FILE PHOTO - Voters wait in line at the polling site at West Acres.
BISMARCK, N.D. (North Dakota Monitor) – North Dakotans in June will have a chance to decide whether all future constitutional amendments should be limited to one subject.
The so-called single subject proposal is the only statewide measure approved for the primary election ballot. Constitutional Measure 1 would apply the requirement to both voter-initiated amendments as well as those referred by state lawmakers.
The proposal was put on the ballot through Senate Resolution 4007, which legislators passed during the 2025 session.
The purpose of the resolution is to make constitutional amendments easier to understand and to prevent “bait and switch” scenarios where unpopular provisions are buried inside larger, unrelated amendments, said Senate Majority Leader David Hogue, who sponsored the proposal.
It’s common for states that allow voter-initiated constitutional amendments to also have a single subject requirement, according to a 2022 academic article published by the Nebraska Law Review.
Senate Resolution 4007 makes it the responsibility of the Secretary of State’s Office to verify that each proposed amendment meets this requirement before it can be certified for the ballot.
Secretary of State Michael Howe told lawmakers during the 2025 session that he would look to the North Dakota Attorney General’s Office to help him make those decisions.
The Senate passed the resolution with overwhelming support, with only one lawmaker voting no. The resolution passed in the House by a more divided vote of 57-36.
Opponents of the proposal have voiced concerns about whether a single subject requirement could be fairly enforced.
House Minority Leader Zac Ista, D-Grand Forks, said he voted against the resolution because he feels it would add a “layer of bureaucratic review” to the amendment process. He also said there isn’t clear criteria for determining what does or doesn’t meet the requirement.
“I think in North Dakota, if we entrust the secretary of state and attorney general of being the sole arbiters of what is and is not a single subject, that’s really going to handcuff voter initiatives in the state,” Ista said.
He questioned whether Article XIV, which created the North Dakota Ethics Commission, would have made it on the ballot if a single-subject requirement existed at the time.
Hogue said he doubts it would require any complicated analysis to determine whether a proposed amendment meets the rule.
“I don’t think it’s a legal judgment,” Hogue said. “I think if you’re trying to pass two different measures in one, that’s a common sense judgment.”
Ista said he also wonders why the measure is on the June primary ballot, as opposed to the general election ballot, which usually sees higher voter turnout.
The Legislature passed a similar provision in 2023 as part of a package of other potential changes to constitutional measures, including requiring a measure to be passed with two votes. That proposal failed on the 2024 general election ballot.
North Dakota’s constitution already requires that the Legislature’s bills be limited to a single subject.
That provision was grounds for a lawsuit over the 2023-2025 budget bill for North Dakota’s Office of Management and Budget. Historically, the budget bill for the Office of Management and Budget had been the last bill to pass during the legislative session. This led lawmakers to attach unrelated miscellaneous provisions to the bill, since it was the last chance to get legislation passed before the session adjourned.
The North Dakota Supreme Court in 2023 ruled this practice unconstitutional and found the Office of Management and Budget bill passed earlier that year to be of no effect. This led former Gov. Doug Burgum to call a special session in October 2023 to pass a new budget for the agency.
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