Amid the flurry of proposals and counter-proposals, threats of more lawsuits and general malaise over the Iowa Supreme Court ruling striking down Gov. Tom Vilsack’s use of the line-item veto to eliminate some provisions from the legislation authorizing the Grow Iowa Values Fund, no one’s talking much about the most pertinent issue: getting the state’s premier economic development fund up and running again.

No one’s talking much about the Iowa Constitution, either. Its single-subject provision would seem to make moot discussion about points of contention between the governor and Republican leadership that range from changes in banking fee regulations, workers’ compensation laws and unemployment taxes to caps on punitive damages in medical malpractice lawsuits.

Article III, Section 29 of the state Constitution says: “Every act shall embrace but one subject, and matters properly connected therewith; which subject shall be expressed in the title. But if any subject shall be embraced in an act which shall not be expressed in the title, such act shall be void only as to so much thereof as shall not be expressed in the title.” The provision is clear and concise and leaves no room for doubt as to its intent.

However, the Supreme Court declined to take up the constitutional argument raised by a handful of Democratic lawmakers and the Iowa Trial Lawyers Association. That’s unfortunate. It leaves unchallenged the flimsy argument that all the issues under consideration are economic development issues and therefore germane to Values Fund legislation and not in violation of the Constitution. That’s a little like arguing that the awkward sentence construction in the Second Amendment to the U.S. Constitution – “A well regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed” – makes gun ownership an American birthright, despite more than a century of interpretation by the courts to the contrary.

Just as the myth of the Second Amendment has been perpetuated, so too has the myth that political logrolling is the art of compromise. It’s hardly that. Rather, it’s a way for the majority party of pressure the minority party.

We’ve made this point before: Legislators should reauthorize the Values Fund. Period. Save the debate on the other issues until after the November general election, when voters will decide how much they want to change the complexion of the Iowa Legislature.