The Patriot Post® · Dems Weaponize Ballot Initiatives to Subvert State Constitutions

The U.S. Constitution is a remarkably durable document, and that’s by design.

Since it came into effect in 1789, it’s been amended just 27 times. For our purposes, we can subtract the first 10 amendments, known as the Bill of Rights, which were ratified en masse in 1791. And from the remaining 17 amendments, we can subtract an additional two — the 18th and the 21st — one of which enacted Prohibition in 1920 and the other which undid it in 1933. Thus, only 15 changes have been made during the entire 235-year history of our nation’s Constitution.

Now consider the state of Michigan’s constitution, which was adopted in 1963. And yet, in the 61 years of its existence, that constitution has already been amended 39 times — including three times in one fell swoop during the midterm election of 2022. This isn’t because Michiganders are unusually fickle; it’s because the framers of that constitution were idiots.

Whereas amendments to the U.S. Constitution require approval by a two-thirds majority of both houses of Congress followed by ratification from three-fourths of the states, an amendment to Michigan’s constitution can be initiated by citizens obtaining signatures equal to a mere 10% of the votes cast in the state’s most recent gubernatorial election followed by a simple majority vote of the citizenry once the amendment appears on the ballot.

This is lunacy, and it leads to mischief.

Which brings us to the power-mad Democrats, whose well-monied, hard-left activist base has taken advantage of the ridiculously easy amendment process in Michigan and in other states to put various ballot initiatives on the 2024 ballot that, if enacted, would give the power of state law to radical policies that never passed through these states’ legislative process.

As political analyst Shawn Fleetwood writes, “If approved by voters, these deceptively worded amendments will turn swing states and reliable Republican strongholds into bastions of despotic leftism.”

How did we get here? As Honest Elections Project Executive Director Jason Snead tells it, a ballot-initiative process that was “initially meant to be a last check on government has, in fact, become a [tool] that the left is [weaponizing] to push its agenda.” Indeed, as Fleetwood continues:

According to Snead, the left’s hijacking of the ballot initiative process can be traced back to as early as 2018, when Democrat activists placed a measure overhauling Michigan’s election system on the state’s midterm ballot. The constitutional amendment sought to implement radical left-wing policies, such as automatic voter registration and no-excuse absentee voting.

The idea appeared to pick up further steam in 2022. In Michigan, leftists put forward ballot measures enshrining abortion and child mutilation and unsecure election practices into the state constitution. Much like the 2018 amendment, the initiatives were approved by voters.

Think about the destructiveness of this legislative end run: When all this was happening in Michigan, Republicans had control of both state houses. Thus, under normal circumstances, the state’s Democrat governor, Gretchen Whitmer, would’ve had to gain bipartisan approval for any legislation she hoped to pass. Instead, by weaponizing the ballot-initiative process, radical Democrats were able to attractively word their constitutional amendments and get this enshrined as law with a mere majority vote of the citizenry.

Now, for example, thanks to a disastrous Democrat-driven 2022 ballot initiative, Michigan has a nine-day early voting period; a no-fault absentee-ballot request policy; no requirement for voters to prove their identity with a photo ID either for in-person voting or absentee voting; prepaid postage for absentee ballots; and taxpayer-funded drop boxes. Bulk-mail balloting, anyone?

Consider, for example, the deceptively worded language in this part of the ballot initiative: “requiring voters to present photo identification or sign an affidavit when voting in person or applying for an absentee ballot.” Low-information voters might reasonably infer that they’re voting in favor of photo ID rather than enshrining a workaround to it.

What’s more, the Michigan ballot initiative stipulates that “local governments can accept charitable and in-kind donations to assist with running elections as long as donations are disclosed and aren’t from foreign entities.”

Hey, what could go wrong? I mean, besides allowing gobs of dark money to flood into the state for the purpose of funding Democrat operatives to, er, “assist” with the running of local elections?

And it’s not just Michigan. As Fleetwood adds: “After successfully duping Ohio voters into embedding baby-killing into their state’s founding document last year, Democrats are now going all out on radical ballot measures this fall. In addition to abortion, left-wing groups are backing amendments mandating minimum wage hikes, legalizing marijuana use, implementing ranked-choice voting, and expanding the use of mail-in balloting, to name a few.”

Of course, the Democrats’ ultimate goal at the national level is the enactment of HR 1 and its senatorial companion, SR 1, which together represent the ultimate ballot initiative.

Can anything be done? Raising the insane simple-majority threshold for amending these state constitutions would be a good place to start. In the meantime, however, these are the rules, and the Democrats are taking full advantage of them.

John Adams once presciently noted that our Constitution “was made only for a moral and religious people” and that it’s “wholly inadequate to the government of any other.”

He was right, of course, but he stopped short of identifying another problem that plagues us today. Our Constitution requires not only “a moral and religious people” but a well-informed one.