KEY PIECE OF INITIATIVE PROCESS REMOVED

Nevada's rural counties will almost certainly be the losers in a
federal judge's decision to invalidate the rule on initiative
petitions requiring signatures in 13 of the state's 17 counties.

The ruling wasn't unexpected and, in fact, was probably inevitable.
The requirement simply wasn't going to pass constitutional muster.

Here's the upshot: Petition circulators who want to change the state's
laws to legalize marijuana, for example, now may never have to leave
Clark County to collect enough signatures to get the issue on the
ballot. And once it's on the ballot, there'll be little need to win
anywhere but Clark County.

To qualify for this year's ballot, an initiative petition needed the
signatures of 51,337 registered voters, which amounts to 10 percent of
the turnout in the previous general election. The law thrown out by
Judge James Mahan had also required initiatives to get enough
signatures in 13 counties - spreading out the effort so that it had to
have some support in most areas of the state.

As the American Civil Liberties Union argued, however, that threshold
gave more weight to signatures in rural counties than those in urban
counties. The "one man, one vote" concept has prevailed in all such
tests of geographical distribution.

In few places, however, is the population so out of whack with the
geography as in Nevada. Clark and Washoe counties have 87 percent of
the state's total population, and in the 2002 general election
accounted for 82 percent of all the votes cast.

By sheer numbers, they should control the state's political destiny.
But we still think there's something to be said for protecting the
interests of the residents of Esmeralda County, population 1,116.

We have two recommendations:

First, petition circulators should attempt to honor the spirit of that
law by making an effort to gather signatures across the state. As
unlikely (and cost-ineffective) as this seems, it might be politically
smart.

Second, the Nevada Legislature must look at raising the bar on
initiative petitions. We much appreciate the power of the public to
bring matters to a vote, but Judge Mahan has gutted one of the
critical safeguards of the process. It may be necessary to require 15
or 20 percent of the previous election's turnout.