Politics & Government

Question 9 for Saline City Council Candidates: How Will You Govern?

This is the ninth and final question of Saline City Council candidates?

Is it your job, as a council member, to study issues and do what you think is right? Or is it to vote on issues the way you think the public wants you to vote?

Linda TerHaar

It is my responsibility to study and be as well informed about issues as possible; it is my obligation to vote in the way I believe is in the best interest of the entire community.

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Jim Peters

A city council member's job is to represent the citizens of the city, introduce and pass ordinances and oversee the day-to-day operations and the budget of the city.

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Jim Roth

It is the job of a council member to listen to the public, study the issues, assess to cost (present and future) and then make the decision that is best for the citizens of Saline.

John Heller

Fortunately, Ken Bruns' documentary on the Prohibition era was recently broadcast on PBS. I say fortunately because that subject is highly instructive when answering this question.

As Burns' film makes clear, the vast majority of the American people were in favor of Prohibition when the 18th Amendment to the Constitution was adopted.  However, as his film also demonstrates the results were disastrous. So much so, in fact, that only 14 years after the 18th Amendment was ratified, the 21st was approved, ending what had turned out to be a thoroughly misguided experiment.

The lesson of that episode is that the public can sometimes be wrong. Therefore, it is incumbent on an office-holder to study the issues and do what is right if it is clear to him or her that the public is going to embark on something as ill-conceived as Prohibition.

That's not to say that an office holder should lightly disregard what the public wants. If a large number of people believe in something, an office-holder should, by all means, give such opinion the weight that it deserves. Still, as Prohibition clearly shows, the public can sometimes be wrong, and an office-holder has a duty to try to save it from its mistakes.


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