Problems with the initiative process

[Reed Davis <rd100@delphi.com>]

> Broder's book was so good at describing how initiatives have
> become a means of selling an idea to voters when it can't
> pass the Legislature. We would like to have the process
> include legislative review before a measure goes on the
> ballot. The Legislature could not kill a proposal, but could,
> with the author's consent, amend it, and even pass it. What
> we have now is a 3 stage process: qualifying, voting, and
> legal review.
>
I agree that the California initiative process has some serious
problems.  I say that as a California voter who has tried to
understand all of the initiatives that I've been asked to vote
on.  The most obvious problem is that they are allowed to be
much too complex for voters.  Although, I take voting seriously,
I simply don't have time to read the text of the propositions
contained in the booklets that they send out.  I seriously doubt
that more than a handful of voters do.  Hence, I think that any
proposition that appears on the ballot should be limited to one
paragraph of a couple of hundred words.  If nobody is going to
read the implemention text, why should we vote on it?  The
legislature could write the implementation with the media and
various experts monitoring them to ensure that they don't alter
the intention of the proposition that was passed.

Because of this limitation, I think the proposition process is
best geared toward local issues (such as whether to implement a
half-cent sales tax for road improvements) or broad policy
decisions where the implementation is relatively trivial (such
as banning smoking in restaurants).  There are other pros and
cons of the initiative process.  However, I think that placing
a limit on the length (and, hence, the complexity) of the
propositions would go a long way toward improving it.

Reed Davis