In 2008, State Senator DiAnna Schimek’s 20-year legislative career came to an end, thanks to the term limits initiative enacted by Nebraska voters. Third time proved the charm; the state supreme court had struck down the first two citizen-initiated term-limit measures.
Without the initiative process, no term limits. That’s reason enough for Schimek and other pseudo-solons to despise the initiative — not to mention that every initiative breaks legislators’ law-making monopoly
In 2008, Sen. Schimek and her fellow unicamereleons realized the voters had won. Unable to overturn term limits a third time, they did the next worst thing: wreck the path by which such popular reforms could be instituted in the future.
Schimek introduced Legislative Bill 39, which re-wrote the rules for petitioning initiative measures onto the ballot. Illuminatingly, more than 90 percent of state senators termed-out that year supported Schimek’s parting shot to punish the initiative petition process. When the governor vetoed this frontal assault on a fundamental democratic check, legislators overrode his veto.
Since passage of LB 39 in 2008, not a single citizen initiative has qualified for the ballot.
Then, on Tuesday, after a multi-year legal challenge brought by Citizens in Charge and Nebraska citizens, a federal judge struck down the law’s ban on out-of state petition circulators as unconstitutional.
One of the chains left around the neck of the Nebraska citizenry by Schimek and that last batch of career politicians has now been removed.
This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.
4 replies on “Nebraska Initiative: Open or Closed?”
A million thanks to Jacob and Citizens In Charge for their efforts and success here. As a citizen who recognizes that government is often misused to steal from citizens, and that these efforts deal a blow to the thieves, I thank them for helping to eliminate this abuse of (and by) our government.
The American people have always had it within their power to impose term limits — through the ballot box. Nothing stops any of us from voting out the people who are in. They don’t have a god-given right to rule. We keep giving it to them. The government we have is our fault.
Congratulations from the “Wild East” in Europe! It’s hard to fight for freedom here but success like that against its usurpers is always inspiring. We must globally come together to save the world from them!
@Pat — I don’t blame the voters because so often the voters lack a meaningful choice. But either way, the answer is for us to get politically active and to demand the power AND the processes to control government. That includes electing people who believe and act upon the idea of citizens, not politicians, having the ultimate say-so.