Signs concealed-carry bill
Walker signs a bill allowing citizens to carry concealed weapons after going through training, passing a background check and obtaining a permit. The bill also bans guns from certain locations and allows private businesses to ban guns on their premises.
By signing concealed carry into law today we are making Wisconsin safer for all responsible, law abiding citizens.
Signs budget
Walker signs a two-year $66 billion budget that cuts almost $800 million from public schools, expands taxpayer support for private voucher schools, cuts taxes for businesses, and keeps property taxes the same, helping to eliminate a $3 billion deficit without raising taxes. It is estimated the state’s main account will have a $300 million surplus by June 2013. Walker uses his power to veto fifty items in the budget.
Our balanced budget makes tough choices while also providing a path to prosperity for our state and our people. Through honest budgeting, we are providing an alternative to the reckless tricks and gimmicks of the past. To move forward together, we are acknowledging that we have to make sacrifices to protect the next generation by decreasing the serious debt that they would otherwise inherit.
Assembly Minority Leader Barca criticizes Walker’s budget and vetoes as helping businesses but hurting the poor and middle class.
His vetoes don’t change the fact that his budget serves corporate special interests at the expense of Wisconsin’s small businesses and middle class. Time and again, Gov. Walker has gone out of his way to limit public scrutiny of his extreme agenda and it comes as no surprise that the governor used many of his vetoes to take away public accountability and further consolidate power in his administration.
Signs voter photo ID law
Walker signs a bill requiring voters to show a photo ID at the polls.
To me, something as important as a vote is important whether it’s one case, one hundred cases or one hundred thousand cases. Making sure we have legislation that protects the integrity for an open, fair and honest election in every single case is important.
Voids paid sick leave ordinance
Walker signs a bill voiding Milwaukee’s paid sick leave ordinance which was passed by a popular referendum. The ordinance required large businesses to provide nine days and small businesses five days of paid sick leave per year. The ordinance has been challenged in the courts and has never gone into effect.
This law removes another barrier in the road to creating 250,000 private sector jobs by 2015. Patchwork government mandates stifle job creation and economic opportunity. This law gives employers the flexibility they need to put people back to work and that makes Wisconsin a more attractive place to do business.
Lifts state of emergency
Syria’s government passes a law to lift the country’s state of emergency as protests against the rule of Assad continue. The state security court is abolished while a law allowing peaceful protests is approved. The repeal of the emergency law is a key demand of protesters.
[The people should] refrain from taking part in all marches, demonstrations or sit-ins under any banner whatsoever. [If demonstrations are held] the laws in force in Syria will be applied in the interest of the safety of the people and the stability of the country.
Signs bill
Walker signs a bill to take away most of the union’s collective bargaining rights. The State Assembly stripped the budget repair bill of its spending language so they were not required to have a quorum of members present since the Democratic senators still refuse to return to the Senate.
What we’re doing here, I think, is progressive. It’s innovative. It’s reform that leads the country, and we’re showing there’s a better way by sharing in that sacrifice with all of us in government.
Democrats and union leaders continue to oppose the Republican bill. Senate minority leader Miller:
Republicans may have achieved a short-term policy goal, but their radical agenda, the war on working families, has been exposed, and the people of Wisconsin and across the country are united against it as never before.
Massachusetts marries gay couples
More than 1,000 gay and lesbian couples stream into Boston and town halls across Massachusetts seeking licenses to marry after the state legalizes same-sex marriage. The woman who is first in line to apply for her marriage license camped out in front of Cambridge City Hall with her bride-to-be says:
To have the highest court in the state affirm your right to be a family was wonderful, and it just gave you courage.
Funding approved
After a hard political battle, President Bush signs an omnibus bill which includes $110 million in initial funding for NASA’s New Horizons mission to Pluto and the Kuiper Belt System. The funding allows the team to proceed with the final design of the probe.
It’s like the old days. We are going to the frontier. We’re going back to the roots of the space program.
California allows
California voters pass Proposition 215, making the Golden State the first in the union to allow for the medical use of marijuana.
Congress gives women the right to vote
Congress passes the Nineteenth Amendment, also known as the Susan B. Anthony Amendment, giving women the right to vote.
Ratified
The United States ratifies the 14th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. The amendment grants citizenship to “all persons born or naturalized in the United States” which includes former slaves who had just been freed after the Civil War. Known as the “Reconstruction Amendment,” it forbids any state to deny any person “life, liberty or property, without due process of law” or to “deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.”