State ballot initiative fee raised to $2,000 to prevent mischief

[KamaAina]

http://www.sfgate.com/bayarea/article/California-ballot-initiative-fee-raised-to-2-000-6479408.php

It won’t be as easy on the pocketbook for mischief makers to propose outrageous ballot initiatives in California, like a recent one that called for executions of gays and lesbians.

Gov. Jerry Brown signed a bill Tuesday that raises the fee for filing ballot initiatives from $200 to $2,000 in an effort to discourage what has become a plethora of over-the-top measures in recent years....

The $200 filing fee, unchanged since 1943, has been too small of a price to pay for satirists and cranks intent on using the initiative process for making outrageous statements. It really got out of control this year when an Orange County lawyer filed what he called the “Sodomite Suppression Act,” which would have called on the state to execute gays and lesbians....

A San Jose man advanced the “Shellfish Suppression Act,” which would have made the sale or consumption of shellfish a felony with heavy fines or imprisonment. Other measures included a ban on alimony in divorce cases, separating California from the United States and designating the state’s top elected official “president of California.”

Call it "Matt's Law", after Matt McLaughlin, the kill-the-gays guy.

[msongs]

1. corporations and mormon-like churches will have no probs coming up with the 2K$ nt