsement for Hector Uribe for state senator from the Valley, and another being the proposal which I was very pleased to see adopted to limit the Governor’s use of the slush fund that he wanted as the Criminal Justice Fund. The compromise bill that we got through is far different from that the Governor originally proposed. It places limits on its use for electronic surveillance unless there’s specific approval, and it gives a three-member committee composed of the Governor, the Comptroller, and the Lieutenant Governor the final say on whether funds are expended, so that’s a really meaningful safeguard. Speaking of Democratic politics, one last question. Do you think there should be some conscious or semi-conscious attempt on the Democratic or Republican side, or both, to field a slate of statewide candidates, that is, to come up with leading candidates for every position? I really doubt that it’s feasible to put together a slate at this time. I would hope that the slate of people who win in the Democratic primary would be a slate of candidates that could produce some victories for us, but I think there’re gonna be a number of those races that are contested. I think that we’re going to need tremendous amounts of money to prevail in the statewide races in the fall, so I hope there will be some [in the primaries] that are uncontested as well and that we can save our resources for the fall election. Is there any kind of informal consultation going on at upper levels of the progressive Democrats about 1982 strategy? Oh, there’s a good bit of talk about it and rumor at this point, but I don’t think there’s any kind of formal negotiating going on. I was gonna add that as far as state legislative races are concerned, in contrast to the statewide races, that I would anticipate that for myself, for a number of other people as was the case for Senalobby will be financing a Republican to run in the Democratic primary and a Republican to run in the fall so that there’ll be two shots against all of us who choose to exercise some independence up here, that there’ll be an effort to keep us tied down working on our own races spring and fall to force us to spend as much money and time as possible and divert our attention away from the statewide races. I anticipate that to happen in my case, I think it will happen to a number of 16 MARCH 13, 1981