Initiative and referendum petitions are a vehicle for direct democracy. The "initiative petition" refers to a process whereby citizens may propose a law. They must then collect the signatures of a certain number of registered voters to put the proposal on the ballot.

Similarly, if citizens wish to repeal a law enacted by the Legislature, they must collect a certain number of signatures of registered voters on a "referendum petition."

Among the states which have initiative and referendum processes, Wyoming has the most difficult procedures. Backers of an initiative have 18 months to gather a number of registered voter signatures equal to 15% of the number who voted in the last Congressional election, with signatures from at least two-thirds of Wyoming’s 23 counties.

For a referendum, the same number and distribution of signatures must be collected within 90 days of the adjournment of the legislative session in which the subject law was passed.

Under these procedures, few initiatives and only one referendum have ever qualified by meeting the signature requirement.

Further, once an initiative is qualified, it must then go to the Legislature for action. If the Legislature fails to enact "substantially similar" legislation, then the initiative or referendum proceeds to the ballot for a vote of the people.

There it must pass by a majority of those voting in the election -- as opposed to those voting on the initiative or referendum question itself -- so voters who do not vote on the initiative or referendum are, in effect, voting no.

Nearly all the successful initiatives in recent years made it because their backers hired political consultants who specialize in qualifying initiatives - that is, they pay workers to collect signatures. The workers stand in front of public facilities like the Post Office or go door-to-door and gather signatures of registered voters.

SJ 1, a proposed constitutional amendment, was offered to try to reinject a "home-grown" element into the initiative and referendum processes by requiring that the distribution of signatures not only include voters in two-thirds of Wyoming’s counties, but be equal to 15% of the residents in at least two-thirds of the counties, as determined by the total number who voted in the preceding general election in that county.

In other words, the distribution requirement could no longer be satisfied by getting most of the signatures in certain counties and then meeting the two-thirds requirement with a handful of signatures from several more.

According to the bill, the purpose of the amendment "is to ensure that the signatures needed to place an initiative or referendum on the ballot cannot be gathered in only the most populated counties, and that a significant number of qualified voters from throughout the state support the proposal."

Opponents of the constitutional amendment pointed out that since the amendment did not lower the high signature requirement, it just make the initiative process that much harder and therefore even more susceptible to being bought.

Also, since initiative and referendum are processes through which the people act as the legislature, a signature distribution requirement based on counties violates the principle of "one person, one vote." This is because the counties are not equally populated, so a signature distribution requirement that treats all counties the same will give a sparsely populated county too much clout, and a heavily populated county too little.

SJ 1 passed the Senate, 24-6, and the House, 43-17.

It will appear on the general election ballot in 1998, where it must win the approval of 50% of those voting in the election; voters who do not vote on the proposed amendment will effectively be voting no.