Referenda Divide Voters, Interest Groups

If you ask a liberal political type about referendum questions, the answer is quick in coming--"no, no, no, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes." No, this isn't a James Joyce impersonation, it's "politically correct" advice.

Of the eight questions voters will face on November 4, many fit comfortably into either liberal or conservative platforms. As one liberal observer said of the expected returns, "It'll be pretty ideological." This is certainly true of the abortion question, divided as it is between existing battle fronts, and of the two legislative advisory questions on national health insurance and acid rain.

However, others are divided less strongly or cleanly between political orientations, and one has split liberal organizations that usually cooperate. Despite an information booklet mailed to every registered voter by the Secretary of State's office, voters are apparently ill-informed: according to a Boston Globe poll released Sunday, only 42 percent of the voters had any idea which questions were on the ballot.

Some groups take exception to the questions' phrasing. Many representatives of pro-choice groups say Question 1 is confusingly worded, so that voters may not understand that its purpose is to let the state regulate or prohibit abortion. This question has also fanned a perennial argument to the point where some television stations have decided to limit or refuse advertising on any referendum question.

While Catholic leaders support the first two measures, the Massachusetts Council of Churches, a Protestant organization, opposes both, and has begun a campaign with the slogan "no, no, no in November," referring to the first three ballot questions.

Question 2, if passed, would amend the state constitution to let state funds go to private and parochial schools.

Proponents of the measure, led by State Senate President William Bulger of heavily Catholic South Boston, say it would counteract the anti-Catholic sentiments in a section of the constitution that was passed in 1855.

Joan Buckley, a representative of the Massachusetts Federation of Teachers, told a meeting of the AFL/CIO in early October that "public funds should be spent on public schools."

The popular tax cap's chief defender is Barbara Anderson of Citizens for Limited Taxation, which is in turn aided by the Massachusetts High Technology Council.

State Rep. Thomas M. Gallagher (D-Brighton) said that unlike the Proposition 2-1/2 tax cap referendum which passed in 1980, this proposal has little opposition. He said its opponents have limited their efforts to publicizing a less stringent legislative bill that is due to emerge from conference committee this week.

Gallagher, like many liberals, does not support either, because he believes the bill's plan to repeal the surtax and forbid its reimposition will starve Massachusetts social services and education of funding.

Question 4 was brought to the ballot by a coalition of liberal groups, but there the spirit of cooperation seems to have ended.

The Massachusetts Public Interest Research Group (MassPIRG), which collected many of the voters' signatures that got the question on the ballot, charges that the League has been influenced by the Dow Chemical Corporation's contributions toward its Household Hazardous Waste program, which helps individual citizens get rid of dangerous chemicals.

The League of Women Voters, usually their ally in such matters, opposes the referendum mandate to clean up hazardous waste, saying, among other arguments, that it provides no funding source and is impracticial in its demands. They argue that the measures it requires are too Draconian to be carried out, and instead support a version now under preparation in the Senate, which has not come far enough in the legislative process to become law by the November 4 election. The League of Women Voters has been active in supporting this measure.

The key difference between the legislative and referendum versions is that the latter sets quotas for sites to be identified and cleaned up each year. The Department of Environmental Quality Engineering (DEQE), which liberal groups charge with lethargy, would have to identify 400 sites by January 15 of 1987, 600 more in the following year, and 1000 sites every year after that.

Commissioner S. Russell Sylva has said his department would have trouble with the costly and demanding task of meeting quotas.

Laura Barrett, speaking for the Massachusetts Hazardous Waste Campaign, another ad hoc coalition, said it is illegal in Massachusetts to allocate funds by ballot, and that the measure's requirements are meant to spur the DEQE to action. "We went to the ballot process because we have been going to the legislature for the past three years [without success]," she said.

These contentions may become irrelevant, since several polls indicate that the measure is the most likely of the referendum questions to pass.

Question 5, which returns the year-old law requiring seat belt use to the voters, is opposed through the libertarian argument that it intrudes on motorists' privacy and could set a dangerous precedent. Advocates cite a drop of 500 in the number of serious traffic injuries over the first four months after the seat belt ordinance took effect.

Question 6, on voter registration by mail, has met little opposition, but according to the Boston Globe's recent poll, only 2 percent of Massachusetts voters knew the question was on the ballot at all.

Question 7 and 8 are non-binding "legislative advisory" questions. Both are considered likely to pass. Many labor and liberal organizations, as well as the governor and both Massachusetts U.S. Senators, support Question 7, which would advise the Massachusetts legislature and Congress that voters favor national health insurance. Question 8 favors a national program to combat acid rain.