California voters can cast their ballots to do three things: They can write their own laws (the initiative), veto laws the Legislature has passed (the referendum), and remove officials before their terms end (the recall).
All three came out of a 1911 progressive revolt against railroad control of the Legislature, and the idea has held ever since: When elected government is captured or unresponsive, the people have an option to bypass elected officials.
California has voted on about 1,300 statewide measures since 1912, more than almost any place on earth.
To put an initiative on the ballot, proponents file the proposed law with the attorney general, who writes its official title and summary. They then have 180 days to gather signatures.
To qualify for the ballot, a statute needs signatures equal to 5 percent of the total votes cast in the last governor’s race. A constitutional amendment, being a more substantial change, needs 8 percent. County officials verify the signatures and the secretary of state certifies qualifying measures to appear on the ballot. The Legislature can also place measures on the ballot directly.
On the ballot, every measure is a straight yes-or-no vote. There are no amendments and no committee markup. Voters either adopt the proponents’ text as written or reject it.
A simple majority decides, and if two conflicting measures both pass, the one with more yes votes wins. What voters approve outranks ordinary legislation, so a measure can lock a policy or a budget formula in place for decades until another vote of the people changes it.
How does a measure get on the ballot?
There are five steps to getting on the ballot.
- Anyone may file a proposed law with the attorney general’s office and pay a $2,000 fee, which is refunded if the measure qualifies for the ballot.
- The attorney general writes the official title and the summary that appear on petitions.
- Proponents have 180 days to gather signatures: 5 percent of the votes cast in the last governor’s race are required for a statute, currently 546,651 valid signatures, and 8 percent are required for a constitutional amendment, currently 874,641.
- County officials verify signatures, usually by random sample.
- The secretary of state’s office certifies qualified measures to appear on the ballot at least 131 days before the election.
Why does it cost millions of dollars?
Volunteer signature drives almost never hit the threshold in 180 days. A paid-circulator industry charges by the signature, with rates that rise as deadlines approach.
Qualifying a measure typically costs several million dollars even before a single campaign ad runs. The practical result is the system’s central irony: A tool built to check moneyed interests now usually requires money to be successful.
Voter signature drives led by unions, business associations, and wealthy individuals tend to be more successful for this reason.
Genuine volunteer efforts that qualify, like the volunteer-dominated drive for the 2026 voter ID initiative (Proposition 39), are rare enough to be news.
What is the difference between an initiative statute and a constitutional amendment?
A constitutional amendment is more durable than an initiative statute.
The Legislature generally cannot amend an initiative statute without voter permission unless the measure itself allows amendment by the Legislature. For example, most modern measures specify that a two-thirds legislative vote can amend the statute in a way that is consistent with the measure’s purpose.
However, a constitutional amendment can only be changed by another vote of the people. Ballot measure drafters choose accordingly—measures which are expected to experience legislative hostility tend to be formulated as constitutional amendments.
But both kinds outrank ordinary law, which is how voter-approved formulas came to control budgets decades later. See FAQ #7 for a discussion.
What happens after a measure passes?
The successful passage of a ballot measure is not the end of the story. Usually litigation, implementation fights, and other surprises occur.
Courts can strike measures down entirely or in part. Agencies and the Legislature can implement the new laws with varying degrees of enthusiasm and enforcement.
And when two conflicting measures pass on the same ballot, the one with more yes votes prevails where they conflict.
Modern measures are often drafted defensively in anticipation of these kinds of possibilities. They include severability clauses, conflict clauses aimed at rival measures, and even provisions that will fund independent counsel if state officials refuse to defend the law.
Is this a good way to govern?
The honest answer is that California’s ballot initiative process is two things at once.
The initiative has delivered structural reforms that politicians would never touch, including term limits, redistricting reform, and Proposition 13.
But it also lets small parts of the electorate and moneyed interests write detailed statutes that no committee ever marks up, with the associated mistakes locked in place.
Most proposals to reform the ballot initiative process, such as increasing signature thresholds, expanding disclosure, and adding legislative review periods, trade off ballot access against initiative quality.
Here’s the most important thing voters should know about ballot initiatives: A proposition is a law written by its proponents, and the only edit voters get is a yes or no.
