Arizona and other states with the initiative process provide that initiatives must only deal with a single subject. Last November, Proposition 121 appeared on the Arizona ballot. It would have established a top-two open primary if it had passed. The Arizona Supreme Court had ruled before the election that Proposition 121 did not violate the “single subject” rule, but only on January 7, 2013, did it issue its opinion explaining why it didn’t violate the rule.
Opponents of the initiative had won in the lower court. The lower court had said that an initiative that puts a top-two open primary in place, and also abolishes elections for political party precinct committeemember, cannot appear on the ballot because those two parts consist of two different subjects. But the Arizona Supreme Court said both parts are a single subject, and the single subject is that both parts downgrade the role that political parties would play in Arizona elections, if the measure had passed. The decision is Save Our Vote v Bennett, cv2012-010717. Footnote three points out that the initiative didn’t pass, so the decision has no practical significance except as a precedent for future controversies over the single-subject rule.
Given that Arizonians rejected 121 2-1 there’s space enough to appreciate this decision. If the varied things an initiative does have a commonality, that should suffice. Still, watch for a political motivated judicial ruling in the next 20 years stopping a clever initiative via single subject rule, either that or legislators passing stuff putting the wildcard power back into the single-subject political establishment-saving/entrenchment devise.
The establishment will want to use this devise like they typically have, because it stops stuff without getting into the merits of a better political system.