~Basil

Dear MSSA Friends,

Political dimensions of Regents v. Montana

I want to write about the Montana Board of Regents (BoR) and the Montana University System (MUS). Also in this mix is the Commissioner of Higher Education (Commissioner), and the Office of the Commissioner of Higher Education (OCHE).

More Montanans need to understand how all of these pieces fit together and operate.

Article X of the Montana Constitution establishes the BoR for the purpose of managing the affairs of the MUS. The BoR has seven members appointed to staggered seven-year terms by the Governor of Montana. Governor Gianforte appointed one sitting member and six current members were appointed by Governor Bullock while he was in office. Both the Governor and the Superintendent of Public Instruction are ex-officio, non-voting members of the BoR.

The OCHE is basically staff for the BoR. The Commissioner is selected by the BoR and runs the OCHE. There are a surprising number of staff positions in the OCHE. I'd guess between 50 and 100, but I don't have an exact number.

Under the BoR and the OCHE is the rest of the MUS, which includes all the public universities and colleges in Montana - all of public "higher education." This does not include private entities such as Carroll College in Helena. It does not include high schools and grade schools - only public higher education.

So the BoR sets the MUS policy and the OCHE implements the policies set by the BoR. So far, so good.

In Regents v. Montana, the questions is to what extent are the BoR and MUS subject to state laws and to the Montana Constitution. The BoR claims that if the Legislature is able to assert successfully that the BoR is subject to the established constraints on all government entities found in Article II of the Montana Constitution, then the Legislature has usurped the authority given the BoR in Article X of the Constitution.

In making this argument in an attempt to block campus carry in Montana, I believe the BoR is making both a legal error and a strategic political error. I have discussed the legal error elsewhere, including at:

https://missoulian.com/opinion/columnists/online-opinion-regents-v-montana-the-philosophical-argument/article_014407de-4d09-5ea3-b965-1a496f6920c4.html

What I wish to address here is the strategic political error I see the BoR making.

I don't believe the BoR will be able to sell their fight to the public as just some academic exercise that really doesn't matter other than trying to get a resolution to some pristine legal question. Sorry, that dog won't hunt. Montana gun owners will take this personally, and as an assault on the RKBA. They should. It is.

What this fight is about is raw political power. There is a long history in Montana of the BoR seeking to obtain and exercise all possible power free from any constraints whatsoever outside the academic industry. Actually, a similar tension and struggle occurs in many states between the academic establishment and other powers in the state such as the governor and legislature.

In choosing campus carry as the hill upon which the BoR wishes to make this stand, live or die, it is very likely that this particular hill in Montana will be the wrong hill for the BoR to have selected. The cost of this choice could be high.

Up until now, nobody outside the ivory tower halls of academia has paid much attention to the obscure BoR. It has existed quietly and with little resistance in its own little fiefdom. It has had little scrutiny. The general public just doesn't give the BoR much thought.

Suddenly, the BoR has ratcheted itself into the spotlight. Among Montana's gun owners, the BoR is on its way to claiming the troublesome title of "enemy." Frankly, I think the BoR has become so arrogant that it has bitten off more than it can chew.

The legal arguments the BoR has offered are dubious, at best. They are more like the petulant demands of a cranky three-year-old than legitimate legal arguments. Whether the BoR wins or loses the legal argument, the long-term cost of the exercise could well be extreme, for the BoR and for all the rest of the higher education establishment under its umbrella in Montana.

For example, it is certain that Montana gun owners will take a much more serious interest from now on about who the Governor may consider appointing to the BoR. The new members, selected under this raised scrutiny, are likely to set and implement a different type of policies for the MUS than a BoR made up of people not vetted through this new scrutiny. This will have a long term effect on the MUS.

Many legislators are very unhappy with the BoR for its opposition to HB 102, especially because that opposition is so disingenuous. The MUS asked the Legislature for a delayed effective date of June 1st for campus carry. The Legislature graciously accommodated that request with an amendment to HB 102. Now, the BoR claims it cannot implement HB 102 by the requested and delayed effective date. This effective dishonesty doesn't sit well with legislators. It is likely that this souring relationship with the Legislature will have significant consequences when the Legislature considers the MUS budget next legislative session. It will likely have an impact when the Senate next considers confirmation of Governor nominees for the BoR.

These are just some of the consequences that the BoR did not adequately weigh before making its significant decision to fight campus carry. However, such a shortsighted view may be typical of the political stripe of people Bullock would appoint to the BoR. The BoR may inspire a change in public perception from that of a respected if obscure entity, to that of a clutch of clueless snowflakes shouting curses from mommy's basement.

Whatever, the BoR's choice to try to block campus carry will create ripples and have consequences. It may not have been a wise decision by the BoR to pick this particular issue as the hill that it's willing to die to defend. This unfortunate decision, made in momentary petulance, may just spawn a generation of resentment and hostility to the academic establishment by the taxpayers of Montana.

Meanwhile, the fear of guns, hoplophobia, displayed by the BoR and its supporters only serves to demonstrate how very isolated the academic community has become from the rest of Montana. The people who express the attitude and will of academia in Montana have come to have more in common with, and possibly more social and professional association with, other academics in Illinois, Connecticut, and California than they do with the people of Montana.

The academics of Montana have so isolated themselves in their cozy and protected ivory towers that they have become culturally estranged from the rest of Montana. Yet, they truly believe that their occasional forays outside the halls of academia, maybe to buy groceries or visit Yellowstone, cause them to be culturally attuned to Montana.
In this belief they deceive themselves. Too many of these academics have never tilled the Earth, fought fires, repaired engines, branded calves, or done the myriad of other things that define Montana culturally.

Said differently, the denizens of academia really need to get out and experience Montana and genuine Montanans more. If they did, maybe they'd get over their uninformed and irrational fear of guns, their hoplophobia. And, then maybe they'd more wisely choose to not so overtly aggravate and alienate the rest of Montana.

Best wishes,

--
Gary Marbut, President
Montana Shooting Sports Association
http://www.mtssa.org
Author, Gun Laws of Montana
http://www.mtpublish.com