BUCKLEY'S SUMMER OF ERRORS

The secretary of state's sins of omission are becoming increasingly
notorious: Twice in recent weeks, Vikki Buckley's office has failed to
certify signatures for statewide initiatives, putting them on the Nov.
3 ballot by default.

Such incompetence is a scandal, to be sure, but at least it doesn't
obstruct the petition process itself -- which in Colorado is a basic
constitutional right. Far worse would be official incompetence that
penalized the citizen petitioners themselves.

Now come backers of a medical marijuana initiative to claim that
Buckley's office has succumbed to this more dangerous variety of
incompetence, too. Specifically, they argue that her office, using a
sample of 4,482 signatures, undercounted the number of valid
signatures on their petitions and that a proper sample count would
have required her to go on to check every single signature, according
to her own procedures.

A hearing on the medical marijuana claim will occur Friday in Denver
District Court. Unfortunately, at this late date it would be unfair
for a judge to require a full signature count, even if the court
concluded that petitioners are correct and that Buckley's office
miscounted the sample. A comprehensive count, after all, would take
precious time away from the campaign; and this is one issue on which
voters really do need to hear both sides' arguments.

Of course, the alternative to a full count is only slightly more
palatable: put yet another initiative on the ballot that technically
may not qualify. But as we suggested above, if government is going to
bungle in reviewing petition signatures, those mistakes shouldn't
penalize petitioners who conscientiously uphold their part of the bargain.

Perhaps we sound as if we're expecting Buckley's office to be
overruled Friday. If so, it's only because of recent, sobering
experience. Not only has the secretary of state put two initiatives on
the ballot by default, but earlier this summer she threw Senate
President Tom Norton off the GOP primary ballot in the governor's race
on the basis that he hadn't submitted enough valid signatures, too. As
it happened, he had submitted more than enough -- and the secretary
herself was forced to admit this at a hearing after Norton appealed.

Perhaps the most troubling aspect of Norton's treatment was the manner
in which his campaign was apparently kept in the dark regarding what
had been done wrong. Norton said at the time, for example, that he was
"baffled" by a lack of information from Buckley's office as to why he
was tossed off the primary ballot, pointing out that it was difficult
to dispute a problem "if we don't know what she thinks is wrong."
Meanwhile, his campaign manager, J.J. Ament, complained that Buckley
had failed to return his repeated phone calls seeking information
about the petitions.

Although Norton prevailed, the incident set the tone for what has
become a summer of errors by the secretary of state's office. Let's
hope that office hasn't made yet another one.

Checked-by: Patrick Henry