By Dillon Rosenblatt | Arizona Capitol Times
Three legislative proposals that are each designed to independently scale back the lawmaking powers of voters could, in tandem, upend Arizona’s ballot initiative and referral system.
Several factors are standing in the way of these measures stacking on one another, but if voters approve them all, they could lead to incredibly lengthy ballots for years to come, drive up the cost of elections, and legislators would be able to make changes to voter-approved laws with only a simple majority.
Opponents of the two measures in the House and one in the Senate invoke the term “voter suppression” in discussing them, and the few supporters who have testified publicly say they want to keep voters in check and set a single-subject standard for the ballot that the Legislature faces.
At issue is the 1998 Voter Protection Act, designed to prevent lawmakers and the governor from amending or repealing voter-approved laws.
Thomas Basile, an Arizona lawyer who worked as Mitt Romney’s attorney for his 2012 presidential campaign, said he did not see any problem with what the referrals would accomplish since initiatives under the Voter Protection Act have reached the status of “super law” and made voter-approved laws “practically immune from any modifications.”
He said the two proposals in the House “would correct this pretty striking asymmetry and restore the equilibrium established by the original state Constitution.”
