OKLAHOMA CITY — Any constitutional amendment or other state question that “removes a right of the residents of this state” would have to be approved by a simple majority of those who cast ballots in the election and a majority of the voters in two-thirds of the state’s counties, under a measure introduced recently in the Legislature.
Senate Joint Resolution 5 was filed by Sen. Warren Hamilton, R-McCurtain. The resolution does not specify what would constitute removal of “a right of the residents.”
The proposed law would allow constitutional amendments and other state questions to appear on the ballot only in odd-numbered years. This would ensure that they would never be voted on during a general election, when voter turnout is heaviest.
If approved by both houses of the Legislature, SJR 5 would become law without the governor’s signature, because a joint resolution has the full force and effect of law. In contrast, a simple or concurrent resolution is merely an expression of the Legislature’s intent.
SJR 5 is itself a proposed constitutional amendment that would be submitted to the voters for their approval or rejection at a statewide election.
SJR 5 is almost identical to SJR 30, which Hamilton filed last year but died in the Senate Rules Committee. That measure was “designed to give a voice back to rural Oklahomans” and transform how state questions are passed, he said.
Hamilton contends that allowing state questions to pass by a simple majority disenfranchises rural Oklahoma and “gives only the major cities a voice in hot-button topics that often appear on the ballot.”
Politicians trying to ‘take power away from voters’
SJR 5 is another example of “politicians trying to take power away from voters,” said Amber England, founder and chief executive officer of the public-affairs consulting firm Strategy 77.
“It is not easy to get something passed by an initiative petition,” she said. For example, a sufficient number of signatures must be gathered on a petition within 90 days.
“It is not an easy process,” she said.
Election rules should be fair, England said. “But they haven’t proposed that politicians should have to be elected by a two-thirds margin.”
The initiative and the referendum are “enshrined in our Constitution,” England noted: in Article 5, under “powers reserved to the people,” and in Article 24, Section 3, which decrees, “This article shall not impair the right of the people to amend this Constitution by a vote upon an initiative petition therefor.”
“Our founders included provisions for the initiative and referendum so the people would have recourse against legislators who were too selfish or tyrannical to make changes themselves,” England said.
Hamilton said: “State questions allow legislators to dodge the tough issues and present a golden opportunity for voter fraud, election tampering and out-of-state influence.”
No evidence of voter fraud having any effect on any statewide election in Oklahoma has been detected in more than three decades, if not longer.
A simple majority “effectively ensures that rural Oklahoma has no voice,” but requiring approval of a majority of the voters in two-thirds of all 77 counties – 52 of them – “would ensure a voice for all Oklahomans,” Hamilton said.
“More often than not, state questions boil down to ‘urban’ versus ‘rural’ interests,” he said. “If the state question is truly for the betterment of the state, it should have overwhelming support – not just support from our large urban areas.”
Hamilton pointed to voter approval of State Question 802, Medicaid expansion, as an example.
“Only seven of Oklahoma’s 77 counties [Comanche, Pontotoc, Cherokee, Payne, Tulsa, Oklahoma and Canadian] voted in favor the measure, but it still passed and was allowed to become law,” he said.
Medicaid expansion, lottery, MMJ were ‘notable disasters’
Hamilton described the state lottery, medical marijuana and Medicaid expansion as “notable disasters” that occurred “through our flawed methodology of state questions.”
More than 290,000 previously uninsured Oklahomans secured medical health benefits after Medicaid expansion went into effect July 1, 2021.
The state lottery has contributed $1.18 billion to education since its implementation in 2005. Of the 1.43 million Oklahomans who voted in November 2004 on State Question 705, to establish a state lottery, the constitutional amendment passed by a margin of nearly 2-to-1: 64.68% yes to 35.32% no.
Oklahoma voters endorsed State Question 788, legalizing medicinal marijuana, in June 2018 by a margin of 56.86% to 43.14%.
Over the past four years and three months, sales of medical marijuana products have generated almost half a billion dollars in tax receipts, including $201 million from the 7% marijuana excise tax plus $256 million in state and local sales taxes. And 373,525 MMJ patient licenses had been issued as of Jan. 11, state records reflect.
Another measure intended to dramatically raise the threshold for initiatives and constitutional amendments was House Joint Resolution 1002. The measure was proposed last year by former Rep. Tommy Hardin, R-Madill, who termed out after 12 years in the Legislature.
HJR 1002 was a proposed constitutional amendment that would have required initiative petitions to bear the signatures of 8% “of the legal voters of each county of this state,” and a petition proposing a constitutional amendment would have required 15% of the legal voters of each county. That proposal, too, died in the Senate Rules Committee.
“I don’t know what politicians are afraid of,” England said. “In the past few years, this Legislature has shown that they don’t trust voters. But Oklahoma voters deserve the opportunity to vote on public issues.”