History
In 1905, an amendment giving voters the power of referendum was
approved by the Nevada legislature and ratified by the voters by a
margin of five to one.
By 1909, initiative supporters included acting governor Denver S.
Dickerson and U.S. Senator Francis G. Newlands, architect of the
Newlands Reclamation Act of 1901, which set up the federal Bureau of
Reclamation and provided for the construction of dams and canals to
irrigate the arid lands of the western states. An amendment establishing
the initiative process passed the legislature and was approved by
Nevada voters in 1912.
The first initiative to pass was a Prohibition statute, approved by a 59
percent majority in 1918. In 1922, a change in the divorce law was
initiated by petition, sparking the legislature to place its own alternative
on the ballot also. The legislature’s version passed, and the initiative lost. In
1936, Nevadans rejected a pension initiative by a margin of nearly three
to one, but they changed their minds eight years later and approved by
a 53.5 percent margin another initiative to increase the state’s old-age
benefits. During the 1950s business interests and labor unions clashed in
three successive elections over the “Right to Work” issue. Organized labor
lost in all three elections.
The battle began in 1952, when voters approved a “Right to Work”
measure by a slim 50.7 percent margin. Labor unions fought back with a
1954 initiative to repeal the new law; Nevada voters defeated it by a
narrow margin of 51.4 percent. A second union-sponsored repeal initiative
on the 1956 ballot was rejected by a 53.9 percent margin. Another unionbacked
initiative on the same ballot sought to amend the state
constitution to prohibit “Right to Work” laws, but was rejected by an even
more decisive margin of 57 percent.
In 1958, business interests responded with their own initiative to end the
dispute in employers’ favor, simply by making it more difficult to put
initiatives on the ballot and more difficult to pass them. Approved by a
61.9 percent majority, the new provision required that initiative petitions
meet signature quotas in three-quarters of the state’s 75 counties. No
more could initiative proponents get all the signatures they needed from
the heavily populated Las Vegas and Reno areas. Another new
requirement specified that initiatives to amend the constitution be
approved by voters twice, in two successive elections, before taking
effect. Nevada is the only state with such a requirement.
In 1982, an initiative spurred the legislature to pass a similar bill of its
own creating a consumer advocate’s office to deal with utility matters.
Both measures were on the ballot, but sponsors of the initiative liked the
legislature’s version so much that they campaigned against their own! Not
surprisingly, the legislature’s measure won the approval of the voters.
In 1998, medical marijuana was legalized via the initiative process as
was a ban on same sex marriage in 2000.
Excerpted from the Initiative & Referendum Almanac by M. Dane Waters.