While much of the news out of Frankfort this session is disheartening, there are several good bills before the General Assembly. There are bills to help with voting, the minimum wage, health care, education, and many other policies which would help the people of Kentucky.
But perhaps the single most important bill is Representative Josie Raymond’s HB 498, which would establish a process for citizen-driven ballot initiatives. It’s not the flashiest bill, but it is so important because it would give citizens the power to enact everything else. It makes every other piece of legislation possible.
What are ballot initiatives?
Ballot initiatives allow citizens to draft and submit legislation and present it directly to voters for approval. It is a wonderful example of direct democracy.
This is not a novel idea. Twenty-four states have a ballot initiative process (two more have processes for referenda only). Most of these states are in the west, as they had newer governments and less entrenched political interests when formed. South Dakota was the first state to adopt it in 1898, followed by Utah in 1900. However, no state has adopted ballot initiatives since Mississippi in 1992.
Ideologically, initiatives are not liberal or conservative. They simply reflect the will of the majority. In many cases they may reflect society’s preferences better than legislatures as they are individual bills, while candidates are bundles of issues.
Under the proposed bill, an initiative would require the signatures of 2% of the population as of the last Census. Measures would be submitted to the Secretary of State, and if approved, would not be subject to veto by the Governor.
Two percent of the population is a fairly low threshold for signatures. Most states require somewhere around 8% of the total votes cast in the last gubernatorial election, though there’s a lot of variation. As proposed, it would take around 90,000 signatures to get on the ballot.
Ballot initiatives get things done
Ballot initiatives result in a very small percentage of the overall number of laws passed each year, yet they account for an extraordinary number of progressive policy wins.
Since 1998, there have been 23 initiative campaigns to increase a state’s minimum wage. Every single one was successful.
Most of the 35 states which have legalized medical marijuana have done so through ballot initiatives, not legislative action. Fifteen states have legalized recreational marijuana; 13 of those were through initiative campaigns.
Ballot measures have expanded Medicaid, limited payday lenders, established redistricting committees, instituted Automatic Voter Registration, and granted those convicted of felonies the right to vote in states such as Idaho, Nebraska, Utah, and Arkansas.
Progressive policy rarely stands a chance in Republican-controlled legislatures. But even in Democratic strongholds, some of the biggest policy victories have come about not through legislators but through ballot measures.
I researched democratic reforms extensively for my dissertation. The use of ballot initiatives was the only structural element that played any role whatsoever in changing policy outcomes.
Concerns about ballot initiatives
Of course, there are of some criticisms of ballot initiatives. Not good criticisms, but they exist.
It can be expensive to collect signatures and advertise, which has created a sort of ballot measure cottage industry in some states. And if multiple initiatives get placed on the same ballot, it can add a significant amount of political noise during campaign season.
Concerns about a large number of initiatives flooding ballots may be valid, but that is only a sign of voter dissatisfaction with legislative unresponsiveness. Initiatives make up for legislative “sins of omission.”
There is often a concern that legislators can write better laws than an average person, and simply voting “yes” or “no” may not allow for the same nuance that a bill could get in a legislature. Writing laws is the General Assembly’s part-time job after all. But ballot measures aren’t created on a whim. By the time we get to the point where an initiative is up for a vote, the ideas have been well thought out, vetted, critiqued, and adjusted. And besides, legislatures pass plenty of horrendous laws.
There are concerns that if citizens can create new laws or programs on their own, it may cause serious trouble for the budget, requiring states to spend money they don’t have. But again, if spending in a certain area is so lacking that a ballot measure is needed to correct it, that is yet another sign that legislators are unresponsive to the needs of citizens.
There is also a concern that ballot measures can be hijacked by special interests. This is certainly true, but so can a legislature. The initiative process at least gives citizens a path they didn’t have before.
Going forward
As important as this bill is, with a Democratic sponsor, it is almost certainly DOA. Still, if there was a way for Democrats to get just one piece of legislation passed, it should be this one.
With Democrats unlikely to be in a position to pass meaningful progressive legislation anytime soon, this would allow specific policies to get approved without having to make it past 105 Republicans and without being associated with any one party.
In Kentucky, as in many states, progressive policies are often much more popular than progressive politicians. As such, this bill provides a benefit for Republicans as well. Conservative voters could get the popular progressive policies they like without voting for the Democrats they don’t like.
Establishing Kentucky as a ballot initiative state would revolutionize our politics. Good ideas could stand on their own merit. New policies could move our state forward without partisanship getting in the way. And citizens could more fully realize their potential as members of a democratic society.
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