Background
The Missouri General Assembly passed H.J.R. 173 & 174, a proposed constitutional amendment placed on the August 2026 ballot by the Governor. The Resolution would overhaul Missouri’s tax structure by mandating the phased elimination of the state individual income tax tied to revenue growth, granting the legislature authority to expand the sales and use tax base to cover any goods and services as a funding mechanism for that elimination, and requiring offsetting reductions in local property and other taxes. The measure also carried broad “notwithstanding” clauses designed to supersede conflicting provisions elsewhere in the Missouri Constitution.
Jill Owens, a Missouri voter and taxpayer, filed a four-count petition in Cole County Circuit Court seeking to enjoin the Resolution from appearing on the ballot. She argued the Resolution violated Article XII, Section 2(b)’s prohibition on amending multiple constitutional articles, and separately challenged the fairness and sufficiency of both the General Assembly’s summary statement and the Secretary of State’s fair ballot language. Missouri Promise PAC and Dennis Ganahl intervened as additional challengers, also contesting the ballot title language. The trial court denied all claims, and both Owens and the Intervenors appealed.
The Western District consolidated the appeals and, given the imminent election, expedited review on a stipulated record.
The Court’s Holding
The court affirmed the trial court’s rejection of the multiple-articles constitutional challenge. Relying on Missourians to Protect the Initiative Process v. Blunt, 799 S.W.2d 824 (Mo. banc 1990), and Boeving v. Kander, 496 S.W.3d 498 (Mo. banc 2016), the court held that a proposed amendment may affect provisions in other articles so long as all matters share a readily identifiable and reasonably narrow central purpose—here, the restructuring of Missouri taxation. Because Article XII, Section 2(b) is concerned with what an amendment contains, not with downstream effects it may have on other provisions if adopted, the Resolution’s broad notwithstanding clauses did not trigger a pre-election multiple-articles violation.
The court reversed in part, however, finding the General Assembly’s 50-word summary statement insufficient and unfair in two critical respects. First, the statement described only “modifying” sales and use taxes without disclosing that the Resolution grants the legislature sweeping new authority to impose sales and use taxes on any goods and services—the very mechanism the General Assembly acknowledged at oral argument was “certainly the plan” for eliminating the income tax. Second, the statement failed to alert voters that the Resolution would eliminate or suspend existing constitutional limits on sales and use taxes, including the prohibition on taxing goods and services not subject to such taxes as of January 1, 2015 and the revenue cap of Article X, Section 18(e). The court also found that the statement inaccurately implied the income-tax phase-out would be self-executing rather than contingent on subsequent legislative action.
Rather than simply invalidating the ballot title, the court itself certified a revised summary statement and a revised fair ballot language statement to the Secretary of State, exercising the judicial authority to make the minimal modifications necessary to render the title fair and sufficient.
Key Takeaways
- A constitutional amendment touching multiple articles survives a pre-election multiple-articles challenge if all provisions share a single, reasonably narrow controlling purpose—courts look only at what the measure contains, not at collateral effects it might produce after adoption.
- A ballot summary statement that prominently touts tax reductions without disclosing the corresponding grant of new taxing authority—and without informing voters that existing constitutional limits on that authority are being suspended—fails the statutory requirement of being a “true and impartial” statement of the measure’s purposes.
- Inaccurate framing that makes contingent legislative action appear self-executing renders a summary statement legally insufficient, even if the inaccuracy is minor and correctable through limited revision.
- Missouri appellate courts have authority to certify their own revised ballot title language directly to the Secretary of State when a title is found insufficient, rather than merely remanding to the trial court or the General Assembly.
Why It Matters
This decision is significant for Missouri election law because it draws a clear line between permissible brevity and impermissible omission in ballot title drafting: a 50-word summary need not catalogue every detail of a complex measure, but it must disclose the central mechanism—particularly an expansion of taxing authority—that makes the measure’s headline promises possible. Failing to mention that voters are being asked to authorize a broad new sales-tax-on-services power, while prominently advertising the income-tax elimination that power would fund, is the kind of one-sided framing that renders a title legally defective.
More broadly, the case illustrates the tension inherent in pre-election ballot-title litigation over sweeping constitutional overhauls. The court acknowledged that the Resolution’s pervasive notwithstanding clauses make it genuinely difficult to identify every limit that might be rendered ineffectual—yet that very complexity heightens, rather than diminishes, the obligation to inform voters of the core immediate effects. Attorneys advising legislative clients on ballot measure drafting should treat disclosure of new taxing authority, and any curtailment of existing constitutional limits, as presumptively required features of any fair and sufficient summary statement.