The current Illinois State Constitution, ratified in 1970, allows voters to propose changes to the "structural and procedural" elements of the Illinois General Assembly.
Unlike some other states, Illinois does not offer a system for statutory changes, or any topic not related to the structure and procedures of the General Assembly.
On July 20, Cook County Circuit Court Judge Diane Larsen ruled the Independent Map Amendment to the Illinois Constitution unconstitutional. The case is now headed to the Illinois Supreme Court for an expedited decision
before the
August
26th ballot certification deadline. The Court will decide whether or not the initiative will appear on the November ballot for all Illinois voters.
As the recent court ruling may suggest, voters in Illinois often find it difficult to amend the Constitution.
Of the 16 states that allow citizen-led Constitutional ballot initiatives, Illinois is the only state to have no citizen initiatives reach the ballot in the past ten years.
California leads all states, averaging three proposals each year.
The states closest in numbers to Illinois are all considerably smaller in size, but had at least two initiatives reach the ballot in the past decade: Oklahoma, Nebraska, and Montana.
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Citizen-led Constitutional Amendment Initiatives
on Statewide Ballots, 2006 - 2016
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Compiled by the Illinois Campaign for Political Reform |
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Many states provide assistance or advice to the drafters of potential citizen initiatives. Certain states only provide feedback on legal framework, but
Oregon, Colorado, and California provide services that review and assess the content of the law as well. Those three states lead all others in the number of initiatives that reach the ballot. Illinois and Ohio are the only states that fail to offer such a service. Nonetheless, Ohio voters have managed to place eight amendments on the ballot over the last 10 years.
Both the lack of review resources and the narrow definition of permissible amendments make ballot initiatives incredibly rare in Illinois. This is true for not just the past ten years, but the entire life of our current state Constitution. Since the 1970 Constitution's ratification, only one citizen-led ballot initiative has appeared. That amendment successfully reduced the size of the Illinois General Assembly, and was spearheaded by Hon. Pat Quinn.
Contact: Sarah Brune at 312-436-1274 or sarah@ilcampaign.org
ICPR Data and Research Analysts Aaron Feldman and Jack Lockhart contributed to this report.
Data was sourced from the National Conference of State Legislatures and the Initiative & Referendum Institute at the University of Southern California.
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