Anti-drug advocate sues Missouri secretary of state to block marijuana question from ballot

A Jefferson City anti-drug legalization advocate has filed a lawsuit against Missouri Secretary of State Jay Ashcroft, arguing that the petition for the state’s recreational marijuana ballot initiative was not properly certified and should be blocked from appearing on the November ballot.

The lawsuit, filed Friday in Cole County, argues that the ballot initiative amends multiple parts of the Missouri Constitution in violation of the state’s single-subject rule. It also argues that the petition did not garner enough signatures to be included on the Nov. 8 ballot.

The lawsuit was filed by an attorney for Joy Sweeney, a Jefferson City resident and deputy director of training, technical assistance and community outreach for Community Anti-Drug Coalitions of America, a nationwide coalition against drug abuse. Sweeney previously worked as the CEO of the Council for Drug Free Youth and served six years on the Jefferson City Public School Board.

Sweeney’s lawsuit claims that the number of signatures verified by local election authorities was not enough to get the petition on the ballot. It argues that Ashcroft certified and counted signatures that were not verified by local election authorities.

Ashcroft “certified and counted signatures that were marked through by the local election authorities and, absent this action, the Marijuana Initiative Petition would not have had a sufficient number of valid signatures in six of eight congressional districts,” the lawsuit contends.

For an initiative petition to qualify for a statewide ballot, Missouri law requires that the petition gathers enough signatures from registered voters to equal 8% of legal voters in six of the state’s eight congressional districts. The lawsuit argues that the petition did not meet that requirement in at least one of the six congressional districts.

JoDonn Chaney, Ashcroft’s spokesperson, said in a statement that the office could not comment on the lawsuit’s specific allegations, but defended Ashcroft’s certification of the ballot initiative.

“Regarding the marijuana initiative petition, however, the signature numbers and the process speak for themselves,” the statement said. “The individuals responsible for submitting this IP met the constitutional requirements as required by statute, therefore Secretary Ashcroft certified Amendment 3 to the ballot. The secretary followed the law and fulfilled his statutory duty and stands behind his certification.”

The lawsuit states that Sweeney has requested records of all signatures and voter rolls used to certify the petition. Those records have not been provided, the lawsuit says.

Sweeney’s lawsuit also argues that the recreational marijuana initiative violates the state’s single-subject rule because it deals with multiple subjects.

The Missouri Constitution requires that constitutional amendments don’t include “more than one amended and revised article of this constitution, or one new article which shall not contain more than one subject and matters properly connected therewith...”

The lawsuit contends that on top of legalizing recreational marijuana, the ballot initiative would criminalize possession of marijuana in certain amounts, tax the sale of marijuana, sets licensing procedures to grow and sell marijuana and allows for the nonviolent marijuana offenders to expunge their criminal records.

“The Marijuana Initiative Petition, if adopted, has both prospective and retrospective application,” the lawsuit says.