Time to Turn Around and Fix This

C.S. Lewis had a line I’ve been thinking about a lot lately. He said that if you’re on the wrong road, progress means turning around and walking back to the right one. The man who turns back soonest is the most progressive. I like that. It’s the kind of common sense that doesn’t age.

We’ve spent three editorials talking about Montana’s initiative and referendum process — where it came from, who’s using it, and why it’s a structural problem for our republican form of government. Today I want to talk about what we do about it.

I’ll be honest with you. Getting rid of the initiative process entirely would require a constitutional amendment, but that is not the goal. I believe fixing it the right destination, but you don’t fix a leaky roof by wishing it were a different house. In the meantime, there are real, achievable reforms that would close the worst of the doors that outside interests are walking through right now.

First: ban out-of-state money from funding signature campaigns. This is the simplest and most direct fix. If an initiative is a genuine expression of Montana voter sentiment, then Montanans should be the ones funding the signature-gathering effort. The moment you require that the petition phase be paid for by Montanans, you find out pretty quickly whether there’s real organic support for a measure or whether it’s being manufactured by national money. Let the campaign ads come from wherever — but the signatures ought to reflect actual Montana citizens, not a Washington D.C. checkbook.

Second: require that signature gatherers be registered Montana voters. Right now, you can hire a commercial firm from out of state to put people on street corners in Missoula and Great Falls collecting names. That is not grassroots civic engagement. That is a commercial transaction that mimics the appearance of public support. If your measure actually has support in Montana, you can find Montanans to gather signatures for it.

Third: fix the ballot language requirements. The “gist” — the summary that voters read on the petition and on the ballot — has to be honest. It cannot use euphemisms. It cannot hide the cost to taxpayers. If the Secretary of State determines that the gist misrepresents what the measure actually does, she ought to be able to throw it out. Voters who are being asked to make law deserve plain language, not consultant-crafted spin.

Fourth: require a fiscal note before signature gathering even begins. Every bill that comes through the legislature gets a fiscal analysis — an honest accounting of what it’s going to cost the state. An initiative that can raise your taxes, create new state programs, or change how state agencies operate ought to face the same scrutiny before it ever hits a ballot. The people signing the petition deserve to know the price tag.

Fifth: fix the geographic distribution requirement so it actually means something. Right now the threshold can be satisfied by concentrating almost entirely in four or five urban counties. That is not a statewide measure of support. It is an urban measure of support, and for issues that most directly affect rural Montana — water, grazing, timber, agriculture — that gap matters enormously. The distribution requirement should be designed to ensure that rural Montana actually has a voice in what reaches the ballot.

And for the long game: we ought to be pushing for a constitutional amendment that raises the bar significantly for any initiative that would amend the state constitution itself. A ten percent signature threshold to permanently rewrite Montana’s foundational document is not a safeguard. It’s an invitation. We can do better.

None of these reforms take the ballot away from Montana voters. What they do is ensure that when something reaches that ballot, it got there because real Montanans wanted it there — not because a national organization with deep pockets decided Montana was a convenient venue for their next campaign.

We built a republic for good reasons. The Founders were right. And we can restore it — one reform at a time, one session at a time. That’s the work, and I’m glad to be doing it alongside you.