Pat Quinn on Government Reform

Online voter registration and no party in primary voting

That's why Illinois should join 15 other states in making voter registration available online. We must move our election process into the 21st century. And while we're at it, let's pass a long overdue law to allow voters to participate in primary elections without having to publicly declare their party affiliation.

Enact power of petition to recall a corrupt governor

And we gave the people of Illinois the ability to use the power of petition to recall a corrupt governor. But we have more work to do.

In 1976, I led a petition drive to ban conflict of interest voting in the General Assembly. 635,158 voters signed this petition--the greatest number of signatures ever gathered on a single petition in Illinois history. Silence about conflict of interest voting wasn't our Illinois then, and it's not our Illinois now. We can do better.

Limits on campaign contributions and much more disclosure

We enacted a campaign finance reform law that I did sign, that is for the first time a chance to have limits on campaign contributions in the State of Illinois and much more disclosure and openness with respect to money and politics. I think that's a great achievement.

I think we do need in Illinois, what I would call, an ethics initiative that we would put into our constitution that would give voters at every level of government - whether it be the local level, or county level, or the state level - the power to petition and binding referendum to enact binding ethical standards and campaign finance rules that the people feel are appropriate for all of us who are elected representatives.