History
Nebraska’s legislature in 1897 became the first in the nation to pass a
bill allowing initiative and referendum - but only in municipalities, not on
the state level. This bill was the Sheldon-Geiser Act, sponsored by state
legislator A. E. Sheldon.
Walter Breen of Omaha led early efforts for I&R in Nebraska. Breen, a
native of London, emigrated to the United States at age 17 and lived in
Lincoln, Nebraska, before settling in Omaha. He became a successful real
estate salesman and was among the initial organizers of the Populist Party.
By 1897, by the age of 30, he had become secretary of the Omaha Direct
Legislation League, as well as a member of the seven-man executive
committee of the National Direct Legislation League.
Since Nebraska did not have Prohibition, the Prohibitionists favored
I&R, but liquor interests blocked it until 1911. I&R finally made it through the
legislature with the support of the orator and presidential candidate
William Jennings Bryan, along with H. Mockett, Jr., president of the
Nebraska Direct Legislation League, and Professor F. E. Howard of the
state university. Bryan, who spoke on behalf of I&R throughout the nation,
wrote in a 1909 letter: “I know of nothing that will do more than I&R to
restore government to the hands of the people and keep it within their
control.”
In 1912 Nebraska voters approved I&R by a margin of thirteen to one.
It helped that under Nebraska’s constitutional amendment ratification
procedure, blank ballots were counted as “yes” votes: the opposite of the
system that doomed I&R in Minnesota.
Nebraska’s most famous initiative was the successful 1934 amendment
to create the nation’s only unicameral state legislative body. U.S. Sen.
George Norris, who is best known for his bill creating the Tennessee Valley
Authority, led the unicameral campaign. Another highlight of Nebraska
initiative history was the passage, in 1982, of a constitutional amendment
prohibiting farm buy-outs by corporations, which was the toughest
statewide anti-corporate farm legislation in the nation.
Nebraskans have been infrequent initiative users, placing only 27 such
measures on state ballots in 70 years: an average of less than one per
election. The first was a 1914 women’s suffrage initiative, defeated by a
52.4 percent negative vote of the all-male electorate. Nebraskans in 1930
approved authorization for municipally owned electric utilities to extend
their lines. In 1966 they voted by a narrow margin to prohibit property
taxes.
As with many initiative states, there has typically been one person who
becomes personified as THE tax reformer in the state. Nebraska is no
exception. Ed Jacksha is a living legend. He has been involved in almost
every tax reduction measure in the state and has championed initiative
rights for decades. He was also instrumental, as was State Auditor Kate
Witek, Attorney General Don Stenberg, Bob Wright and Omaha Mayor Hal
Daub, in getting a term limits initiative for state legislators passed in 2000.
Excerpted from the Initiative & Referendum Almanac by M. Dane Waters.