AZ Ballot: A trio of Arizona ballot measures that would make it tougher to pass state constitutional amendments by referendum took on increased urgency on Friday night when a lower-court judge ruled that the state could enforce a law first implemented in 1864 to almost completely ban abortion. While an appeal is almost certain, Bolts’ Daniel Nichanian notes that a victory for these three referendums would make it difficult to get pro-choice initiatives, as well as other progressive priorities, approved by voters and enacted in future years.
Also writing at Bolts, Widener University law professor Quinn Yeargain took a look at what these measures, all of which were placed on the ballot by the Republican-controlled state legislature, would do days before the abortion ruling came down. (The article also analyzes a comparable effort in Arkansas.) Proposition 128 would give lawmakers the power to amend or repeal a referendum if the Arizona Supreme Court or the U.S. Supreme Court has struck down any portion (lawmakers currently face strict limits on amending or repealing voter-approved laws).
Prop. 129, meanwhile, would require any voter-initiated referendum to be about a “single subject,” a rule that would not apply to measures advanced by the legislature. Yeargain notes that the right-wing high courts in other states have used this sort of requirement to block ballot measures, and that a win for Prop. 129 could empower the conservative Arizona Supreme Court to take the same action. Finally, Prop. 132 would require any initiative that would approve a new tax pass with 60% of the vote instead of a majority. (This item incorrectly identified this measure as Prop. 130.)
The GOP has had complete control of the state government since 2009, but progressives have used the existing initiative process to pass laws that otherwise would have died in the legislature. Yeargain writes that since 2016, voters “have raised the minimum wage and legalized cannabis; they also increased taxes on the wealthy to raise teachers’ salaries and required employers to provide paid sick time to their employees.”
Arizona Republicans, like their counterparts in other states, have responded over the years by passing their own laws to make it tougher for activists both to get initiatives on the ballot and to keep them there. Most notably in 2017, Gov. Doug Ducey signed laws that banned campaigns from paying petition circulators on a per-signature basis and subjected petitions to “strict compliance” standards that allow signatures to get disqualified for mere clerical errors. Voting rights supporters this year tried to advance a referendum that, among other things, would have done away with “strict compliance,” but the state courts used that very rule to keep it off the ballot.
However, Republicans have still been restricted by the Voter Protection Act, a successful 1998 ballot measure that makes it tough for lawmakers to modify anything passed by voters. The GOP legislature, though, has responded by using its one-vote majorities in each chamber to put Props. 128, 129, and 132 before voters and change the system that has frustrated them so much.