Missouri lawmakers will do anything to block Medicaid expansion — and voters’ will

The Missouri legislature’s strange obsession with overturning the will of the people continues unabated, threatening the rights of everyone in the state.

This week, state House members are discussing Republican plans to make it harder to change the Missouri Constitution, by requiring a two-thirds popular vote to enact any amendment. Right now, it takes a simple majority.

Some plans make it harder to gather amendment petitions, before ever reaching the ballot.

It’s ridiculous. Missourians should insist on their right to amend the state’s charter as they see fit with a majority vote.

Why do Republicans want to make it harder to change the constitution? The short-term answer is obvious: to stop Medicaid expansion.

Expansion supporters are closer than ever to putting a plan on the 2020 ballot. It will take at least 160,199 valid petition signatures to force a vote; in January, supporters said they were halfway there.

Putting Medicaid expansion in the state constitution is not the best way to make policy. But petitioners seek to change the Missouri Constitution, because they know the truth: Regular laws passed by the people are but tissue paper in the hands of GOP legislators, to be shredded on a whim.

The only way to make expansion stick is to put it in Missouri’s charter. And the only way to do that is to gather petition signatures for a statewide vote.

Republicans know this. And they know voters will likely approve expansion, which the party bitterly opposes. That has led to these last-minute attempts to change the rules and to require a two-thirds majority to approve any Medicaid expansion amendment.

A two-thirds requirement would be nearly impossible to reach, not just for Medicaid expansion but for any change in the constitution. The Clean Missouri amendment, now under a separate Republican assault, got 62% of the vote — an enormous endorsement, yet still short of the two-thirds requirement.

Raising the bar would put the Missouri Constitution beyond the reach of its citizens, which contradicts the first words in the document: “All political power is vested in and derived from the people,” it says.

Amending any constitution should not be easy. In Missouri, it is not. Petitioners must gather valid signatures in six of eight congressional districts by a May deadline. They must then make their case to voters.

Those voters must now be on the alert. Lawmakers are trying to hijack the amendment process to remove your voice and amplify their own.

Oh, and by the way: It would take a simple majority in the legislature to enact a change requiring a two-thirds majority for any future changes. It’s hypocrisy, all the way down.