Why wasn’t abortion on the ballot in Texas, like other states in November?
On election night, abortion was on the ballot in 10 states — but not in Texas. This led some to wonder why abortion wasn’t voted on in Texas.
When Roe v. Wade was overturned in 2022, a Texas law took effect making it illegal for a person to perform, induce or attempt an abortion. And before that in 2021, Texas passed Senate Bill 8, which prohibits abortions after cardiac activity is detected and is enforced through civil litigation. Both laws were decided in the Texas legislature without a ballot referendum.
Texas is one of 24 states that do not allow for citizen-led statewide referendums or initiatives to placed on the ballot. For Texas, that means citizens can’t petition to have proposed state laws or constitutional amendments put to a vote.
“The economic and political elites in Texas want to keep important decisions to themselves and don’t trust the voters,” SMU political science professor Cal Jillson said. “The broad answer to the question of why Texas doesn’t allow citizen referendum is that political and economic elites have always been reluctant to allow the citizenry to drive political decisions.”
The only way to get an issue on the ballot in Texas is for it to be a constitutional amendment, said TCU political science professor Jim Riddlesperger.
“And that means that it has to be proposed by the Texas legislature in order to go on the ballot for a referendum for adopting a constitutional amendment,” he said.
The Texas legislature can choose to put abortion laws on the ballot, but the likelihood of that is rare.
“It would take new elected officials and new majorities in the Texas legislature (to put abortion on the ballot), because that’s where this decision will be made,” Jillson said. “It’s not going to happen under the current Republican leadership of the state.”
Under a constitutional amendment, the legislature would vote to allow citizens to vote on the issue.
“It would be hard to get the legislature to agree to a vote in the state of Texas on the issue of abortion because, as you know, nationwide in both conservative and liberal states, these pro-choice initiatives have had great success.,” Riddlesperger said.
In November elections, states that approved measures around the right to abortions were Arizona, Colorado, Maryland, Missouri, Montana, Nevada and New York. Nebraska voters rejected a measure to establish the right to an abortion and approved a ban on second- or third-trimester abortions except in medical emergencies or cases of rape or incest.
Florida and South Dakota voters rejected abortion protections.
