Archive for October, 2009
Initiative Petition Signatory Disclosure Litigation
In the Tim Eyman Thurston County case, a lobbyist by the name of Wahl seeks copies of the signed petitions of various initiatives advanced by Eyman. Eyman is a Washington legislative advocate and a professional signature on petition gatherer. The copies, if produced, will give the lobbyist the name and address of each of the signatories to each of the petitions. See The Olympian,
One can imagine that the lobbyist is going to create a database of the names and addresses of the signatories. From the database the lobbyist will be able to tell whether there is a similarity of signatories from one petition to the next. If there is, and the similarities are significant, one might begin to wonder whether in today’s New World of computerization and the Internet a process of the creation of adjuvant state legislatures might be in the making. The thought being that if a certain group of people can constantly be counted upon to sign initiative petitions then this group of people will have been able to establish a certain legislative power in conjunction with one another that they otherwise would not have been able to establish.
One suspects that if this is true, or if this possibility has become a truth, legislation by initiative is going to come under significant scrutiny.