|
Oklahoma |
|
|
Process Available
Basic Steps to Undertake an Initiative Campaign
I&R Constitutional and Statutory Provisions
Additional Information
Secretary of State's Initiative and Referendum Historical Information
|
The state's first successful initiative, which was on the ballot in a June 11, 1910 special election, proposed two questions in one: (1) Shall a permanent state capitol be established, and (2) if "yes" on the first, shall the capitol be at (a) Guthrie, (b) Oklahoma City, or (c) Shawnee? It passed, and voters chose Oklahoma City by a wide margin, but the state supreme court overruled their decision owing to the ballot's deviation from the single-question, "yes or no" norm. Nevertheless, Oklahoma City ultimately became the permanent state capital. In the August 1910 primary, Oklahomans passed an initiative requiring a literacy test as a qualification for voting, which included a "grandfather clause" that made it apply solely to blacks. The U.S. Supreme Court (223 U.S. 347) struck down the measure as unconstitutional. Yet the election had been unfair for another reason as well: racist state officials, instead of printing "yes" and "no" on ballots, printed in small type: "For the amendment." Anyone wishing to vote against it was supposed to scratch out those words with a pencil. If they left their ballot as it was, it was counted as a vote in favor. In some precincts voters were not even provided with pencils. Casting further doubt on the accuracy of the 1910 vote count was a "literacy test" measure placed on the ballot by the legislature in the 1916 primary, six years later: voters rejected it by a 59 percent margin. On the 1910 ballot, voters rejected an initiative to allow liquor sales in cities, which had been prohibited in Oklahoma’s original constitution. It was the first of several Prohibition-repeal initiatives. The Oklahoma humorist Will Rogers would later say, "Oklahomans vote dry as long as they can stagger to the polls." Indeed, liquor was so plentiful that voters in 1914 passed an initiative to make "drunkenness and excessive use of intoxicating liquors" cause for the impeachment of elected officials. In 1912, a majority of the voters favored one initiative to require the direct election (by the people, instead of by state legislators) of U.S. senators, and another to move the state capital to Guthrie. The first was superseded by passage of the Seventeenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, ratified the following year, while the second failed to win a majority of all ballots cast in the election. The worst victim of the supermajority requirement was the 1914 gubernatorial candidate Charles West, who sponsored four initiatives: one to reduce the number of appellate courts, a second to reduce the property tax by 29 percent, a third to tax oil and gas production, and a fourth to abolish the state senate, thereby creating a unicameral legislature. All four garnered majorities of ballots cast on each proposition, but not majorities of the total cast in the election, and therefore failed. In 1916 this unfair requirement brought down two more initiatives, to the chagrin of their Socialist sponsors. Ironically, the measures were designed to ensure the fairness of elections. One would have altered voting registration procedures; the other would have created a state election board composed of three members, one appointed by each of the state's three major political parties (the Socialists were the third-largest party at that time). In the 1920s, corruption in state government prompted an initiative to establish a procedure to convene the legislature promptly to investigate allegations of corruption; it passed by a nearly three to one margin but was thrown out by the state supreme court, which ruled that it was not the proper subject of a constitutional amendment. When the court threw out a 1926 initiative that would have established a procedure for contesting property tax levies, however, its sponsors persisted: they rewrote their initiative in conformity to the court's requirements, and voters passed it the second time in 1928 by a margin of nearly five to one. The Great Depression hit Oklahoma hard, and Oklahomans turned to the initiative process to propose economic reforms. Among these were a 1935 initiative establishing a state welfare program and appropriating $2.5 million for it (passed by a 65 percent margin); a 1936 initiative increasing the automobile tag and sales taxes to provide assistance to needy elderly and disabled persons and children (approved by a 60 percent margin); and a 1936 constitutional amendment authorizing the latter initiative statute (passed by a 62 percent margin). In the 1940s Oklahomans passed initiatives that provided retirement pensions for teachers (1942), allowed local property tax increases to aid schools (1946), and allowed the legislature to raise additional school funds (1946). The only initiative to gain approval in the 1950s was a 1956 reapportionment measure; despite a four to three margin in favor, it failed to get a majority of those voting in the election. In the 1960s two more initiatives failed for the same reason: a 1962 reapportionment proposal and a 1964 measure changing the property tax limits. In 1974 the state constitution was finally amended so that an initiative would win if a majority of those voting on the individual initiative approved it. However, in 2001, the state legislature placed a constitutional amendment on the ballot that would have required twice the number of signatures for initiatives pertaining to wildlife. This action was taken to stop animal protection advocates attempts to ban cockfighting in the state, however the voters defeated it. This state history is based on research found in David Schmidt's book, Citizen Lawmakers: The Ballot Initiative Revolution. |
