Liberty Tree | Wisconsin voters give a mandate for peace!

Wisconsin voters give a mandate for peace!

April 5, 2006

Wisconsin voters overwhelmingly voted "yes"? yesterday in a statewide plebiscite on immediate US withdrawal from Iraq. The statewide vote, conducted in 32 cities, villages, and town across the Midwestern state, was 61% for withdrawal from Iraq; 24 of the 32 cities, or 75% of them, voted for withdrawal.

Before Tuesday, some 76 US city and town governments had passed troop withdrawal resolutions. Wisconsin's vote on Tuesday was different in that it involved a direct vote of the people. The Wisconsin vote on withdrawal was enabled by the state's direct legislation law, which guarantees Wisconsinites the right to initiate legislation at the municipal level.

"Will this mandate for peace have an impact on US policy? You bet it will,"? says Liberty Tree's Ben Manski, who provided legal counsel for the troop withdrawal campaign. "It's one thing when a city council passes a resolution advising Congress; it's another when the people themselves issue a mandate to their representatives, instructing them to end the occupation of another country."?

In the spring of 2005, the Wisconsin Green Party initiated the troop withdrawal campaign, building a multi-partisan coalition of peace advocates around the state. By autumn, petition drives were underway in scores of municipalities. Initially, a few local city officials attempted to interfere with their constituent's right to engage in direct legislation. Recourse to courts of law and public opinion resulted in success for every local petitioning effort.

The use of direct legislation and the plebiscite to put a check on hawkish politicians has a rich history in the United States. Wisconsin's direct legislation law, enacted in 1911, had long been championed by Governor, and then Senator, Fighting Bob La Follette, a leading opponent of US entry into World War I. Similarly, Senator Jeanette Rankin supported the use of direct legislation to oppose that war, and the national Progressive Party was nearly successful in its advocacy of a constitutional amendment to relocate the power to declare war from Congress to a national vote of the people.