GOP blocks criminal checks for legislators

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http://blog.cleveland.com/openers/2007/12/gop_blocks_criminal_checks_for.html

Columbus -- On a day when state senators approved requiring background checks for dozens of licensed occupations, one powerful group of Ohioans managed to escape the same scrutiny.

State lawmakers themselves.

Partisan tempers flared on the Senate floor Tuesday as majority Republicans threw a rare procedural block on a Democrat poised to offer an amendment requiring that state lawmakers be subject to criminal background checks. The amendment would have required county elections boards to conduct checks on current state lawmakers as well as future candidates for legislative office.

"If we are holding them to this standard, then we as legislators should be held to the same standard," said Sen. John Boccieri, a Mahoning County Democrat who is running for Congress. In the legislation, which passed 30-2, background checks are imposed on nearly four dozen licensed occupations ranging from massage therapists to social workers to podiatrists. The bill now returns to the House for further consideration.

Rather than tabling the Boccieri amendment as is usually done when Republicans reject Democratic ideas, Sen. Jeff Jacobson, a Dayton-area lawmaker who is the second-highest-ranking Senate Republican, objected to the amendment before Boccieri was done offering it.

More, and the comments are good, too.