Some Legislators Pushing Back Against Citizen and Activist Group Initiative Petitions

The success of the ballot initiative to legalize recreational marijuana appears to have rallied some lawmakers who want to make it harder to amend the Missouri Constitution. 

Several bills have been pre-filed in the Missouri House and Senate that would place limits on the initiative petition process, making it harder for outside activist groups to rally citizens into passing issues that lawmakers tend to neglect. 

In addition to legalizing marijuana, the initiative petition system was used in 2018 to add Medicaid expansion to the State Constitution after Republican leaders in both chambers kept blocking expansion efforts by Democrats.