| When it comes to efforts to place cannabis legalization measures on state ballots, campaign organizers’ work is rarely finished when they turn in the required number of signatures to state officials, or even when those state officials certify their initiatives for the ballot. While voters in six states—Arkansas, Maryland, Missouri, North Dakota, Oklahoma and South Dakota—will make their voices heard on cannabis legalization in the upcoming November election, it remains to be seen whether the votes on Arkansas’ adult-use legalization measure will count as a lawsuit makes its way through the legal system. Responsible Growth Arkansas submitted more than 190,000 signatures in July—more than double the 89,151 signatures required to qualify the Arkansas Adult-Use Amendment for the state’s ballot—and Secretary of State John Thurston even certified the signatures, only to have the state Board of Election Commissioners reject the measure last month after commissioners indicated that they didn’t believe the ballot title fully explained to voters the impact of the constitutional amendment.
Responsible Growth Arkansas then filed a lawsuit in the state’s Supreme Court to challenge the board’s decision, and the court has since issued a formal order, directing Thurston to “conditionally certify petitioners’ proposed initiated amendment pending this court’s decision in the case.” Voters will now have the opportunity to cast ballots on the amendment in the upcoming election, but it remains to be seen whether those votes hold any bearing to shift cannabis policy in the state as the case plays out in court.
Advocates in Nebraska are also embroiled in litigation—in that case, to ease the state’s ballot requirements—although the Secretary of State announced last month that Nebraskans for Medical Marijuana fell short on signatures to qualify the group’s two medical cannabis legalization initiatives for the November ballot.
At issue in that case is a rule that requires petitioners to not only gather signatures from 7% of Nebraska’s registered voters, but also 5% of voters in at least 38 of the state’s 93 counties in order to enact a statute. Some have argued that the 5% requirement gives disproportionate power to Nebraska’s smallest counties, and while a judge granted a preliminary injunction in June to block the Secretary of State from enforcing the rule, the state appealed, and the 8th Circuit Court of Appeals sided with state officials.
These cases, as well as others (the South Dakota Supreme Court’s ruling that overturned that state’s 2020 voter-approved adult-use cannabis legalization measure, for example), highlight the extent of the ongoing battle that cannabis advocates must fight to make voters’ voices heard on legalization.
-Melissa Schiller, Senior Digital Editor | 