MISSOURI WATCH: SO MUCH FOR AN INFORMED ELECTORATE

If those of us who inhabit the mid-portion of the northern half of the American hemisphere would begin to pay as much attention to government as we do to partisan politics, and if we began worrying more about our responsibilities as citizens and less about our rights, we might have a country in which seldom is heard...you know how the old song goes.

As I hope for the impossible, I do so only because I recently attended a meeting of presumably typical Missourians, virtually all of whom would be called successful today, given the current measuring standards. In other words, it was a gathering of white-collar professionals, with enough money in the bank to buy a variety of foreign-manufactured luxury cars and wear silk suits designed by European tailors. There wasn't a U.S.-made pair of shoes in the house, except mine.

I had been invited to the meeting to help the group understand the workings of state government, and while I was at first puzzled as to why this group should want to know more about how things work in Jefferson City, the questions asked by those in attendance caused me to wonder if they knew anything at all. It wasn't that they lacked opinions on how state government works. They had these wholesale. The problem was that their facts weren't factual and their opinions were based on about as much misinformation as is written on the first political science mid-term by a college freshman.

For starters, I asked the group if anyone could name the three branches of state government, a basic question that is probably first taught, and then repeatedly so, in the fourth grade. Well, yes, the audience knew that there was a governor and there was a legislature and there were judges. Not bad, but hardly A-student performance. Most didn't know there was more to the executive branch than a governor, an office unrealistically assigned far more power by the attendees than is actually the case. When I used the correct term for the state's legislative bodies---General Assembly---several said they "preferred" to call this branch of government by its "correct" name. But, wait, the ignorance gets worse.

Not a single member of the audience was able to describe Missouri's non-partisan court system or provide any details, even the areas where it was in effect. Since these were perfectly honest men and women, each admitted he or she had never read more than a couple of paragraphs of the state Constitution. I noted that they had a lot of interesting reading to catch up on, since our state has the second longest such document in the country. It also is one of the more arcane and outdated around, but I decided against pumping these good citizens with too much information within a short period of time. It's not surprising that no one knew the state voted every 20 years on whether to convene a new constitutional convention, but when I suggested that such a step was long overdue, several quickly objected that the "current" 1945 version was adequate, some even suggesting that it was superior. These views, mind you, came from a group that had never read more than a couple of paragraphs of the state charter.

I admit I was tempted to note that the constitution that is now more than 50 years old, and which was actually written 53 years ago, was undoubtedly the most expensive state charter in existence. Missourians have paid more than $2.5 billion of their hard-earned tax dollars to overcome the school-segregationist views contained in the 1945 version. Nothing superior about that.

If I seem to be too harsh, I'm sorry. I am really not trying to trash persons who were gracious enough to invite me into their midst, and I am attempting to show my appreciation for their invitation by not identifying their group or members. But their lack of information was shocking, as were their staunchly held opinions, most of which were based on misinformation or, truthfully, no actual information at all.

When I expressed shock at their general lack of factual data, I followed up with a question on whether they read the a daily or weekly newspaper. Distressing as their misinformation had been, even more upsetting was the general view that their hometown press, including local radio and television, was simply not a reliable source of information. It was almost a case of the old joke, 'Don't bother me with the facts.'

The group at hand wasn't timid about expressing their individual rights. "We have a right to better representation" and "We want better public officials" were just a couple of the entitlements tossed around. When I suggested that citizens who demand rights should also be aware of their responsibilities, it was as if I was suggesting they were poor citizens. I was!

~Jack Stapleton of Kennett is the editor of the Missouri News and Editorial Service.