Amending NC’s constitution is a serious matter

North Carolina voters will face an unusually long ballot this November — one loaded with constitutional amendments. At least three are already confirmed: a cap lowering the state income tax ceiling from 7% to 3.5%, a requirement that the General Assembly limit local property tax levy increases, and an extension of the photo voter ID requirement to mail-in ballots. More may follow before the session ends, potentially including a Right to Work amendment and a Right to Farm amendment. Depending on how things go in the General Assembly, voters could be weighing in on half a dozen constitutional changes in a single election.

Supporters of limited government — and I count myself among them — have good reason to cheer the goals behind several of these proposals. North Carolina’s sustained tax-cutting over the past decade has been a genuine success story. Cementing those gains against future reversal is a legitimate policy objective. Property tax increases have placed real burdens on homeowners, particularly seniors on fixed incomes. And requiring the constitution itself to cover photo ID for mail-in ballots, which already applies to in-person voting, is a reasonable matter of consistency. These are not bad ideas.

But there is a separate question that deserves more attention than it is getting: Is the state constitution the right tool for achieving them?

Constitutions are not ordinary legislation. They are foundational documents, harder to change by design, meant to enshrine enduring principles rather than the policy preferences of any particular legislative majority. When we constitutionalize something — anything — we are telling future generations that this matter is so fundamental it should be taken off the table of ordinary democratic deliberation. That is a significant act. It should not be undertaken lightly, or primarily for electoral reasons.

Some of the proposals before voters this fall carry genuine constitutional weight. The income tax cap, for instance, reflects a substantive theory about the proper limits of government taxation — a philosophy with deep roots in the Lockean tradition of protecting individual property from government overreach. There is a principled case that structural fiscal constraints belong in a constitution, not just in statute, precisely because they are meant to bind future legislatures.

Other proposals are harder to defend on those terms. North Carolina’s right-to-work law has been on the books since 1947. The right to farm has been in statute since 1979. There is no credible threat to either — the sponsors of those amendments admitted as much in committee hearings. Constitutionalizing existing laws that face no imminent repeal is not principled constitutional design; it is entrenchment for its own sake, aimed at making it harder for a future legislature to govern. That should concern conservatives who believe in constitutional integrity as much as it concerns anyone else.

The property tax amendment raises a harder question. House Bill 1089 does not set a specific cap in the constitution itself; instead, it would require the General Assembly to enact laws limiting how much local property tax levies may increase, leaving the details to future legislation. Authorizing the legislature to enact enabling legislation is not, by itself, a constitutional defect — that structure appears throughout our federal and state constitutions, and it is often the right approach.

Consider the voter ID amendment on this same ballot: it uses the same enabling-legislation structure, but there the implementing framework already exists in statute. North Carolina has had a voter ID requirement since 2018, covering acceptable forms of ID, exceptions, and administrative procedures. Voters know broadly what they are approving. With the property tax amendment, no such framework has been drafted. Voters will be asked to constitutionalize a mandate without being able to evaluate what that mandate will actually look like in practice — including its consequences for local governments that depend on property tax revenue to fund schools and public safety. That is a reason for caution, not necessarily opposition.

None of this means voters should reflexively oppose these measures. But it does mean they should think carefully about what constitutional amendments are for. The North Carolina Constitution already contains important structural protections for individual liberty and limited government. Those protections derive their force from their rarity and their principled grounding. A constitution that becomes a vehicle for routine policy entrenchment loses something important. It loses the gravity that makes constitutional commitments meaningful.

Voters in November should evaluate each proposed amendment on its own terms, asking not just whether they agree with the policy but whether it belongs in a constitution. Some of these amendments will pass that test. Others may not. Either way, the question is worth asking because the strength of our constitution depends on how carefully we treat it.

“Amending NC’s constitution is a serious matter” was originally published on www.carolinajournal.com.