This year’s ballot is long and complex. There is, of course, the presidential ballot and the House races. The purpose of this guide, however, is to clarify and gives some information on the fourteen–yes, 14!–state-wide ballot initiatives.
First a general word about how these things get on the ballot.
There are four methods: the state legislature may propose state constitutional amendments and statutory initiatives. The amendments require 55% approval to pass, due to a constitutional amendment passed a few years ago aimed at limiting the number of constitutional amendments on the ballot. Seems like that didn’t work too well this year as the legislature proposed 5 of them.
Statutory amends are more rare, as the legislature can just pass laws and have the governor sign them–they don’t need to be referred to the people. Except in the case of tax increases. TABOR requires the state to refer these to the people. (The Democrats hate TABOR and try all kinds of ways to get around it–but that’s another story.) There are two of these on the ballot.
The citizens also have a voice.
Both constitutional amendments and statutes can be put on the ballot by citizen initiative. This year there are 2 amendments and 5 statutes on the ballot. In addition to amending the constitution or statutes, citizens have the right to outright repeal statutes via the initiative process. Although this option has been around for a century, it was first tried with National Popular Vote in 2020. The initiative failed to pass.
Each of the four types of ballot initiatives is designated by a different numbering or lettering system. Citizen initiatives get numbers, the legislature gets letters, each in two different sequences.
With that, here are my recommendations in brief:
Loading…
Reload document 
Open in new tab
Leave a Reply