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THOMAS SPENCER
News staff writer

    Advocates for a new state constitution have pushed their issue to center stage in coming elections, but they urged supporters Tuesday to make sure candidates are committed to the cause, rather than just paying lip service.

   Five hundred constitutional reform advocates met in Birmingham to discuss the promise and the peril of their campaign to rewrite Alabama’s 100-year-old constitution during next year’s elections.

   Movement supporters claimed progress on several fronts. All the major candidates in next year’s governor’s race have endorsed a new constitution, except for Republican Tim James, who opposes a comprehensive rewrite.

   The umbrella group pushing for a new state constitution, Alabama Citizens for Constitutional Reform, has signed up 1,000 members, drawing in students, business, education and political leaders.

   But several speakers Tuesday warned that the growing popularity of the issue also poses a risk. Candidates will be tempted to tout constitutional reform as a panacea for the state’s complex problems. Reform supporters must be ready to ask them tough questions, they said.

Special interests:

   Gov. Don Siegelman, who has made it clear that constitutional reform will be the centerpiece of his campaign, kicked off Tuesday’s proceedings with a speech that traced the state’s current money problems to the constitution, which he said empowers special interests, “hinders progress, prevents change and punishes children.

   “The state’s constitution ties education funding to the most unreliable, most unstable of state tax sources and then forces cuts when revenues don’t meet budget expectations,” Siegelman said.

   “When there is a revenue shortfall, it is the children who get hurt first. We balance the budgets on the backs of our children and their schools,” he said. Siegelman referred repeatedly to unspecified “special interests” that he said put in place a dysfunctional government through the constitution.

   “They wanted leaders to fail. They wanted to hold us down, to hold us hostage, and to hold us back. They wanted to centralize power, and they did,” Siegelman said. “The special interests wanted to rule the day and to rule this state. And not much has changed in the last 100 years. Since then, the special interests have ruled the day.”

   Later in the program, Energen CEO Mike Warren warned against politicians who rail against “special interests” and the nebulous “they.”

   Warren, chairman of the Business Council of Alabama, said he was a “big mule,” a special interest and a utility the favorite whipping boys of Alabama politicians.

   Trying to simplify complex problems, Warren said, “politicians serve our people pabulum and platitudes.”

   Warren said the Business Council will be active in efforts to reform the constitution.

   “Look at all the Alabama politicians trying to get in front of your parade,” Warren said.

   Howard Hawk, a Marshall County district judge and former budget committee chairman in the state House of Representatives, said he’d watched generations of Alabama politicians run on symbolism and hot-button issues. George Wallace used race, he said, and Fob James ran on religion.

   All the while, the fundamental problems of the state, embedded in the constitution, were ignored, Hawk said.

   “We’ve elected political leaders who have been devoid of political honesty and political courage,” he said.

   He warned reform supporters to press the candidates on their commitment to constitutional reform.

   Alabama needs a new constitution because the current document, filled with restrictions, keeps government from adapting, Hawk said.

   “It is going to get worse,” Hawk said. “Change is coming quicker and quicker every year.”

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