The first statewide initiative from Edwin and Joyce Koupal’s People’s Lobby to appear on the ballot, the Clean Environment Act, lost by a wide margin. The Koupal’s blamed much of its failure on the huge amount of money the oil and chemical industries were able to spend on the “No” campaign. In a strategic move, [...]

Politics in a democracy is about changing minds, and to change minds you need to get your message to the people you hope to persuade. Reformist groups throughout history have often run into opposition from the established mainstream media, which tends to be supportive of the current status quo structure. Being able to speak directly to supporters and the population as a whole has been critical to independent political movements. I have previously stressed in my Non-partisan League series the importance of owning your own means of communication and being a financially independent organization, but it is a message that bears repeating because history is always repeating itself.

Edwin and Joyce Koupal and their People’s lobby technically “failed” three times in their efforts at California-wide direct democracy before passing their first successful ballot initiative, the Political Reform Initiative of 1974. Yet from each loss, the Koupals learned important lessons they applied to later efforts. One of the lessons they learned was the importance [...]

The beginning of the 20th century saw Populists, Progressives, and citizen reformers using the three main forms of large scale direct democracy — recalls, ballot initiatives and referendums — to address systematic problems with the status quo power structure in this country and expand political accountability. After World War II, the use of citizen initiatives [...]