Vote Yes on Amendment L to preserve our Constitution and with it, the life and state we love.
Before we were a state, we were a promise. Generations of families, crossed these prairies, raised children, and built something lasting. They handed us our state Constitution, a timeless framework not meant to be changed on a whim.
And it was never meant to be changed by a tiny minority of citizens.
Right now, dark money is running a Vote No campaign in South Dakota with the goal of leaving our founding document exposed. Our state, our way of life, and our future is under attack, election cycle after election cycle, one amendment at a time.
The current election cycle has opened up our Constitution to a threat veiled in disingenuous marketing messages and hundreds of thousands in advertising dollars.
If we miss this opportunity to vote Yes on Amendment L, we remain vulnerable to outside interests that don’t share our values.
Is it true that a minority of voters can change our Constitution?
Yes, and the math is pretty simple. First you need to understand that Registered Voters are NOT the same as Vote Cast. Let’s use 2022 Amendments C and D as an example:
Amendment C in June 2022 - require a 60% majority to amend the Constitution.
582,359 Registered Voters*
122,387 Votes Cast voting no
21.02% of Registered Voters voted no, Amendment failed
909,824** Population in 2022, so 13.5% of the Population decided the vote
Amendment D in November 2022 - Medicaid Expansion on the ballot
597,073 Registered Voters*
192,057 Votes Cast voting yes
32.2% of Registered Voters (voted yes, Amendment passed by 56% of Votes Cast)
909,824** Population in 2022, so 21.11% of the Population decided the vote
A tiny minority of citizens make decisions that every single South Dakotan has to live with.
Doesn’t Amendment L silence voters?
No. Opponents of Amendment L claim that a yes vote will silence voters. Untrue. Raising the threshold to 60% of Votes Cast just sets a slightly higher bar to pass fundamental changes.
The United States Constitution requires two-thirds of Congress and three-fourths of the states to change it. They built a high bar on purpose, because the most important things deserve the broadest agreement.
Amendment L asks for something far more modest: 60 percent of votes cast. Not two-thirds. Not three-fourths. Not two years of rounds through the legislature plus a citizen majority. Just a clear, decisive consensus, so that when we change the document that protects us, we do it together, not by a tiny minority.
Of the 50 states, 48 do a better job of protecting their founding document, and it is time that South Dakotans took the extra step to protect ours too.
Amendment L allows the people to decide how our constitution is changed. Isn’t that authentic direct democracy?
Myth: Billionaires are funding the Yes vote on Amendment L.
Untrue. Despite what you see on TV, or hear on the radio, there are no billionaires behind the Yes vote, just regular South Dakota citizens. As is evident by the barrage of No vote advertising, clearly the big money is behind the No vote.
Why is this true? The money trail proves who benefits when our Constitution is easy to change. Unfortunately, because of the dates for filing reports, South Dakotans will not find out who is behind the hundreds of thousand of dollars of advertising behind the No vote.
Of the 50 states, 48 do a better job of protecting their founding document and we can too.
Myth: Amendment L infringes on Direct Democracy
Here’s what Amendment L does not do. It does not touch Initiatiated Measures or Referendums. Since 1898, South Dakotans have had the direct-democracy power to write laws and to overturn the Legislature's laws by a simple majority, and that remains untouched.
However, those who say we have a "128-year tradition" of amending our constitution by simple majority are blurring our history. FFor the first 74 years of statehood, our voters couldn't amend the constitution by initiative at all. That power didn't arrive until 1972, and it became fully direct only in 1988.
But in that time, something else has changed. Out-of-state money, millions of dollars in advertising, now flows into our state to reshape our constitution. These well-funded campaigns, often led by people who don't live here, have made it their mission to rewrite our Constitution.
One example from 2022’s Medicaid Expansion is The Fairness Project, a national, out-of-state ballot-measure organization that provided hundreds of thousands of dollars, personnel, services, campaign strategy and coalition support to:
Make sure our Constitution remains vulnerable (Amendment C, June 2022 decided by 21.02% of Registered Voters)
Passed Medicaid Expansion (Amendment D, November 2022 decided by 32.2% of Registered Voters).
These outside influence groups come from both sides of the aisle to shape our state, and we remain exposed as a minority of voters decide our fate.
Fact: Amendments and Laws are not the same
Amendments and laws differ in important ways, and should not be used interchangeably.
Amendments are for the highest level structural principles because they are inflexible, have permanency, and are ill-suited to support programs and policies that require funding and administration.
Laws are best for policies and programs, especially that require funding.
Medicaid Expansion is good example of how difficult it is to administer an Amendment:
2022 Medicaid Expansion was voted into our Constitution as Amendment D.
2024 the Legislature proposed Amendment F, to authorize work requirements for certain Medicaid Expansion recipients which voters approved.
2026 Amendment I is on the upcoming ballot to address the fiscal risk created by constitutionalizing the program.
This is not an argument for or against Medicaid Expansion, but a statement that it does not belong in the Constitution.
Passing it as an Initiated Measure would have let voters approve the policy while leaving the Legislature flexibility to manage a complex, multi-billion-dollar government program. Putting it in the Constitution transformed a policy and spending decision into a constitutional obligation, making administering it difficult and risky.
Expect more amendments in the future to address the ongoing unintended consequences of Amendment D.
*Election Results https://electionresults.sd.gov/
**Population: https://www.census.gov/newsroom/press-releases/2022/2022-population-estimates.html
“Amendment L was brought by the Legislature in an effort to protect our founding document. These out-of-state actors bring repeated election cycle assaults to disrupt our way of life and must be held to a higher standard.”
— Representative John Hughes, District 13
Contact
Feel free to contact us with any questions you have regarding Amendment L.
Email
info@VoteYesForL.com