This Tuesday, voters in Ohio will decide the future of direct democracy in Ohio.  For the most part, the U.S., like many other democracies is a republic.  In other words, the usual way that laws get made is through the legislative process with elected representatives debating, amending, and voting on proposals.  In theory, the will of the majority is expressed through their representatives.  A little over a century ago, reformers during the Progressive Era argued that there were flaws in the representative system that sometimes allowed a minority to block useful and popular legislation.  The remedy was the initiative and referendum process which allowed ordinary voters to get proposals on the ballot were they could be directly determined by the voters.

Now, not every state has authorized the initiative and referendum process.  Even in those that do, the rules differ as to how many signatures are required.  However, for the most part, states that allow for direct democracy (whether through proposals initiated by voters or by proposals referred to the voters by the government) only require a simple majority for the proposal to pass.

Even from the beginning, there has been resistance to the initiative and referendum process.  After all, special interests that are able to get what they want from elected officials do not like the voters having the ability to override those efforts.

In recent years, the tension over direct democracy has grown.  There are several factors that have contributed to this.  First, the growth of political action committees means that there are groups with the money to run the initiative process.  While things differ from state to state, there is at least a perception that the use of the initiative to get around a recalcitrant legislature has grown.  Second, in many ways, the legislative process has become more dysfunctional.  People are sorting themselves more and more by partisan affiliation which makes it easier to gerrymander districts.   Third, the Republican Party is now a coalition of groups that have very little in terms of a shared agenda.  Instead, there is a working agreement among Republican politicians that each group gets a little of what they want.  But most of these ideas lack majority support.  Due to single-issue voting, the Republicans are able to win majorities even though none of the planks of their platform is popular.  Fourth, in those states which allow initiatives, Republican legislatures have shown a willingness to disregard statutory initiatives leading to proponents opting for changes to the state constitution instead of simple statutory proposals.

As would be expected, the far right has, in recent years, decided that they need to impose curbs on the initiative process.  Typically, these proposals involve increasing the number of signatures required.  The other change that is frequently proposed is to require initiatives to get supermajorities to pass.

The proposal in Ohio seems to contain the worst of these proposals.  First, it requires that any future initiative be signed by 5% of the voters  (based on votes in the last governor’s election) in each county (as opposed to the current requirement of one-half of the counties).  It is not easy to get 5% of the voters in urban counties, but there are enough voters to find 5% to support any issue.  But there are rural counties with around 4,000 voters.  Which means that something that is opposed by 3,800 voters in any of those counties will not be on the ballot even if the overwhelming majority of voters statewide want it.  Second, it requires that sixty percent of the voters vote in favor of the amendment.   A basic foundation of American democracy is that power comes from the people.  There is no defensible philosophical justification for allowing a minority to block a constitutional change.  (Yes, the U.S. Constitution requires a supermajority, but it requires a supermajority of representative institutions which is a means of assuring that the proposal has actual majority support.)

Aside from the general desire of the Republican Party to protect their coalition from having key proposals picked off one-by-one by the voters, a key motivation behind this proposal is the Anti-choice movement.  Currently, Ohio will be voting for, and a majority will likely be approving, an amendment this November giving some state constitutional protection to women who need to get an abortion.  People who think The Handmaid’s Tale depicts a society that we should be trying to achieve are hoping that by putting this change on a special election in August (i.e., an election which would usually be very low turnout), they will make it difficult for groups that want to protect women’s rights to get the right to choose amendment adopted in November by making a 55% yes vote insufficient.

While we will need to wait for the actual votes to be counted on Tuesday, the early vote totals seem to reflect that that effort to slip this change under the radar failed.  The number of early votes reported is roughly equivalent to primary elections.  While that is lower than general election totals, it is still higher than what would typically occur in a special election.  Hopefully, on Tuesday, voters will give a big thumbs down to this power grab the Ohio Republican Party.  And if we are lucky, voters will remember this next year when it comes time retire the legislators behind this boneheaded idea.