The Proposal to Steal Missouri’s Constitution.
BY: GENEVA LEE
News Editor
Politicians are taking away our constitution. This is no exaggeration.
In August 2020, Missouri voters passed Medicaid Expansion with a majority of the vote. In November 2018, Missouri voters overwhelmingly voted to end gerrymandering, with 62% of people in favor. Missourians have voted in favor of raising the minimum wage to $12 an hour, for union protections, for regulations against puppy mills and animal cruelty. And all of these measures were placed on the ballot in a process known as the “Citizen’s Petition Initiative.”
The Citizens’ Initiative Petition is a method of changing the Missouri State Constitution, in which a simple majority of voters can change the constitution on Election Day. A proposed amendment can be placed on the ballot two ways:
1. The state legislature votes to put one on the ballot, via a simple majority
2. Citizen petitioners collect signatures from at least eight percent of registered voters from six of the eight of congressional districts in Missouri
The secretary of state must then put the potential amendment on the ballot. Whenever an amendment is placed on the ballot, the secretary of state writes the summary of the proposed constitutional change for the ballot, though courts may find language unconstitutional and rewrite the summaries. The governor decides when the vote will happen (e.g.: during August or November elections).
Essentially, if Missourians wanted to raise the minimum wage to $15 an hour and the legislatures did not want to, Missourians could make a “raise the minimum wage to $15 an hour” petition and collect signatures. If they collect enough signatures, they give them to the secretary of state, Jay Ashcroft, who writes the summary: “Minimum wage increase: A “yes” vote will amend the Missouri Constitution to impose a minimum wage increase to $15 an hour, a “no” vote will leave the current minimum wage unchanged,” for example.
The governor, Mike Parson, decides when this will be voted on—this year, Election Day is August 2 (for primaries) and Nov. 8 (for the general).
Let’s say Governor Parson picks the November election. On Nov. 8, voters will line up, vote for or against the minimum wage increase, and if at least 50% of voters plus one approve, then the minimum wage increase goes into effect. If not, the minimum wage increase fails.
The Citizens’ Initiative Petition does not have an enforcement mechanism and relies upon the legislature to implement and the courts to check an obstructionist legislature.
And amendments can be undone. Anti-gerrymandering, worker’s protections and unions, Medicaid Expansion (under the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act), and minimum wage increases are usually considered left-wing or liberal positions, often supported by Democrats.
However, the Missouri House of Representatives and Senate have Republican supermajorities, and all but one statewide elected official identify as Republicans.
Missouri Republicans have worked to undermine these progressive changes, often successfully, to the Missouri Constitution in a number of ways: refusing to allocate funding to measures, placing proposed amendments they dislike on low-turnout elections, writing misleading or unconstitutional ballot language, or even putting amendments up for re-votes.
Political elites have undone much of our constitution.
However, the greatest threat yet to the Citizens’ Initiative Petition is underway. Republicans have created legislation that all-but-ensures that no citizen-led constitutional amendments can ever pass again. This February, Rep. Bishop Davidson (R) proposed HJR 70, which states that Missouri should require a majority of all registered voters in Missouri approve of an amendment for it to pass.
Note, this doesn’t mean a majority of people coming out to vote: it’s a majority of all of the 4.2 million registered voters in the entire state, whether or not they actually even vote on Election Day. Under Davidson’s proposal, with current numbers, there would need to be at least 2.1 million votes in favor for any amendment to pass.
However, in the August 2020 primary, only 1.2 million votes were cast in total, with a majority (677,000) in favor of Medicaid Expansion.
Under the new proposal, even if every person, 100%, of the people who came out to vote supported Medicaid Expansion, it still would have failed by about a million votes. The Missouri legislature will be voting to put this on the ballot this year.
The irony is that for Davidson’s proposed amendment to pass, it’d only need a simple majority of voters, and to undo it, it would take more than a simple majority. It would, in fact, take more people than the number who actually vote to reverse.
This will effectively lock Missourians from being able to change our constitution for perpetuity.
Those who are not yet old enough to vote will also never get a chance to change the Missouri Constitution: this decision will be made for them.
To rub salt in the wound, this only applies to when the proposed amendment is placed on the ballot via petitions—if legislators put a proposed amendment on the ballot, it will only need the current simple majority of votes (not voters).
And further rub acid in the wound: Davidson and his colleagues don’t even need a simple majority of votes to stay in office, just a plurality (and in safe-Republican seats, they only need a primary plurality to boot)!
They believe that less than half of the voters can decide who their representatives are, but that a majority of voters are unqualified to decide our constitution.
Republican legislators are making it so that we can only pass the constitutional changes that they want us to.
And the nuanced wording—a simple majority of all registered voters, rather than a simple majority of all votes—will make it difficult for most voters to see the difference if HJR 70 passes, meaning that a massive education campaign would be required for any hope to block the proposed amendment.
It sounds reasonable at first look, and all subsequent looks, really, unless it is explained in-depth, like in this article.
I cannot stress enough how dire this is. This proposal would actually be the nail in Missouri’s constitutional coffin.
The second that this act passes, our constitution would die.
Anyone who agrees can write to Missouri representatives (even if they are not my representatives, I still write to them because their actions affect me and all Missourians) telling them not to put this on the ballot.
Jobs with Justice also is phone banking to call voters to let them know that this is happening.
And of course, there is always the option of donating to candidates, of any party, who are committed to standing against such a horrific policy.
