Taking the Initiative

Frustration with the legislative process has helped spawn an amazing number of initiative petition campaigns in California this year. The office of Secretary of State March Fong Eu said that at latest count 21 campaigns were under way to win places on the June and November, 1988, ballots for proposed changes in state law or the state Constitution. One of those was Eu’s own “Dimes Against Crimes” campaign to increase taxes on alcoholic beverages to raise more money for local law-enforcement agencies.

At least two measures already have qualified for the ballot. They deal with election campaign reform and AIDS. Two other petition campaigns authorized by the secretary of state also propose changes in election campaign law, three would alter the Gann limit on state and local government revenues, and three involve the controversy over insurance company premiums and lawsuits to recover damages arising from accidents.

One petition campaign seeks to outlaw fishing with gill nets. Another would change the legal hours for bars and liquor stores. There is a proposed $776-million bond issue for parks and other natural lands. Supporters of the legalization of marijuana are trying for the 16th time to write their cause into law via the ballot box.

Ever since the initiative procedure was adopted by California progressives in 1911, it has been the tool of ordinary citizens for enacting legislation when the state Legislature has failed to do so. Back then, a few powerful business interests--primarily railroads--effectively controlled the Legislature. Increasingly, the legislators themselves and other elected officials are trying to enact legislation by way of the initiative. Elected officials are sponsors of at least half a dozen petition drives this year.

Some of the current campaigns will be abandoned without serious effort. Others will fall short of the signatures required. But California voters could face an extraordinary number of initiative ballot measures next year.

The initiative is a valuable outlet for voter frustration when the Legislature and/or the governor refuse to act on fundamental issues of overwhelming popular will. Lately, however, the initiative has become a campaign tool to get an official’s or an office seeker’s name before the public linked to a popular issue. Or it is used by a special-interest group as a lobbying tactic to pressure the Legislature to favor its programs in Sacramento. Initiatives written by amateurs often result in flawed law--as with Proposition 13, the Jarvis tax initiative.

The League of Women Voters has sponsored legislation to reform the process by restoring the indirect initiative, which gives the Legislature a chance to adopt a proposal in a manner acceptable to the petition sponsors. This might help some. But the major problem with the initiative method is the ability of special interests to buy their own laws by hiring professional signature collectors and mounting advertising campaigns that distort and obfuscate the ballot issues.

The Legislature might explore equitable ways in which to limit the work of the professional signature gatherers and to require more open disclosure of petition campaign sponsorship. And one certain way to reduce the need for legislation by way of the ballot box is to have legislation achieved in the way it was meant to be all along--in the Legislature.