Origins, history, and current use of ballot initiatives in wildlife management

Ballot initiatives allow citizen majorities to initiate and implement governmental policy. The United States of America is one of the few democracies in the world without a national ballot initiative system. The founders of the Constitution chose representative democracy, where the wishes of the governed are translated through elected representatives, because majority citizen rule was believed to be a precursor to infringement of minority rights and liberties. Ballot initiative systems were ‘ adopted by many states, however, between 1897–1915 in response to corrupt state legislatures dominated by corporations and monopolies. Natural resource issues began appearing on ballots beginning in South Dakota and Oregon in 1908, but have increased rapidly in the last 20 years. Wildlife management policy established by ballot initiative outcomes has generally been related either to the prohibition of some activity or to the funding, structure, and programs of state wildlife management agencies. Prohibitions created by ballot initiative have affected commercial fisheries and bear, mountain lion, and furbearer management in various states. Common themes may connect the prohibitions caused by ballot initiatives. Ballot initiative systems are designed to produce an open, responsive government. Yet influence by well‐funded special interest groups on an uninformed general public may unfairly limit consumptive user groups regulated by state wildlife management agencies. These user groups are in almost every case a numerical minority of the state's voting population and may not have access to the tools needed to level the playing field in a ballot initiative.