I think the initiative 20 years ago was a good deal; a lot of tax limitation measures got passed. But lately, the courts have gotten a lot more brazen in overturning government-limiting measures, so it's the bad measures that predominate. Unless this court bias issue gets cleaned up, I'm thinking the day of the initiative has passed, at least as a check on government.
The initiative process could still be a useful tool if we first addressed the current problems with the judiciary, which are, in my view:
- The idea that judges should be appointed to represent special interests as opposed to interpreting and applying law.
- Judicial legislation.
With these two elements under control, the initiative process would become much more viable again. Any disputes in regard to the government's proper role in a given situation (such as a highly controversial state supreme court decision) should be resolved by the people themselves instead of taking it to the United States Supreme Court. This would serve as a check on the state judicial process, and would also rob the US Supreme Court of a chance to usurp more 10th amendment liberties from the states and the people.
"But the Chief Justice says, "there must be an ultimate arbiter somewhere." True, there must; but does that prove it is either party? The ultimate arbiter is the people of the Union, assembled by their deputies in convention, at the call of Congress, or of two-thirds of the States. Let them decide to which they mean to give authority claimed by two of their organs. And it has been the peculiar wisdom and felicity of our constitution, to have provided this peaceable appeal, where that of other nations is at once to force." - Thomas Jefferson
