HELENA — A proposal to bring a ballot measure to keep political party labels out of Montana’s judicial elections is taking another step forward.
On Tuesday morning, the committee behind the effort officially submitted the language for their proposed constitutional amendment to the Montana Secretary of State’s Office.
“We believe that we've closed in on something that's very workable, it's non-intrusive to the Constitution, and so we believe that we're right there,” said Pepper Petersen, political director for Montanans for Fair and Impartial Judges.
Watch the video for a look at the next steps for the proposed amendment:
The amendment would add just three words to the Montana Constitution. Currently, the constitution says, “Supreme court justices and district court judges shall be elected by the qualified electors as provided by law.” The proposed change would insert “in nonpartisan elections” after “elected.”
Montana judicial elections have been conducted on a nonpartisan basis since 1936. Lawmakers have debated proposals to introduce party labels to judicial elections each of the last three legislative sessions, but none have been successful. If this amendment reaches the ballot and voters approve it, the Legislature couldn’t switch to partisan elections without another amendment that would have to go before voters.
Opponents of the current system, particularly Republicans, have argued judicial races are already politicized and that allowing judges to run with a party label would simply provide more transparency for voters.
Petersen said he’s convinced Montanans are satisfied with the way judicial elections are run.
“This isn't a change for Montana, this is just codifying something that we've been doing in law for a long time – and instead of just being a statute, we're going to move it over into the state constitution,” he said. “So what we're doing is we're preserving that Montana way of justice, and we think Montanans will react accordingly and support this overwhelmingly.”
The proposed text and ballot statements must now be reviewed by legislative staff to ensure they are clear, consistent and properly formatted. The Montana Attorney General’s Office will then determine whether the proposal is legally sufficient. If the attorney general signs off, supporters will be able to start gathering signatures to qualify the measure for the November 2026 ballot.
Petersen said he’s confident their language will pass legal muster. In light of how short it is, he expects the reviews will go relatively quickly.
“We've got a broad coalition of bipartisan supporters that have been helping us on this and making sure that we're going in the right direction, and we feel like we're in a great place,” he said.
It takes at least 60,241 signatures from registered voters to get a constitutional initiative on the ballot – 10% of the votes cast in last year’s election for governor.
Petersen and campaign manager Ted Dick were also the main organizers of New Approach Montana — the successful 2020 ballot campaign to legalize recreational marijuana sales in the state. That campaign had to collect more than 50,000 signatures – during the COVID-19 pandemic.
“We know it can be done in about six weeks, but we want to give the volunteers a chance to engage on this,” he said.
