The headliner might have been a big fight over how California's judicial branch should be funded.  Currently, the Judicial Council - led by the state's Chief Justice - decides how to distribute money to the various state courts.  But under a bill that passed by the narrowest of margins and split both parties, the courts would be funded by a basic formula set by the legislature.

Meanwhile, Democrats used their majority to push through legislation that would allow school districts to deny charter school applications if the districts would face a "negative fiscal impact."  And two notable measures fell short: one that would ask voters to change California's "Three Strikes" law to require the third strike be violent … and another that would create a four-tiered sex offender registration system instead of the current "one size fits all" approach.