Citizens in Charge

Voters in Nevada are under attack by their state legislature.

Recently the Nevada legislature voted to make the ballot initiative process much, much harder. New legislation would effectively shut out regular citizens out of the process.

In his daily commentary, Common Sense, Paul Jacob discusses the actions in Nevada in A Law to Be Named Later. He writes:

Nevada solons came back with legislation mandating that petitions be gathered in each of 42 legislative districts. This makes a petition drive actually 42 drives — greatly increasing costs and the opportunity for error.

Worried that scheme wouldn’t pass court review, legislators amended the bill to require petitions to come from every U.S. congressional district. But only for this election cycle. There’s a kicker: By 2011, legislators will create “petition districts.” How many districts? They’ll decide later … as many as they determine can get away with.

Read the rest of the story here.