This autumn, voters across 41 states will weigh in on over 140 ballot measures running the gamut from life and death issues to tax proposals. Rather than relying solely on elected officials, these ballot measures allow citizens to render direct judgments on critical matters. California, Colorado, and Arizona are slated to host the most measures, although the final count may increase in certain states or decrease due to ongoing legal challenges.
In the wake of the 2022 Supreme Court decision that overturned national legal protections for abortion and transferred authority over the issue to states, a spate of abortion initiatives has emerged. Nine states including Arizona, Colorado, Florida, Maryland, and South Dakota, among others, will address proposed constitutional amendments to affirm abortion rights. Most of these proposals aim to ensure access to abortion until the point of fetal viability, with allowances for later terminations to preserve the health of the prospective mother.
Nebraska alone offers a counter-proposition, which would emboss the state’s existing 12-week abortion ban, with rape, incest, and the health of the mother as exception clauses, into the constitution. In the event that both measures receive the majority vote, the one with the highest vote count wins. In another development, a proposed New York amendment seeks to outlaw discrimination based on one’s ‘pregnancy outcomes’ or ‘reproductive healthcare and autonomy,’ though it doesn’t explicitly address abortion.
In West Virginia, a sole amendment seeks to outlaw doctor-aided suicide. Assisted suicide is currently legal in ten states and Washington, D.C. Similarly, in eight Republican-led states, constitutional amendments that only allow citizens to vote have been put forth. While noncitizens are already prohibited from voting in federal elections by a 1996 U.S. law and several state laws, these new proposals specifically target the constitutions of states like Idaho, Iowa, Missouri, and others.
A proposal in California seeks to intensify penalties for serial shoplifters and fentanyl peddlers and establish a fresh drug court therapy program for individuals with numerous drug convictions. The intent is to roll back bits of a 2014 initiative which had downscaled penalties for non-violent drug offenses and property crimes as a response to prison overcrowding, amid an uptick in widespread store burglaries perpetrated by organized groups.
In Arizona, voters will decide on a measure that would mandate life sentences for certain child sex trafficking offenses. Meanwhile, Colorado has two propositions on the docket that would disallow bail in first-degree murder cases and extend mandatory jail time before parole eligibility for offenders convicted of specific violent crimes.
Several states including Idaho, Montana, Nevada, and South Dakota are considering measures to establish open primary elections, where candidates from all parties compete on a single ballot. Arizona voters have two competing proposals to mull over— one advocating open primaries, and the other upholding the state’s existing partisan primaries system. The proposal with the highest number of votes takes effect in the event of both being passed.
On the other hand, Florida is considering extending partisan elections to its school boards, thereby reversing a 1998 amendment that rendered them officially non-partisan by eliminating party labels from ballots. Proposals in Idaho, Nevada, and Oregon are pushing for the introduction of ranked choice voting, a system currently employed in Alaska and Maine, where voters rank their candidates in order of preference until one achieves a majority.
A Connecticut amendment seeks to authorize absentee voting without having to provide a reason. In contrast, a Nevada proposition requires photo identification to part in in-person votes or the last four digits of either a driver’s license or Social Security number for mail voting. This provision, if approved, entails a second positive vote in 2026 to take effect.
A proposed Colorado amendment intends to follow California’s precedent by imposing a sales tax on firearms and ammunition, with the majority of proceeds allocated to services for victims of crime. Arizona, on the other hand, is considering a bill making illegal entry from abroad a state crime unless one passes through sanctioned ports of entry, much like a contested Texas law.
In terms of drug legislature, voters in Florida, North Dakota, and South Dakota will settle the question of whether to legalize recreational marijuana for adults. Turning to Massachusetts, an initiative aims to legalize the possession and supervised consumption of natural psychedelics such as psilocybin mushrooms.
Several states, including California, Colorado, and Hawaii, are tackling outdated, unenforceable laws against same-sex marriage – a right that was federally legalized in 2015. Moreover, a California proposal seeks to enshrine the right to marry as fundamental.
On the topic of wages, a California measure seeks to incrementally lift the state’s minimum wage for all employers to $18 an hour, and Alaska and Missouri both aim to raise their minimum wages to $15, along with mandating paid leave for sickness. However, Arizona considers permitting employers to pay worker receiving tips up to 25% less than the minimum wage, as long as the tips ensure that the total remuneration exceeds the minimum wage.