Referendum proposals receive limited support

AUGUSTA – Proposed constitutional amendments to restrict the citizens initiative process found no support on the Legislature’s Legal and Veterans Affairs Committee Thursday.

The committee voted unanimously, with three members absent, against three bills that would have amended the state Constitution to restrict the initiative process. A fourth bill was amended to make a change in the referendum process without a constitutional amendment, and it passed 7-3.

There is the feeling in some corners, including the Governor’s Office, that the initiative process could be heading for disaster. Gov. Angus King endorsed several referendum bills to avoid a situation such as what occurred in Oregon during the last election, when there were 26 referendum questions on the ballot requiring 300 pages of explanation.

But the proposals brought together strange bedfellows, who told the committee at last week’s public hearing that an attack on the referendum process was an attack on democracy itself. The people who spoke against the bills represented such disparate groups as the Maine Taxpayers Network, Forest Ecology Workshop, Natural Resources Council, Christian Coalition, Christian Civic League, Maine Reform Party, Maine Toxics Action Council, Maine AFL-CIO, Maine Militia, Maine Citizens to Defend the Bill of Rights, and the Maine People’s Alliance.

Their objections found sympathetic ears on the committee.

The sole bill to survive Thursday was LD 59, sponsored by Rep. Arthur Mayo, R-Bath, which would require a minimum number of signatures from each county to place a referendum on the state ballot. Mayo said the bill was aimed at eliminating a referendum drive centered in a single county. Requiring signatures from each county would obtain a greater cross section of public opinion, he said. Gov. King endorsed the Mayo bill at a press conference last week.

Some committee members, including Rep. Lillian LaFountaine O’Brien, D-Lewiston, said the requirement would be too stringent and kill any referendum issue that affected only a few counties.

Mayo agreed to amend the bill to require that one-tenth of 5 percent of votes cast in the previous gubernatorial election be collected from each of 10 counties. For example, given the 421,000 votes cast in the last gubernatorial election, petition organizers would need to get a minimum of 2,100 signatures from each of 10 counties. Petitioners still would be required to meet the current requirement of gathering enough signatures statewide to represent 10 percent of the votes cast in the previous gubernatorial election in order to get their issue on the ballot.

Mayo also agreed to make the change by law, not by a constitutional amendment. That meant his bill would require only a simple majority in the House and Senate for passage. A constitutional amendment would have required a two-thirds majority.

The Mayo bill was approved by a 7-3 committee vote.

With little debate, the committee members voted unanimously against:

. LD 59, which would have increased the number of signatures required for a referendum from the current 10 percent of votes cast in the last gubernatorial election to 15 percent. That would have increased the number required from 42,101 to 63,151, based on the last election.

. LD 199, sponsored by Rep. Walter R. Gooley, R-Farmington, which would have banned a revote on any rejected referendum for six years.

. LD 580, sponsored by Rep. Stephen Stanley, D-Medway, which would have banned the collection of referendum signatures on Election Day.