House Advances Bill Stifling Ballot Measure Process

HB 1105 would make it more difficult for Oklahomans to propose legislation via the initiative and referendum process.

March 14, 2024

The initiative and referendum process in recent years has been a favorite target of the Republican supermajority in the Legislature. The Oklahoma House of Representatives stayed true to form on March 13 when it advanced legislation that would make the state’s constitutionally guaranteed right to propose and repeal laws more difficult.

HB 1105 would do three things:

1.  Charge petitioners a $1,000 filing fee that would be reimbursed if the proposed law qualified to be placed on the ballot;

2.  Extend the two protest periods from ten business days to ninety days for opponents to challenge either the constitutionality of a proposed ballot measure or the validity of the petition signatures gathered for it to qualify to be placed on the ballot; and

3.  Require criminal background checks by the Oklahoma State Bureau of Investigation for every person responsible for the circulation of a petition to gather signatures.

After debate, the measure passed the House by a vote of 76 – 20. All nineteen Democrats present voted against the measure, and all but one Republican member present voted for the bill. Only Representative Daniel Pae (R-Lawton) crossed party lines to vote against the bill, which now moves to the Senate for consideration.

Several members of the House Democratic Caucus debated against the bill, saying they believe it infringes on direct democracy and is a violation of the constitutional protection of anonymous speech. “These petitions, whether from an organization or grassroots, are like statewide elections,” said House Democratic Leader Cyndi Munson. “Why would we ever stifle this process?”

Oklahoma is unique in that it is the first state in the nation to have the ballot initiative process written into its original constitution, said Representative Mickey Dollens (D-Oklahoma City). “This is an effective tool for checks and balances on the supermajority. This form of direct democracy gives regular Oklahomans the ability to directly impact legislation and bring up policy that would otherwise never be addressed in this chamber.”

Majority Floor Leader Jon Echols argued for the bill, saying it didn’t really change the process all that much. “What it does at the end of the day is those two things, which absolutely encourages citizen engagement and reflects some of the fees that are costs. And it adds background checks,” Echols said.

Democratic members pointed out that the background checks do not prevent anyone from circulating a petition, but rather makes a circulator’s criminal history a matter of open record. Echols conceded the background checks would not stop criminals from gathering signatures but that voters have a right to know who is approaching them.

Echols also argued that ballot measures have stopped being driven by grassroots activists and have become the domain of well-funded special interest groups who send petition circulators to high-density urban areas where they can efficiently gather signatures. Dollens countered that because circulators have only ninety days to collect the necessary signatures (172,993 for a constitutional amendment and 92,263 for a statute), it is expensive to qualify an initiative to the ballot. “With ninety days to collect 180,000 signatures, you’ve got to be where the most densely populated areas are, and that costs a lot of money,” Dollens said. “By extending that signature gathering period, not only would you get more rural representation, you would be less reliant on out-of-state money.”

After Oklahoma voters legalized medical marijuana with State Question 788 in 2018 and expanded Oklahoma’s Medicaid program with State Question 802 in 2021, the Legislature began working harder to curtail the ballot measure process. When the United States Supreme Court’s Dobbs decision overturned a woman’s right to an abortion and threw it back to the states in 2022, those efforts only intensified.

Oklahomans often have a better idea of what they need than the Legislature, said Representative Monroe Nichols (D-Tulsa). “What we are doing now is trying to make it harder. The reality is, at every single turn, the interests in this building have done things like roll back diversity, equity, and inclusion, or work to change parts of history that we don’t like. But Oklahomans have actually worked to expand Medicaid, worked toward criminal justice reform.”

HB 1105 is an attempt to increase barriers for ballot initiatives that are valued by Oklahoma voters, said Representative Forrest Bennett (D-Oklahoma City). “The initiative process is extremely popular outside of the chamber,” said Bennett. “In my time in Oklahoma politics, it is the only way to bring positive change. When partisanship is taken out of these questions for Oklahomans, the people of Oklahoma aren’t as red and blue as we think. The petitions bring commonsense questions onto the ballot, and many commonsense problems are not addressed by this chamber. We could learn from this and be more responsive to the people, but instead we sit here and ask how we can subvert that process. This bill treads on the rights of Oklahomans and their freedom to petition.”

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