Maine — Question 1 (1996)

Overview

Maine voters approved Question 1 at the November 5, 1996 general election. The voter-initiated statute, formally titled An Act to Seek Congressional Term Limits, established the Congressional Term Limits Act of 1996 and created a state-authored ballot-instruction system directed toward advancement of congressional term limits through Article V.

Question 1 incorporated two distinct constitutional instruments:

• a specified federal amendment establishing three-term House and two-term Senate Eligibility Boundaries, with transition treatment for prior service and no prescribed ratification deadline;

• a prescribed Article V application through which the Maine Legislature was instructed to seek a Convention for proposing the specified congressional term-limit amendment.

The specified amendment supplied the substantive federal eligibility architecture. The prescribed application supplied the state-legislative pathway toward constitutional proposal.

Around those instruments, the Act assigned separate forms of conduct to Maine’s federal delegation, state legislators, and Governor.

Members of Congress were directed to advance the specified amendment through the congressional proposal pathway.

Members of the Maine Legislature were directed to advance the prescribed Article V application, preserve that application and the supporting state law, and support ratification if the specified amendment were submitted to the states.

The Governor occupied a separate institutional position. The Act called on the Governor to aid the Legislature’s Convention-application effort and also prescribed state-law duties intended to preserve the Congressional Term Limits Act against legislative alteration or repeal.

Question 1 further established three office-specific candidate pledges for nonincumbent candidates for Congress, Governor, and the Maine Legislature. Incumbent conduct and nonincumbent pledge responses were connected to state-administered ballot designations.

An incumbent candidate whose conduct satisfied the statutory criteria would receive:

“VIOLATED VOTER INSTRUCTION ON TERM LIMITS”

A nonincumbent candidate who declined the applicable pledge would receive:

“REFUSED TO PLEDGE TO SUPPORT TERM LIMITS”

The Maine Secretary of State determined whether a designation applied. The Act also supplied procedures for challenging those determinations, judicial review, an evidentiary standard, severability, and stage-specific conditions ending particular designation requirements as the constitutional-amendment process advanced.

Its governing architecture was:

voter instruction → specified constitutional objective → prescribed application and actor-specific conduct or pledge → Secretary of State determination → potential review → ballot accountability → staged regulatory exit

Question 1 therefore established a:

Ballot-Instruction Mechanism
Indirect · State-Authored · Office-Specific

Maine’s institutional sequence began before the election.

On April 3, 1996, the Maine Supreme Judicial Court issued an advisory Opinion of the Justices concerning the initiated bill. Four Justices addressed the principal constitutional questions and identified limits on using initiated legislation to prescribe the exercise of Article V functions. Three Justices declined to resolve those questions before the electorate had acted. All seven agreed that Maine’s initiative provisions required the measure to proceed to the voters because the Legislature had not enacted it without change.

The advisory sequence therefore became:

constitutional objections identified → ballot submission remains required → electorate decides

Maine voters approved Question 1 by 318,119 to 225,620. The Governor signed the initiated legislation on December 3, 1996, and the Congressional Term Limits Act took effect January 2, 1997.

The measure therefore progressed from advisory constitutional review through electoral authorization into effective statutory law.

Binding federal review followed.

On May 19, 1997, the United States District Court for the District of Maine held in League of Women Voters of Maine v. Gwadosky that the Act violated Article V. The court concluded that the combined instructions and threatened state-authored ballot designations impermissibly burdened the independent deliberative roles assigned to legislators within the constitutional amendment process and enjoined implementation or enforcement of the entire Act.

Maine’s complete sequence became:

pre-election advisory review → voter approval → statutory effectiveness → federal Article V injunction → continued statutory presence → legislative repeal

The Legislature formally repealed the Congressional Term Limits Act in 2002.

Maine therefore provides a distinctive Ballot Instruction Phase example in which constitutional concerns were identified before the election, ballot submission remained constitutionally required, voters authorized the measure, the statute became effective, and a later binding federal judgment terminated its operation.

Jurisdiction and Scope

Jurisdiction: Maine

Measure: Question 1 (1996)

Initiated bill: LD 1827 / IB 6

Formal title: An Act to Seek Congressional Term Limits

Statutory title: Congressional Term Limits Act of 1996

Form: Voter-initiated statute

Statutory placement: 21-A M.R.S.A. §§641–646

Election date: November 5, 1996

Effective date: January 2, 1997

Federal offices implicated: United States House of Representatives; United States Senate

State offices implicated: Governor; Maine Senate; Maine House of Representatives

Administrative authority: Maine Secretary of State

Internal judicial-review routes: Maine Superior Court for review of designation determinations; Maine Supreme Judicial Court for an original action challenging the Act

Institutional object: Advancement of congressional term limits through a specified federal amendment, a prescribed Article V application, actor-specific official conduct, candidate pledges, and state-administered ballot designations

Electoral output: Prescribed ballot designations based on official conduct or a nonincumbent candidate’s response to the applicable term-limits pledge

Institutional Reach

Question 1 connected the federal amendment objective to several actors occupying distinct positions within constitutional maintenance and state election administration.

