Ballot Law Update: 2016 Mississippi initiative seeks veto referendum power
November 26, 2014
By Josh Altic
This edition of the Ballot Law Update explores the increasingly insistent calls for the powers of initiative and referendum for New Jersey. It also reports on an initiative in Mississippi that proposes the power of referendum.
Mississippi Veto Referendum Amendment, Initiative 44 (2016):
Although Mississippians have the power to indirectly initiate constitutional amendments, which means they can force legislators to consider proposed measures through signature petitions, with the measure going before voters if lawmakers fail to act, they do not have the power to repeal legislation through a veto referendum process. A man named Josh Hardy has proposed an initiative for the 2016 ballot that, upon approval, would provide the power of referendum so that voters could repeal a state law or local ordinance through a petition process.[1]
Fueled by the election, the clamor for I&R powers gets louder in New Jersey:
The many successful initiatives that were featured on November ballots motivated advocates of direct democracy in New Jersey, who have long called for the state legislature to give the citizens the power of initiative, to turn up the volume. Proponents of I&R claim that voters in New Jersey deserve the power to initiate measures on important policies and put them before voters. In order to give the people of New Jersey an appetite for I&R, supporters point to legalized marijuana in Colorado, Washington, Oregon, Alaska and Washington, D.C. and minimum wage increases in Alaska, Arkansas, Nebraska and South Dakota, which were all accomplished through initiatives. In an op-ed for The Times of Trenton titled "N.J. voters are left to envy states with initiative and referendum," George Amick wrote, "But, with I&R unavailable in New Jersey, the lawmaking process is a closed loop, with no way for ordinary citizens to break in. It’s a kind of Catch-22: The Legislature will retain the power to originate public policy, and exclude the people, until there’s a change in the constitution — but the constitution can’t be changed until the Legislature acts to change it." Although three bills were introduced in the state legislature in January of 2014, none were acted on or considered throughout the rest of the session.[2]
While supporters point to the important issues and popular policies put before voters by the initiative power, critics of liberal direct democracy powers point to California and Washington as examples of states where initiatives are prolific, claiming this power has introduced laws that are harmful to those states. In an op-ed partially written in response to Amick, Bill Schluter, a former Republican state senator, explained what he saw as the complicated pros and cons of initiatives. On the side of the cons, he expressed the fear that, through I&R, voters could be manipulated by well-funded political campaigns to directly enact policy changes. David Broder, a political columnist for the Washington Post, claimed that I&R “has given the United States something that seems unthinkable — not a government of laws but laws without government.”[3]
See also
Additional reading
- App.com, "EDITORIAL: Reforms needed to curb voter apathy," November 9, 2014
- Citizens in Charge, "More NJ Calls for Initiative & Referendum," November 10, 2014
Footnotes
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