Right now, voters in 24 states and the District of Columbia can bypass their legislatures by gathering

signatures to get proposed laws or constitutional amendments on the ballot.

But according to the Associated Press, about 40 bills in roughly a dozen states are being

considered or have already been signed into law to restrict this citizen

initiative process. Dane Waters is head of the University of Southern California's nonpartisan

initiative and referendum institute. Mr. Waters, in your view, what's the role of this

citizen ballot initiative in our American democracy?

Well, it's a check and balance on representative government.

It's not a replacement for it.

And this is what a lot of people don't understand,

is that they think that when we have direct democracy or in the states where it does exist,

that somehow is trying to circumvent or bypass normal representative government.

But it's not.

It's always been designed to be a check and

balance and a safety valve for the people to use when the legislature, for whatever reason,

is unwilling or unable to do things that the people want. And why are legislatures, why are lawmakers,

elected lawmakers, trying to restrict it? Well, there's always been this animosity by lawmakers

against direct democracy in the United

States. Ever since the process has been around, they see it as an affront to their power. But what they

seem to forget is that when they are elected, the people aren't giving away their sovereign rights.

They're just loaning those rights to the lawmakers. And they reserve their right to make laws with the initiative process

or direct democracy. And so this confrontation between lawmakers and the people has always been

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