For the fifth straight year, lawmakers will debate restoring Mississippi’s ballot initiative when they convene at the Capitol in January.
House Constitution Chairman Price Wallace, a Republican from Mendenhall, and Senate Elections Chairman Jeremy England, a Republican from Vancleave, told Mississippi Today that they will likely file bills to give Mississippians a way to circumvent the Legislature and place issues on a statewide ballot.
“It’s important,” England said. “It’s important for the people to feel like ‘If our Legislature is not reacting to things we want, then we want to have this process available to us.’”
Mississippians had the constitutional right to a ballot initiative starting in 1914, but the state Supreme Court threw it out in 1922. The initiative went dormant until the Legislature and voters restored the right by passing a measure in 1992, allowing voters to amend the state constitution. But the Supreme Court again nullified it on technical grounds in 2021 in a ruling on a lawsuit over voters passing a medical marijuana initiative.
Ever since the Mississippi Supreme Court invalidated the ballot initiative then, legislators have been unable to reach a consensus on how to restore the right to voters.
Since the court’s ruling, some lawmakers have questioned whether Mississippi needs an initiative and raised concerns that uber-wealthy out-of-state special interests can manipulate voters through ballot initiatives.
To assuage these concerns, Senate leaders have proposed a new initiative process that requires petitioners to collect a larger number of voters’ signatures to have something placed on a ballot than in the previous process.
“The process should be difficult because it goes around and goes outside our constitutional republic system of government,” England said.
House leaders, on the other hand, have pushed for an initiative process similar to the previous one. Last year, Rep. Wallace advocated for a process that required petitioners to gather around 140,000 signatures before it could be considered on the ballot.
But the Simpson County Republican said he hopes lawmakers could work constructively this year to find some common ground on how to restore the process.
“We’re all going to work on something,” Wallace said.
Both House and Senate leaders agree that a new initiative process should only allow voters to make changes to state law, not the Constitution, and not allow voters to propose initiatives related to abortion and the public pension system.
During the 30 years that the state had an initiative, only seven proposals made it to a statewide ballot: two initiatives for term limits, eminent domain reform, voter ID, a personhood amendment, medical marijuana, and a measure requiring lawmakers to fully fund public education.
Of those seven, only eminent domain, voter ID and medical marijuana were approved by voters. The rest were rejected.
Hence then, the article about mississippi legislators to debate restoring ballot initiative during 2026 session was published today ( ) and is available on Mississippi Today ( Middle East ) The editorial team at PressBee has edited and verified it, and it may have been modified, fully republished, or quoted. You can read and follow the updates of this news or article from its original source.
Read More Details
Finally We wish PressBee provided you with enough information of ( Mississippi legislators to debate restoring ballot initiative during 2026 session )
Also on site :
- Saudi Arabia to unify LPG gas cylinder prices nationwide from January 2026
- Two dozen killed in Ukrainian strike on Russian New Year’s celebration – governor
- Volunteer in Iran’s Revolutionary Guard reportedly killed during widening protests