Commentary
Progressive California Gov. Hiram Johnson’s initiative system has justified itself again. Look at the political establishment’s response to the U.S. Supreme Court’s recent decision ending affirmative action at Harvard University and the University of North Carolina, with national application. Gov. Gavin Newsom and Attorney General Rob Bonta and others have rejected that decision, contradicting what their own voters indicated, twice, ought to be done.
As Johnson explained in his 1911 Inaugural Address, “I commend to you the proposition that, after all, the initiative and the referendum depend on our confidence in the people and in their ability to govern. The opponents of direct legislation and the recall, however they may phrase their opposition, in reality believe the people cannot be trusted.”…