Politics or policy? How to deal with the influx of illegal immigrants is a top campaign issue this year.

• Author: Frates, Chris

When Colorado and Georgia tackled illegal immigration reform earlier this year, lawmakers defused what could have been an explosive issue in a tough election season. As November draws closer, politicians campaigning in both states are trumpeting their legislation as the toughest in the nation.

The Georgia law's Republican author said 80 percent of the residents were demanding a state solution. But Peach State Democrats countered that the legislation was more about politics than policy. And in Colorado, a state supreme court decision sparked a political firestorm that threatened radically to alter the state's political landscape a few short months before one of the most important elections in decades.

Immigration bills focusing on everything from employment, trafficking, public benefits, education, identification, voting rights, trafficking and law enforcement passed in 27 states in 2006, but Georgia and Colorado enacted the most comprehensive legislation. In Georgia, the governor's office and both houses of the legislature are controlled by Republicans, so the omnibus bill that passed there had smoother sailing. In Colorado, where Democrats hold the power in the legislature and the governor is Republican, politics was at the forefront.

THE COLORADO CASE

It started in mid-June, when the Colorado Supreme Court struck down a proposed constitutional amendment to ban state services to illegal immigrants that would have been on the November ballot. Supporters of the citizens' initiative were livid with the ruling and charged that the court's Democratic-appointed majority ran out the clock by taking three months to rule. Proponents had no legal remedy other than to ask the court to reverse its ruling--an unlikely outcome.

Enter Governor Bill Owens.

A day after the ruling, Owens lambasted the court's "arrogant" decision, which he said ignored years of legal precedent. The court, he said, had denied voters "a say in one of the most important public-policy debates of our time."

If the court did not reverse its decision, Owens threatened to call a special session to put the measure on the ballot. But with the legislature in Democratic hands, the governor was largely picking a political fight.

The announcement came during summer election season with both sides embroiled in an all-out war for control of state government. Republicans are battling to regain control of a state legislature wrested from their grip two years ago for the first time in four decades. And Democrats are eyeing the governor's mansion after an eight-year hiatus.

Republicans hoped to put the ban on the ballot in part to drive the Republican base to the polls. Not surprisingly, Democrats wanted to keep what they called a wedge issue off the ballot.

Owens' special session threat gave the early upper hand to Republicans, political observers said, because it forced Democrats to strike a precarious balance between getting tough on immigration without alienating their liberal base.

"They're going to have to oppose what Owens is going to do, but they can't come out in favor of illegal immigration. He's put them in a tough spot," said Bob Loevy, a Colorado College political science professor, in June.

Perhaps with that in mind, Democratic leaders went to work. Two days after calling a special session unnecessary, they announced they were considering taking the unprecedented step of calling lawmakers back to Denver--on their own terms.

If Owens were to make the call, he would dictate the agenda. For example, he could have narrowly tailored the call to force lawmakers to debate putting a measure on the ballot. Hoping to avoid getting put in a box, Democrats later decided to attempt to call lawmakers back themselves.

They asked their colleagues to come back to consider strengthening enforcement of current laws, including employer verification of employment-eligibility status. But the idea was a long shot because Democrats needed two-thirds of the lawmakers to sign on. And with Owens and other Republicans...