Dana Hess writes for South Dakota Searchlight, an online news organization.

The end of the legislative session is usually a time for congratulations, much of it well-deserved.

The 2024 Legislature balanced a $7.3 billion budget. That budget included 4% raises for state employees, education and health care providers; more than $220 million for new prisons; the creation of a statewide public defender office; and a freeze on tuition at the state’s universities. Sure, some bills made it through that were more partisanship than practicality, but overall it was a job well done.

What’s lost in the end-of-the-session look back at the bills that were passed is any scrutiny of the bills that didn’t make it, often relegated to the mythical wastelands of the 41st day (a motion legislators use to defeat bills during a session that has, in this year’s case, only 38 days). Keeping South Dakota safe from bad laws is an important role for legislators.

The struggle to keep children safe from porn

U.S. Supreme Court Justice Potter Stewart once said of hard-core pornography: I know it when I see it. Lawmakers know that they want to protect children from porn. They just haven’t yet seen the way to do that.

After sailing through the House, a bill to protect children from being able to access pornography on the internet bogged down in the Senate. Originally the bill called on porn sites to offer an age verification system. If they didn’t, that would allow parents to sue if their teen made it on to that site, which is kind of like pulling the plug on the computer after Junior already got to see “Debbie Does Dallas.”

Getting the seamier portions of the internet to bow to the will of the South Dakota Legislature seems like a tall order, but it has worked in other states. Pornhub blocks internet addresses in Virginia, Utah and Mississippi. That site, however, is just the tip of a creepy, mostly lawless iceberg.

After the bill’s defeat, some lawmakers are hoping to tackle the subject again in a summer study. Here’s hoping they can make that happen, if only for the delight it will bring to the state’s headline writers: Lawmakers take the summer to study porn.

Exceptionalism fails a second time

A bill that would create a civic engagement center at Black Hills State University failed to pass muster, again. A similar bill in 2023, seeking to create a Center for Exceptionalism at BHSU, failed twice, each time by just one vote.

“Exceptionalism” is a buzzword for teaching history and civics with an emphasis on this country’s superiority. For its practitioners, it’s not enough for students to emerge from class smarter, they must also have a new-found love of country.

Just enough lawmakers saw the 2024 bill for what it was, a watered-down version that tried to hide its exceptionalism roots. This year’s version failed, too, by just one vote. Now that’s exceptional.

Lawmakers help keep 2024 ballot smaller

There are as many as nine constitutional amendments, initiated measures and referendums circulating for the 2024 ballot and two that have already made it onto the ballot. Lawmakers did their best to make sure that the ballot doesn’t get even longer, defeating eight joint resolutions to put additional amendments on the ballot and one measure that called for a statewide vote.

The one constitutional amendment that lawmakers agreed to put on the ballot, a work requirement for people enrolled in Medicaid, is likely a wasted effort. The federal government, which pays for 90% of the program, doesn’t currently allow work requirements.

Some bills seek to really, really, really protect gun rights

One of the constitutional amendments that didn’t make it onto the ballot called for boosting the right of citizens to bear arms. It went beyond the usual Second Amendment protections to outlaw taxes on arms and ammunition purchases while it also curtailed the ability of law enforcement to confiscate firearms used in the commission of a crime until after a conviction.

Usually any legislation that has to do with firearms ricochets through the Capitol without much fuss. After all, we live in the land of constitutional carry and a state government that picks up the tab for federal background checks.

In this case, however, the Senate Judiciary Committee agreed unanimously that citizens’ rights to bear arms could be protected without endorsing an amendment that would play hell with both the state’s tax system and the judiciary system.

Even for our gun-loving Legislature, sometimes the Second Amendment is just enough.