Associated Press: US states split on allowing citizen ballot initiatives

Associated Press: US states split on allowing citizen ballot initiatives

Susan Lerner, executive director of Common Cause New York, previously worked for a good-government advocacy group in California, giving her a clear picture of the states' contrasting policies. "I've worked in the two extreme examples of how much dysfunction there can be," she said. "In California, there's too much direct democracy and in New York there's none. Neither is the right solution. I came out of California feeling its initiatives were out of control — and now I'm nostalgic for them," recalling instances when California lawmakers would tackle difficult issues to defuse a potential initiative campaign.

NEW YORK (AP) — Every two years, citizens across the U.S. manage to place some eye-catching measures on state election ballots, posing questions to voters that can be divisive and sometimes historic. But more than half of states offer no such opportunity.

Twenty-four states — mostly in the Western half of the country — have ways for citizens to bypass the Legislature by gathering signatures and taking proposals directly to voters. In one of those states, Illinois, the process is so restrictive that only one citizen initiative has ever passed.

In the other 26 states, there’s no option for ballot measures — and no sign that politicians are eager to create one. …

Susan Lerner, executive director of Common Cause New York, previously worked for a good-government advocacy group in California, giving her a clear picture of the states’ contrasting policies.

“I’ve worked in the two extreme examples of how much dysfunction there can be,” she said. “In California, there’s too much direct democracy and in New York there’s none. Neither is the right solution.”

“I came out of California feeling its initiatives were out of control — and now I’m nostalgic for them,” she added, recalling instances when California lawmakers would tackle difficult issues to defuse a potential initiative campaign.

Lerner expressed interest in a compromise proposal floated unsuccessfully about 20 years ago in Vermont. Called the Citizen Initiative, it would have enabled voters — if they gathered enough signatures — to put a policy proposal before the Legislature and require an up or down vote on it.