To the editor:

In the United States, and specifically Kansas, constitutions are delineated into three branches of government: executive, legislative and judicial. Each branch is assigned some specific powers. The only branch assigned the power to impose taxes is the legislative. This is so because the legislative branch must stand for election on a periodic basis and, thus, must account to the electorate for their conduct.

If the recent Kansas Supreme Court decision ordering the Legislature to increase funding for education is allowed to stand, then the power to tax will have passed from the legislative branch to the judicial branch. Judges, for all intents and purposes, do not face the electorate on a periodic basis and, thus, cannot be held responsible by the electorate for their actions. This “power grab” by the Supreme Court, regardless of how you may feel about educational funding, means that the court can at any time impose a “tax” and be completely immune to the consequences.

This is one form of judicial tyranny and leads to a very dangerous and slippery slope where the judiciary becomes supreme over the other branches, and our constitutional system of checks and balances ends. Someone needs to have the courage to challenge the constitutionality of this action by the court or we will all eventually rue the day.

Brent Garner,

Lawrence