This article first appeared in the St. Louis Beacon, March 5, 2011 - As it retools from last fall's losses, the Missouri Democratic Party is dispatching its grassroots activists to collect signatures on several initiative petitions that the party and its allies believe can help turn the tide.
New state Democratic Party chairman Susan Montee said Saturday that the party will be actively working to get proposals on the 2012 statewide ballot that would:
- Allow no-fault early voting in Missouri, which now is among a minority of states that don't offer it. Voters can cast absentee ballots for six weeks before the election, but by law they are supposed to meet certain requirements.
- Restore state campaign-donation limits, although at a higher level than when the Legislature and then-Gov. Matt Blunt tossed them out in 2007. Montee said the proposed initiative petition was submitted Friday to the secretary of state's office.
- Reduce the size of the Missouri House to 103 members from the current 163. Missouri's House is among the largest in the country.
Although Missouri political parties have often taken stands on ballot measures, it's rare for them to coordinate the campaigns to get the issues on the ballot.
Montee, who lost her re-election bid for state auditor last fall, said in an interview that Democratic leaders decided in December that the party needed to get involved in issues as well as candidates.
The reason is obvious, Montee said. After last fall's losses, Democrats are so heavily outnumbered in the state House and Senate that "if we have an agenda, the only way to advance it is to go directly to the voters."
Montee said that the plan calls for using the party's congressional and county committees to collect signatures. And she acknowledges that will be quite a task.
Because all three proposals likely would be constitutional amendments (the donation-limit proposal may be a statutory change), advocates will need signatures from roughly 147,000 to almost 160,000 registered voters, in total, from at least six of the state's nine congressional districts. The number of signatures depends on which six districts are selected.
A ballot measure seeking a change in state law would require just over 90,000 signatures.
Montee said that the party hopes to conduct training sessions at Jackson Days, the regional Democratic event held in early April in Springfield, and to have some petition signature-collection sheets ready for distribution.
Missouri labor unions, a traditional ally of the state party, might also be tapped to help collect signatures. Some leaders already have called for backing the proposal to reduce the size of the Missouri House, in part reflecting anger over the effort of some Republicans to pass a right-to-work measure that would bar closed union shops this session.
Montee said that the Democratic Party is focusing on the financial benefits of reducing the size of the Missouri House, now the nation's fourth largest. Fewer members would save the state about $5 million a year, she said
No-fault early voting long has been favored by Democrats, and some Republicans, because it gives registered voters more options and more time to cast their ballots.
Several proposed initiative petitions to allow early voting have been submitted to the secretary of state's office. The proposals are in court, Montee said, because of disputes over the ballot language. The wording must be resolved before signatures can be collected.
As for campaign-donation limits, Gov. Jay Nixon has been among the Democrats who have decried their elimination. Nixon noted that the state's former limits were created after more than 70 percent of Missouri voters approved even stricter limits in 1992.
The GOP-led elimination of the old voter-approved limits is one of the examples cited by Democrats as examples of Republicans ignoring or overturning the will of the voters. Speakers at this weekend's Democrat Days also point to the current Republican push to curb the minimum wage increases mandated by a ballot measure approved by more than 70 percent of the voters in 2006.
But there is a split even within Democratic ranks on the issue of whether and when it's appropriate for the legislature to change laws enacted via initiative petitions.
Voters narrowly approved last fall the measure, known as Proposition B, that imposes restrictions on dog breeders.
But several rural Democratic legislators are involved in the efforts to alter Prop B because most rural counties overwhelmingly opposed the measure out of fear that it might lead to similar regulations regarding the care of farm animals.
Montee doesn't foresee a Democratic split on any of the three initiative-petition drives that the party is about to conduct.
