NOM BLOG

Massachussetts Proposes to End Initiative Process

 

They say the people now support gay marriage in Massachusetts. So why are politicians there now proposing to limit the right of the citizens of Massachusetts to amend their own constitution?

This is an extraordinary admission they do not trust their own people, even after years of SSM.

SB 12 would amend Article 48 of the constitution to not allow any initiative petition that “restricts the rights set forth in the MA constitution to freedom and equality, or the right of each individual to be protected by society in the enjoyment of life, liberty and property, according to standing laws.” In plain English, this amendment would essentially eliminate the citizen initiative process because there are very few subjects that do not deal with freedom, equality, life, liberty and property!

The proponents of this bill claim that it is “too easy” for citizens to amend the constitution, which is preposterous. Placing a proposed amendment before the people through an initiative process is so prohibitively difficult in Massachusetts that the process has rarely, if ever, been used or succeeded. In the history of the Commonwealth, only 13 initiative petitions to amend the constitution ever succeeded in collecting the required number of signatures, and only three of those were approved by the Legislature to go on the ballot, of which two were approved by the voters. (Massachusetts Family Institute)

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