Pandora’s Box (Hunter Field Editor’s Note)

The Arkansas Supreme Court building in Little Rock (Madison Ogle)

The Arkansas Supreme Court may not have opened Pandora’s box when it overturned the long-held precedent barring the state Legislature from changing — or outright repealing — citizen-initiated constitutional amendments, but it certainly unclasped the latch.

The logic behind the decision confounded me and a host of attorneys who had long thought it settled that Article 5 of the Arkansas Constitution gives the General Assembly authority to tweak only citizen-initiated acts, not amendments to the Constitution. The Legislature can’t unilaterally amend the Constitution, so why would it have the authority to do so only when a measure is initiated and approved by a statewide majority vote?

The legal reasoning ends up in a debate over textualism, originalism and following well-established precedent. Smart minds can disagree.

However, the practical effect of the decision is the neutering of one of the powers the framers of our Constitution went out of their way to protect closely: the right to petition through direct democracy.

We are now left to wait and see whether the next legislative session will be open season on citizen-initiated amendments that Republicans in the Legislature despise, namely medical marijuana and gambling.

Senate President Pro Tempore Bart Hester was quick to tell the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette lawmakers would look at changing amendments “where out-of-state billionaires came in and bought our constitution.”

House Speaker Brian Evans took a much more measured tone, saying the House would be cautious before taking a hatchet to the people’s laws.

I agree with Hester that some of the recent voter-backed amendments were driven by wealthy, out-of-state interests.

But the people of Arkansas voted, and I respect them too much to substitute my judgment for theirs.

I guess we’ll see if the Legislature does too.

From the staff at Arkansas Business, we want to wish you a wonderful holiday season.

This will be our last regular issue of the year, and we plan to take a week off to refresh, celebrate and reflect.

Subscribers over the next two weeks will receive the Book of Lists — our annual compilation of much of the data and lists we produced this year — and a collection of Executive Q&As from the past year.

Regular programming will return Jan. 12 with an issue focused on startups.

Thanks as always to those of you who value our work enough to subscribe or advertise. We look forward to serving you in 2026.

Email Hunter Field, editor of Arkansas Business, at hfield@abpg.com