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The Battle over Citizen Lawmaking: A Collection of Essays

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The initiative and referendum process was used more during the 1990s than it had been for decades. The people have used the process to cut taxes, protect animals and the environment, enact public health care laws, impose term limits on their legislatures, and much more.

State legislatures have reacted by curtailing the process, in effect opposing this challenge to their power by the people they are supposed to represent. The Battle Over Citizen Lawmaking describes this struggle as well as teaching us a great deal about initiative and referendum in America.

Of all the books written about the initiative process in recent years, The Battle Over Citizen Lawmaking stands out as the best. The book, written by scholars, journalists, and activists and edited by the President of the Initiative and Referendum Institute, gives an account of the history of the initiative process and the reasons both for and against increased regulation. Unlike many other works on the subject, it is scupulously fair to all points of view.

Although it is intended as a textbook for political science classes - and is a very good one indeed - The Battle Over Citizen Lawmaking is also suitable for the informed general reader. If you plan to read only one book about the initiative process, read this one.