Maine’s Members of Congress were directed toward the congressional proposal pathway.

Members of the Maine Legislature were directed to advance the prescribed Article V application and, if the specified amendment were submitted to state legislatures for ratification, to support ratification.

The Governor was incorporated through a request to aid the Convention-application effort and through separate state-law duties concerning preservation of the Congressional Term Limits Act.

Nonincumbent candidates for Congress, Governor, and the Maine Legislature entered through office-specific pledge provisions.

The Secretary of State administered the designation system and determined whether the statutory criteria for ballot notation had been satisfied.

Question 1 therefore extended across federal constitutional proposal, state Convention-application and ratification functions, gubernatorial preservation duties, candidate conduct, election administration, and judicial review while retaining the specified congressional term-limit amendment as its common substantive objective.

Architecture and Classification

Ballot-Instruction Mechanism
Indirect · State-Authored · Office-Specific

Question 1 combined voter instruction concerning a specified federal constitutional objective with state-administered electoral accountability.

Its basic sequence was:

voter instruction → prescribed constitutional-maintenance conduct or candidate pledge → Secretary of State determination → state-applied ballot designation

The architecture operated through two principal candidate pathways.

Incumbent Officeholders

Incumbent Members of Congress, Maine legislators, and the Governor were evaluated according to conduct prescribed by the Act.

When an incumbent’s conduct satisfied the applicable statutory criteria, the Secretary of State would assign:

“VIOLATED VOTER INSTRUCTION ON TERM LIMITS”

The relevant conduct varied by office. Members of Congress were evaluated through the congressional proposal process; Maine legislators through Convention-application, preservation, and potential ratification functions; and the Governor through the Act’s state-law preservation requirements.

Nonincumbent Candidates

Nonincumbent candidates for Congress, Governor, and the Maine Legislature were offered office-specific term-limits pledges.

A candidate who declined the applicable pledge would receive:

“REFUSED TO PLEDGE TO SUPPORT TERM LIMITS”

The pledge pathway measured a candidate’s stated commitment to future conduct. The incumbent pathway evaluated conduct already undertaken in office.

State Determination

The resulting ballot information originated in state law and state administration.

The Act defined the relevant conduct and pledge obligations. The Secretary of State determined whether the statutory criteria had been satisfied. Maine election officials then placed the prescribed designation adjacent to the candidate’s name.

The administrative relationship was:

prescribed conduct or pledge response → state evaluation → state-authored electoral designation

Question 1 therefore belongs to the state-authored branch of the Ballot-Instruction Mechanism. The State established the governing criteria, evaluated compliance, and supplied the resulting ballot message.

That architecture became central to later constitutional review because the electoral designation carried the State’s evaluation of conduct occurring within the federal constitutional amendment process.

Specified Amendment and Prescribed Article V Application

Question 1 incorporated two documentary instruments directed toward the congressional term-limit objective: a specified federal constitutional amendment and a prescribed Article V application.

Specified Federal Amendment

The Act stated its intention that the law lead to adoption of the following constitutional amendment:

CONGRESSIONAL TERM LIMITS AMENDMENT

Section A. No person shall serve in the office of United States Representative for more than three terms, but upon ratification of this amendment no person who has held the office of United States Representative or who then holds the office shall serve for more than two additional terms.

Section B. No person shall serve in the office of United States Senator for more than two terms, but upon ratification of this amendment no person who has held the office of United States Senator or who then holds the office shall serve in the office for more than one additional term.

Section C. This article shall have no time limit within which it must be ratified to become operative upon the ratification of the legislatures or Conventions of three-fourths of the several States.

Architecture

Regime: Endpoint System

Mechanism: Lifetime Exhaustion

House Eligibility Boundary: Three terms

Senate Eligibility Boundary: Two terms

Transition treatment: At ratification, a person who had previously held or then held a House seat could serve no more than two additional House terms. A person who had previously held or then held a Senate seat could serve no more than one additional Senate term.

Partial-term counting: None specified

Ratification mode: Legislatures or Conventions of three-fourths of the states

Ratification deadline: None

The specified amendment supplied the federal eligibility architecture. The Congressional Term Limits Act separately supplied the state-level constitutional-maintenance, pledge, ballot-designation, administrative, and review provisions intended to advance that amendment.

Prescribed Article V Application

The Act separately supplied an application to Congress for use through the state-legislative Article V pathway.

It defined Application as an application seeking a Convention for the purpose of proposing an amendment limiting House service to three terms and Senate service to two terms.

