Pubdate: Wed, 01 Nov 2000
Source: Baltimore Sun (MD)
Copyright: 2000 The Baltimore Sun, a Times Mirror Newspaper.
Contact:  501 N. Calvert Street P.0. Box 1377 Baltimore, MD 21278
Fax: (410) 315-8912
Website: http://www.sunspot.net/
Forum: http://www.sunspot.net/cgi-bin/ultbb/Ultimate.cgi?action=intro
Author: Lyle Denniston

MARIJUANA, GAY RIGHTS LEAD MYRIAD BALLOT QUESTIONS

Voters Have Chance To Decide Policy Issues

WASHINGTON - The often successful drive to legalize marijuana as a medicine 
and the seldom victorious effort to allow doctor-assisted suicide will be 
back on the ballot in some states next week amid an outpouring of voter issues.

Citizens with gripes or policy ideas that state legislatures won't pursue 
will have the chance on Tuesday to test the popularity of their causes as 
more than 200 proposals go before the voters in 42 states.

Once again, says the Initiative and Referendum Institute, a 
Washington-based group that tracks citizen actions, voters will face 
"politically diverse, emotional and very controversial issues."

What's different this year, the institute adds, "is the sheer magnitude of 
the impact the election outcomes might have. Tremendous social and fiscal 
changes are possible, and if they occur, the impact on our society will be 
long lasting."

Perhaps the boldest collection of measures in any one state will be on 
Maine's ballot. One proposal would make that state the second, after 
Oregon, to create a "right to die" by authorizing doctor-assisted suicide 
for "a terminally ill adult who is of sound mind."

Another proposal tests voters' willingness to put into effect a bill, 
already passed by the Legislature, to bar discrimination against gays and 
lesbians in access to jobs, housing, credit and public accommodations. 
Twice before, such measures have been repealed by the voters. But polls 
indicate that the new measure might prevail.

Maine will also vote on whether to allow video lottery games at horse 
racing tracks, with 40 percent of the take to be passed out to local 
governments.

Gay rights also figure on the ballots in three other states. After 
Vermont's move this year to authorize gays and lesbians to join in 
marriage-like "civil unions," Nebraska will be the next state to decide the 
issue. On the ballot there is a proposal to ban civil unions, along with a 
constitutional amendment to forbid to homosexuals to marry.

Nevada will also vote on a proposed ban on gay marriages. In similar votes 
in the past, Alaska, California and Hawaii have barred same-sex marriages. 
A total of 33 states now forbid that practice.

Oregon will decide whether to bar public school teachers from teaching 
about homosexuality in a way that "encourages, promotes or sanctions" such 
behavior.

On another marriage issue, Alabama will vote on whether to legalize 
marriage between couples of different races - a symbolic vote only. A ban 
included in the state constitution has been unconstitutional since a 1967 
Supreme Court ruling, but Alabama has never formally acknowledged that fact 
by repealing the ban. South Carolina voters lifted a similar ban in that 
state two years ago.

Abortion figures in only one ballot contest this year: A Colorado proposal 
would forbid abortions until after doctors and clinics have given pregnant 
women information that might discourage them from ending their pregnancies.

The effort to use citizen initiatives to permit the use of marijuana as a 
form of medicine continues this year, with ballot proposals in Colorado and 
Nevada. Marijuana-as-medicine proposals have succeeded in the past in 
Alaska, Arizona, California, Maine and Washington state, as well as in the 
District of Columbia.

Alaskans will be asked to legalize the possession, use, cultivation and 
sale of marijuana - something no state has yet done. If that measure 
passed, the Justice Department would likely move to bar it from taking 
effect, on the theory that the federal ban on marijuana takes precedence.

In California and Massachusetts, the ballots include proposals to provide 
treatment, instead of jail time, for some users of illegal drugs.

Among the usual array of education questions, the ballots in California and 
Michigan contain measures to authorize vouchers that students could use to 
pay private school tuition. The Washington state ballot has a measure to 
encourage charter schools as an alternative to regular public schools.

Proposals for using the money that states are being paid from the 
settlement of lawsuits against the tobacco industry are on the ballot in 
several states.

Voters in Arizona, Arkansas, Oklahoma and Oregon will decide whether to 
direct legislatures to spend the money on such things as health insurance 
for the elderly or low-income families and research on early detection of 
diseases.

The English-only movement to promote official use of the language is 
represented by measures in Oklahoma and Utah. In Arizona, voters will face 
a proposed ban on bilingual education in the public schools.

Gun control reappears on the ballots in Colorado and Oregon, where voters 
will decide whether to require criminal background checks before a purchase 
made at a gun show can be completed.

Proposals on wildlife protection - and some offsetting proposals to protect 
hunters' rights - are on the ballots in a handful of states.

Oregon is the state with the most measures, 26. A dozen or more are on the 
ballots in Arizona, Alabama and Colorado.

In Maryland, the only measures on the ballot are two that were put there by 
the General Assembly: a measure to allow for faster county takeover of 
private property needed for redevelopment in Prince George's County and a 
proposal to change the way officers of Cecil County are elected.
- ---
MAP posted-by: Keith Brilhart