Six North Dakota legislators have introduced HCR3011, which would make it illegal for initiative circulators to be paid. HCR 3011 also imposes a severe county distribution requirement on statewide initiatives, requiring a substantial number of signatures from each of 27 counties in the state. Here is the text of the bill.
Both aspects of the bill are unconstitutional. The U.S. Supreme Court struck down laws that make it illegal to pay circulators in 1988, in Meyer v Grant. And the U.S. Supreme Court struck down county distribution requirements for statewide petitions in 1969, in Moore v Ogilvie.
The bill also increases the number of signatures for statewide initiatives that change a statute, from 2% of the population of the state, to 3%. The six sponsors are: Representatives Al Carlson (R-Fargo), Jeff Delzer (R-Underwood), Bill Devlin (R-Finley), Dave Monson (R-Osnabrock), and Senators Tony Grindberg (R-Fargo) and David Hogue (R-Minot). Fortunately, if this bill passes, it cannot take effect unless the voters approve it.
This is the second attempt to injure initiatives. As reported earlier, the North Dakota Senate has already passed SB 2183, to require initiative circulators to have lived in North Dakota for two years. Thanks to Paul Jacob for this news.
Gee – the EVIL ANTI-Democracy minority rule gerrymander oligarchs are STRIKING BACK !!! — see the Star Wars movies.
—
SMASH the oligarchs — esp. in the small States with blowhard robot party hacks.
P.R. and nonpartisan P.R.
Damn, these legislators sure are determined to prevent North Dakotans to petition their government.
I’m pretty sure that North Dakota has a recall process. It sure would be nice to see it used against these clowns.
‘Moore v Ogilvie’ was based on the Illinois requirement that a fixed number of signatures be gathered in each of 50 counties, without regard to the size of electorate in the county. It would have required a collection rate of at least 3-1/2 times the state rate in some counties. In addition, 1/2 the population of Illinois lived in Cook County.
The North Dakota proposal would require that the statewide collection rate happen in 50 percent of counties (NOT 50 counties as you claim. North Dakota has 58 counties, so 50% would be 29 counties).
“The North Dakota proposal would require that the statewide collection rate happen in 50 percent of counties (NOT 50 counties as you claim. North Dakota has 58 counties, so 50% would be 29 counties).”
That’s still pretty damn difficult. Have you ever been to North Dakota? I have. There are some pretty freaking rural counties there.
#3, thank you. North Dakota has 53 counties, so the bill would require signatures from 27 counties. The Illinois law invalidated by the US Supreme Court in 1969 required signatures from 50 counties, and Illinois has 102 counties. So the North Dakota requirement is still more severe than the old Illinois law. Further, the principle is the same, no matter how easy the distribution requirement is. Illinois amended its law to say that no more than 13,000 signatures could come from a single county (25,000 were and are required), but that was held unconstitutional also, by the 7th circuit in 1975. And in 1976, Eugene McCarthy even won against Rhode Island’s distribution requirement, which required only 10 signatures from each of the 5 counties.
#5 You’re correct, North Dakota has 53 counties.
The arbitrary nature of the Illinois law was not that it required signatures from 1/2 the counties but rather that it required a fixed number of signatures from smaller counties.
If one were to collect 125 signatures in Montgomery County, that would be the equivalent of collecting 21,570 signatures in Cook County, the most populous. Alternatively, if signatures were collected in the 50 largest counties at the Montgomery County rate, 50,228 signatures would be needed.
Compare that to North Dakota, where the signature rate in the 27th largest and the 1st largest counties would be the same. Though of course the petitioners would not need to select the 27 largest counties. They could collect 22 signatures in Slope County and qualify for that county. Compare that in Illinois, where if the petitioners sought to qualify Hardin County and would have required a signature rate 15 times that of the state as a whole.
You have not stated an underlying principle. At best you have said that the practice in the 7th Circuit and Rhode Island were to invalidate certain laws. Maybe they were innumerate.
And there is no reason to assume that a State could not require more diversity in the legislative process, than in electing a statewide office. Afterall, nobody argues with the idea that for a bill to be passed it must received a yea vote from senators elected from 1/2 the senate districts, and a yea vote from representatives elected from 1/2 the house districts.
It would be laughable for a representative to argue that the voters from his district were 99% for the bill, while only 50.1% of the voters in another district were opposed, so his vote should count double, and the other representative should abstain.
Such an absurdity would fly in the face of Supreme Court rulings with regard to at-large multi-member legislative districts.