Florida Voting Rights Restoration for Felons Amendment (2016)
| Florida Voting Rights Restoration for Felons Amendment | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Election date November 8, 2016 | |
| Topic Suffrage | |
| Status Not on the ballot | |
| Type | Origin |
The Florida Voting Rights Restoration for Felons Amendment was not on the ballot in Florida as a legislatively referred constitutional amendment on November 8, 2016.
The measure would have allowed people convicted of felonies or adjudicated to be mentally incompetent to vote or hold office under the following conditions:[1]
- Upon the restoration of a convicted felon's civil rights in cases of homicide or sexual assault;
- Upon the competition of a convicted felon's sentence in other cases;
- Upon the removal of an adjudicated disabled person's disability.
Text of measure
Constitutional changes
- See also: Article VI, Florida Constitution
The proposed amendment would have amended Section 4 of Article VI of the Florida Constitution. The following struck-through text would have been deleted and the underlined text would have been added by the measure's approval:[1]
(a) No person convicted of a felony, or adjudicated in this or any other state to be mentally incompetent, shall be qualified to vote or hold office until restoration of civil rights or removal of disability, except:
- (1) If convicted of a felony involving a sexual offense or a felony involving a homicide, upon restoration of the person’s civil rights;
- (2) If convicted of any felony not specified in paragraph (1), upon the person’s completion of sentence; or
- (3) If adjudicated mentally incompetent, upon
until restoration of civil rightsor removal of disability.
(b) No person may appear on the ballot for re-election to any of the following offices:
(1) Florida representative,
(2) Florida senator,
(3) Florida Lieutenant governor,
(4) any office of the Florida cabinet,
(5) U.S. Representative from Florida, or
(6) U.S. Senator from Florida
if, by the end of the current term of office, the person will have served (or, but for resignation, would have served) in that office for eight consecutive years.[2]
Path to the ballot
- See also: Amending the Florida Constitution
According to the Florida Constitution, a 60 percent supermajority vote is required in one legislative session of the Florida Legislature in order to qualify an amendment for the ballot. The measure was referred to the Committee on Ethics and Elections, where it died on May 1, 2015.[3]
Related measures
See also
External links
Footnotes
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 Florida Senate, "Bill Text," accessed November 18, 2015
- ↑ Note: This text is quoted verbatim from the original source.
- ↑ Open States, "SJR 208," accessed November 18, 2015
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State of Florida Tallahassee (capital) |
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