Marijuana DQ’d, casino measure next?

By STEVE BRAWNER

Unless the state Supreme Court rules differently, Arkansans won’t be voting on a proposed medical marijuana amendment this year.

That’s the latest after Secretary of State John Thurston Monday informed Arkansans for Patient Access that it had not collected enough signatures to qualify for consideration.

Thurston had disqualified most of the signatures the group had submitted during the “cure period” allowed under the Constitution. Citizen-led ballot groups get an extra 30 days if they come within 25% of the required signatures during the initial collection period. 

Signatures can be disqualified for a variety of reasons. Thurston earlier had said he would be rejecting signatures collected by paid canvassers if their background checks had been certified by the manager of their canvassing company. Under the law, a proposal’s sponsor must certify the background checks. He originally had allowed managers to sign the documents on a sponsor’s behalf but reversed course after Attorney General Tim Griffin said only the sponsor can do so. 

An Arkansans for Patient Access spokesperson told the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette that it will file a lawsuit to revive the effort.

The question about who exactly can certify the canvassers is already before the Supreme Court. The same issue occurred regarding a proposed constitutional amendment that would revoke the future Pope County casino’s license. A favorable ruling for that effort might breathe life into the medical marijuana one. Based on past history, I would bet against both, no pun intended.

One amendment definitely has qualified for the ballot. It would make state lottery scholarships available for students attending public and private vocational or technical schools and institutes. It was referred to voters by the Legislature, so it did not have to go through the signature collection process. 

Arkansas is one of 16 states that allow citizen groups to propose constitutional amendments that go directly to the ballot. It is obvious the process isn’t working as well as it could. Early voting begins in less than three weeks on Oct. 21, and Arkansans still do not know if the casino and marijuana proposals will be in question. They will be on the ballot regardless, but if they don’t qualify, their votes won’t be counted.

At this stage of the election season, one of two things should be occurring.

The first is that voters should be educating themselves on the proposals’ pros and cons. Supporters and opponents should be spending money on ads and polls, not lawyers. Journalists should be disseminating overlooked details – for example, that the marijuana proposal includes a trigger mechanism letting adults possess an ounce of cannabis recreationally if the federal government no longer lists marijuana as a controlled substance, or if Congress makes possession no longer a federal crime.

Or second, the proposals should be memories and out of the headlines, and voters should be focusing on clean ballots where all the votes will be counted in every race.

Amending the Arkansas Constitution should be hard, but it’s too hard in the wrong ways and not hard enough where it should be harder. A proposed constitutional amendment should fail because it lacks broad support or because it conflicts with the U.S. Constitution, not because of signature questions that require a Supreme Court ruling. We probably should increase the number of signatures required for consideration and/or the percentage of votes required for voter approval (it’s just 50% plus one now), but reduce all the technicalities. 

There’s one other way to make it hard to amend the Constitution: Voters themselves should set the bar high. In addition to asking ourselves,“Do I agree with this?” we also should ask, “Should this be in the Constitution or just be a law?”

A Constitution should provide a broad framework describing the government’s structure and the people’s rights. It should be the law of the land. 

Casino licenses shouldn’t be in the Constitution, as they are now. Neither should the Constitution describe which plants we can smoke. Those are matters for changeable law that can be passed or amended by the Legislature or through an initiated act, which is a law passed by voters.

For now, I guess we’ll all just have to keep our eyes on the Supreme Court. The wheels of justice turn slowly. 

This election, however, is coming quickly. Again, voting starts in less than three weeks. 

Steve Brawner is a syndicated columnist published in 17 outlets in Arkansas. Email him at brawnersteve@mac.com.