An argument for voting against all ballot initiatives

Ballot propositions are designed to bypass the legislative process, to allow citizens to make law directly. Democracies tend to end in tyranny, so the founders of our republic favored separation of powers rather than democracy. Making positive law is supposed to be difficult, not something to be done whimsically. Ballot propositions undermine the separation of powers and lead to bad law.

Laws passed by the legislature may be readily amended, but laws passed by initiative can only be amended by initiative. Arizona permits three kinds of citizen initiative, an amendment to the constitution, a statute, and a referendum. Rules here. The rules for getting a proposition on the ballot do not require any geographical distribution. The sponsor of a 2020 ballot statute, for example, can gather all 237,645 required signatures in downtown Phoenix. There are companies that collect signatures. They charge about $10 per signature. (Search for ‘paid petitioners’ or ‘Arizona Petition Partners.’) Two million dollars sounds like a lot of money, but it is evidently no serious bar to out-of-state interests who wish to make Arizona law. Here is a good account of the difficulty of amending the statutes passed by initiative. Special interests are almost always the sponsors of ballot initiatives. Who would be willing to spend $2 million to repeal one?

Ballot initiatives are often paid for by out-of-state interests

Proposition 208, the “Invest in Education Act,” reports contributions to date of $4.6 million, of which $4 million has come from a Portland, Oregon-based charity called “Stand for Children.” (Campaign finance report here.) The second biggest donor is the Arizona Education Association, our teacher’s union. If you read about Stand for Children (here) you will learn that they are a 501(c)(3) charity that does political advocacy, specifically in favor of such causes as Black Lives Matter and barring police from schools. IRS Forms 990 no longer require the disclosure of donors, so we must guess the source of their funding. One possible source is us taxpayers. Stand for Children is apparently a major beneficiary of the CARES Act. Story here.

Proposition 207, the “Smart and Safe Act,” is mostly funded by commercial sellers of marijuana. (Campaign finance report here.)

Ballot initiatives are intentionally misleading

The petition gatherers are required to state their proposition in 100 words or less, so there is always a battle over whether the petition signers and the voters are being misled. Here is the proposition that has become 208 on our November ballot:

THE LAW WOULD IMPOSE A 3.5% TAX SURCHARGE ON TAXABLE ANNUAL INCOME OVER $250,000 FOR SINGLE PERSONS OR MARRIED PERSONS FILING SEPARATELY, OR $500,000 FOR MARRIED PERSONS FILING JOINTLY OR HEADS OF HOUSEHOLDS, TO INCREASE FUNDING FOR PUBLIC EDUCATION

In 2018, a similar proposition was disqualified because the proposed tax rate hike from 4.5% to 8% was described as a “percentage” increase of 3.5%. This year, the same tax proposal is okayed as a “surcharge.” The sponsors do not wish to appear to be proposing a 78% tax hike.

By contrast, the short title of Proposition 207, the “Smart and Safe Act,” is so self-evidently untrue we may detect a sense of humor. The longer title is less reassuring:

THE LAW WOULD ALLOW LIMITED MARIJUANA POSSESSION, USE, AND CULTIVATION BY ADULTS 21 OR OLDER; AMEND CRIMINAL PENALTIES FOR MARIJUANA POSSESSION; BAN SMOKING MARIJUANA IN PUBLIC; IMPOSE A 16% EXCISE TAX ON MARIJUANA SALES TO FUND PUBLIC PROGRAMS; AUTHORIZE STATE/LOCAL REGULATION OF MARIJUANA LICENSEES; AND ALLOW EXPUNGEMENT OF MARIJUANA OFFENSES.

To evaluate these claims requires considerable knowledge and experience. If the promoters turn out to be wrong about either the smart or the safe parts, who will pay to repeal this statute? Remember, the legislature won’t be able to.