Two Arkansas groups are working to ensure citizens' right to amend the state constitution.
Protect AR Rights and the League of Women Voters of Arkansas each want to put an amendment on the ballot strengthening the canvassing process altogether.
The Arkansas Constitution has language guaranteeing the right of citizens to pass amendments and initiatives — this means any citizen can work through a process to put a proposal on the ballot for a vote.
Recent legislative sessions have dialed the ease of the process back. Kwami Abdul-Bey with Protect AR Rights said the new laws make it impossible to put something on the ballot.
“These nearly 25 separate bills targeted each and every one of the 3 million people who call Arkansas home,” he said at a press conference Monday.
Both groups still have to get the language in their ballot titles approved by the attorney general. This may be difficult, as a new state law requires the proposal's ballot title be written at or below an eighth-grade reading level. This limits the number of syllables in each word and the number of words in each sentence. Protect AR Rights says this rule is almost impossible to follow along with another requirement mandating the wording be “clear.”
Jen Standerfer, a lawyer for the group, said the language in their proposal was probably too advanced for the grade level calculation, because it contains words like “fundamental."
“What I have found is that sometimes simplifying the language for readability actually requires you to lose substance,” she said.
Their amendment is called the Arkansas Ballot Measure Rights Amendment. It makes direct democracy a fundamental right, and is intentionally easy to read. Most sentences start with “it.”
“It makes 'petition fraud' a crime. It allows the legislature to decide the penalty range for criminals who intentionally defraud the petition process. It prohibits the government from unduly burdening these fundamental rights,” the ballot title reads.
Meanwhile, the League of Women Voters put forward an amendment called the Direct Democracy Amendment. The proposal differs slightly from the one from Protect AR Rights, such as over the burden of proof needed in a court challenge.
Keesa Smith-Brantley, executive director of Arkansas Advocates for Children and Families, said she hopes the two groups can coexist.
“We do not want there to be any confusion,” she said.
In a statement, David Couch, attorney for the League of Women Voters, said they have “been working for more than two years on a strategy to protect direct democracy in our state and for over 100 years to protect the right to vote.” He said they were not invited to be a part of Protect AR Rights' efforts, but they were willing to work in tandem with the group.
At the same time, Protect AR Rights is working with the League of Women Voters and the ACLU of Arkansas to challenge the laws in court.
In a statement, Arkansas Attorney General Tim Griffin said he will “vigorously defend the State and the constitutionality of our laws that govern ballot initiatives.”
The ballot titles from both groups will be reviewed in the coming weeks.
