Missourians could make it harder to overturn ballot items

Missourians could decide this fall whether to make it much harder for the legislature to overturn voter-approved initiatives.

Backers of the Respect Missouri Voters initiative said they were turning in more than 350,000 signatures to Secretary of State Denny Hoskins’ office on Sunday. If they reach certain signature thresholds in six out of eight congressional districts, the proposed constitutional amendment will be on the November ballot.

Among other provisions, the Respect Missouri Voters initiative:

• Requires ballot summaries to be “clear, unbiased, fair, accurate and easy to understand.” It bars the legislature from curtailing how judges rewrite ballot summaries.
• Disallows the legislature from passing any law or referring any ballot initiative to voters that weakens the initiative petition process. That includes boosting the threshold needed to approve a constitutional amendment or raising the number of signatures needed for something to qualify for the ballot.
• Bars lawmakers from changing or repealing any voter-approved statute or constitutional amendment unless 80% of the legislature agrees to refer alterations to a statewide vote.

Benjamin Singer of Respect Missouri Voters said that the high bar to change any voter-approved measure would apply to anything enacted after Jan. 1, 2010.

“We didn’t want to have a situation where we’re relitigating 120 years of law,” Singer said. “We just wanted to say, ‘Look, if there’s something that people have voted on in the last 15 years, the people decided, let’s move forward from here and protect the will of the people.’”

Singer said his initiative was able to garner interest after the GOP-controlled legislature last year overturned a voter-approved paid sick leave initiative and placed a measure repealing a 2024 constitutional amendment protecting abortion rights on this year’s ballot.

“Other states have this in their constitution where they require a huge bipartisan supermajority if politicians want to change something that people have voted on and send it back to a vote of the people,” Singer said. “And so that’s what we are going to have. Because Missouri, unfortunately, has been one of the states that doesn’t have this protection of the will of the people in our constitution.”

Dueling ballot items 

Missouri lawmakers placed a separate measure on the 2026 ballot that would require any constitutional amendment put on the ballot through initiative petition to pass in eight out of eight congressional districts.

Singer said his group would be working to defeat the proposal.

“And we have to pass the Respect Missouri Voters amendment, which will prevent them from trying to take away this freedom ever again,” Singer said.

Gov. Mike Kehoe has not said whether Amendment 4 will appear on the ballot in August or November. His office said he plans to make that decision by May 22.

It’s also possible that the Respect Missouri Voters initiative could impact future changes to Missouri’s congressional map. That’s because the group’s proposal states the legislature cannot propose, pass or refer any law “similar in effect to a law rejected by referendum petition, unless 80 percent of the House or Senate refer the change to a vote of the people.”

That means if a referendum on a map lawmakers passed in 2025 makes the 2026 ballot, voters reject the 2025 congressional map, and the Respect Missouri Voters initiative passes, it may be difficult for lawmakers to approve new congressional lines in 2027 without 80% of the legislature referring it to a statewide vote.

“It is not right for politicians and special interests to try to undermine what the people of Missouri voted on that is counter to the spirit and the letter of our constitution,” Singer said. “And so for any citizen petition, whether it’s an initiative or a referendum, constitutional or statute, we have to protect the voice of the people. That’s who government is supposed to work for.”

Hoskins has not said whether the referendum on the congressional map will appear on the November ballot. The group behind the referendum, People Not Politicians, has pointed to numbers released by Hoskins’ office showing it collected enough signatures.