The Supreme Court last month ruled the Legislature did have the authority to place on the 2014 ballot an advisory measure about the SCOTUS Citizens United decision, even though the court had earlier removed the measure from that ballot so the court could study the issue. But the court’s January ruling didn’t automatically put the measure on the 2016 ballot. The court said the Legislature would have to act again because, the court concluded, the 2014 legislation under review “directs only placement on th[e] [2014] ballot.”
The court’s decision was a big win for the Legislature, but the Legislature still filed a rehearing petition, arguing “it should not have to pass a new measure in order to secure the placement of [the] advisory question on the November 2016 ballot.”
Today, the Supreme Court denied rehearing. Justice Ming Chin voted to grant the petition, but, because his lone dissent from last month’s decision said the Legislature shouldn’t have any authority to place an advisory proposition on the ballot, his vote today can’t be viewed as anything more than a further protest against the majority’s opinion.
