overturning propositions

Factual Questions
1

Recently in California, Proposition 8 was ruled unconstitutional. Have there been past propostions, elected by majority vote, that have been deemed unconstitutional and overturned? Jonie Kipling

2

Yes. While I don’t have any expertise in California jurisprudence, the immediate cause of Proposition 8 being presented was the finding that Proposition 22 was unconstitutional. To avoid this being any more confusing than necessary, let me outline the sequence of events:

  1. The idea of gay marriages first is broached, becoming a public issue in the late 1990s/first couple of years of the 2000s.

  2. A group of social conservatives puts Proposition 22 on the ballot in 2002. When passed, this puts a statute on the lawbooks defining marriage as one man and one woman.

  3. This law is challenged in the state courts in 2007-08, culminating in a State Supreme Court decision that this statute violates the equal protection clause of the California State Constitution, which includes sexual orientation explicitly among its protected classes.

  4. With its overturning in late spring 2008, gay marriage becomes legal in California.

  5. The social conservatives, bolstered by out-of-state support, introduce Proposition 8, placing a one man/one woman definition of marriage in the state constituution. Since it becomes itself a clause of the state constitution, the equal protection clause of the state constitution does not operate against it.

  6. This is challenged in state court as not having been passed by the proper procedure for that style of amendment.

  7. The State Supreme Court finds that it was properly passed.

  8. A challenge is then mounted in Federal court that Proposition 8 violates the equal protection and due process clauses of Amendment XIV of the U.S. Constitution.

  9. The U.S. District Court finds that it does indeed violate those clauses, declares it unconstitutional, and stays the effect of the ruling temporarily to permit the decision to be appealed.

So the reason for Proposition 8 was that Proposition 22 was found unconstitutional – of the state constitution, in the state courts.

There are likely other cases – I happened to know about that one owing to the background when Prop 8 became national news.

3

Proposition 187 in California.

4

The court struck California Prop. 105 “Public’s Right to Know Act,” which was adopted by the voters in 1998. The court held the initiative violated the “single subject rule” in the state constitution, which limits initiatives to a “single subject.” (Chemical Specialties Manufacturers Assn., Inc. v. Deukmejian (1991) 227 Cal.App.3d 663 , 278 Cal.Rptr. 128.)

Article II, section 8, subdivision (d) of the California Constitution provides: “An initiative measure embracing more than one subject may not be submitted to the electors or have any effect.”

5

Don’t forget Colorado’s Amendment 2.

The U.S. Supreme Court decision.
The Colorado Supreme Court decision

6

Here are some others:

http://www.thefreelibrary.com/State+appeals+ruling+tossing+Hanford+ban%3B+Initiative+297…-a0148160493
http://www.bpnews.net/printerfriendly.asp?ID=711

7

California’s proposition 14 from 1963 was ruled unconstitutional.