A state court of appeals panel has ruled that the Reform Michigan Government Now! referendum that was slated to be on the November ballot is unconstitutional and must be removed.

The appeals court panel concluded that the reform referendum contains so many different and distinct provisions — cutting salaries of both judges and legislators, cutting the number of legislators and the number of judges, changing the way redistricting was done, removing judicial jurisdiction over redistricting, changing the absentee voting rules, forbidding former legislators from acting as lobbyists and more — that it was a “general revision” of the state constitution, something that can only be accomplished through a constitutional convention rather than a single referendum.

Article 7 of the Michigan Constitution provides the means by which the constitution may be amended and Section 2 of that article specifies citizen-initiated referendums as one way of doing so.

But Section 3 of Article 7 makes a distinction between amendments and general revisions to the constitution, which require a constitutional convention in order to accomplish.

Because this referendum includes so many major changes to multiple articles and sections of the state constitution, most of which are unrelated to the other provisions of the amendment, the court concluded that this is a general revision and requires a convention be called rather than a referendum.

Backers of the proposal vow to appeal immediately to the Michigan Supreme Court, but their chances of winning there are slim. And despite the outrage expressed by backers of the proposal, the appeals court ruling is, in my view, a correct one as a matter of law.