On May 31st, Gov. Kevin Stitt vetoed two bills that would have extended tax compacts with tribal governments. He did the right thing, not just to protect state taxpayers from a possible revenue grab by the tribes’ tax collectors, but also to defend some basic principles of American government.

Elementary school civics teaches that we have three branches of government: legislative, executive, and judicial. Each branch has its own role. This separation of powers makes it possible to have checks and balances that protect liberty and promote good government.

Negotiating agreements with other governments is a core executive power. This is as basic, and common sense, as it gets. Presidents negotiate trade deals and treaties. They require the consent of the Senate after the fact, but the negotiation and initial agreement is done by the executive. Governors have the same kind of power.

A legislature is a big committee—or, in the case of Congress and all state legislatures except Nebraska’s—two big committees. The inability of committees to effectively operate government, including things like negotiating agreements, is why the United States has a president and why states have governors.

Stitt was defending his rightful power when he vetoed the compact bills, and he was upholding the Oklahoma Constitution. The people of Oklahoma deserve a government that can act efficiently in negotiating deals—like tribal tax compacts—and that means keeping that power where it belongs.

Finally, these compacts are a bad deal for Oklahoma taxpayers. Tribal tax collectors want to rush them through without negotiations while also trying to get a court to expand the sales and licenses covered by the compacts. In other words, they want to redirect millions of dollars of current revenue away from the state of Oklahoma and into the hands of tribal tax collectors.

Some people will remember the famous photograph of President Harry Truman with this sign on his desk: “The buck stops here.” It was a statement about executive power—and the responsibility that comes with it. While a committee might negotiate a bad deal and hope that no individual member is held responsible, that is harder for a single elected executive.

Oklahoma taxpayers can thank both Stitt and the Framers of American government for a system where executives have the power to negotiate deals—and to veto bills that try to interfere with that power.