The prescribed application stated:

We, the People and Legislature of the State of Maine, due to our desire to establish term limits on Congress, hereby make application to Congress, pursuant to our power under Article V, to call an Article V Convention.

The statutory definition and the prescribed application therefore operate together.

The definition supplies the subject-specific constitutional objective:

three House terms → two Senate terms

The application supplies the formal state request to Congress:

Maine legislative application → Congress → Article V Convention

The application itself does not repeat the 3/2 eligibility language. Its subject-specific scope is supplied by the Act’s definition of Application, which expressly connects the Convention request to the specified congressional term-limit amendment.

Question 1 engaged the congressional proposal pathway and the state-legislative Convention-application pathway under Article V:

Congress → proposal of the specified Congressional Term Limits Amendment

Maine Legislature → prescribed Article V Convention application

Maine Legislature → potential ratification of the specified amendment

Congressional and Maine Legislative Conduct

The Congressional Term Limits Act assigned separate schedules of prescribed conduct to Maine’s Members of Congress and members of the Maine Legislature.

The congressional schedule addressed proposal of the specified Congressional Term Limits Amendment through Congress.

The state-legislative schedule addressed advancement and preservation of the prescribed Article V application, protection of the Act, and potential ratification of the specified amendment.

Congressional Proposal

Section 4 stated the congressional instruction in mandatory terms:

“Each member of the state's congressional delegation shall use all of that member's delegated powers to propose and vote for”

the specified Congressional Term Limits Amendment displayed above.

The instruction therefore directed Maine’s Members of Congress toward congressional proposal of that specified amendment.

Prescribed Congressional Conduct

The incumbent ballot designation was tied to ten dimensions of congressional conduct. Maine’s Members of Congress were instructed to:

• vote for the specified Congressional Term Limits Amendment whenever it came to a vote in a chamber, committee, subcommittee, legislative council, or other setting in which the Member served;

• second the proposed amendment when a second was required and otherwise unavailable;

• propose, sponsor, or otherwise bring the proposed amendment to a vote of the full chamber when another Member had not done so;

• support votes bringing the proposed amendment before a committee, subcommittee, or other setting in which the Member served;

• oppose delay, tabling, rereferral to committee, postponement, or other action preventing a full-chamber vote on the proposed amendment;

• vote against proposed constitutional amendments containing congressional term limits longer than those in the specified amendment;

• refrain from sponsoring or cosponsoring proposed constitutional amendments or laws containing congressional term limits longer than those in the specified amendment;

• support requests for recorded yeas-and-nays votes on the proposed amendment;

• sign a discharge petition that would bring the proposed amendment before the full chamber; and

• be present and voting during consideration of the proposed amendment or, when absent, be recorded in favor through pairing, proxy voting, or another absentee provision.

The schedule therefore extended across substantive votes, sponsorship, committee and floor access, delay, competing term-limit proposals, recorded voting, discharge procedure, and attendance.

The congressional pathway was:

voter instruction → proposal of the specified Congressional Term Limits Amendment → prescribed congressional conduct → Secretary of State evaluation → potential ballot designation

Maine Legislature

Section 2 stated the state-legislative instruction in mandatory terms:

“Each member of the Maine Senate and the Maine House of Representatives shall use all of that Legislator's delegated powers”

to make the prescribed Article V application displayed above.

The instruction therefore directed members of both legislative chambers toward the Convention-application pathway under Article V.

The state-legislative responsibilities extended beyond the act of applying. Section 643 connected the incumbent designation to thirteen dimensions of conduct involving advancement and preservation of the application, protection of the Congressional Term Limits Act, and potential ratification.

Prescribed State-Legislative Conduct

Members of the Maine Legislature were instructed to:

• vote for the prescribed Article V application whenever it came to a vote in a legislative body, committee, subcommittee, legislative council, or other setting in which the legislator served;

• second the application when a second was required and otherwise unavailable;

• support votes bringing the application before any setting in which the legislator served;

• propose, sponsor, or otherwise bring the application to a vote of the full legislative body when another legislator had not done so;

• oppose delay, tabling, rereferral to committee, or other action preventing a full-legislative-body vote on the application;

• support requests for yeas-and-nays votes on the application;

• request the yeas and nays when another legislator had not done so;

• oppose any change, addition, amendment, or modification to the prescribed application;

• be present and voting during consideration of the application or, when absent, be recorded in favor through pairing or another absentee provision;

• vote against proposed repeal or amendment of the Congressional Term Limits Act;

• vote against legislation supplementing or altering the Act;

• vote for the specified Congressional Term Limits Amendment if submitted to the states for ratification; and

• vote against a submitted constitutional amendment containing congressional term limits longer than those specified in the proposed amendment.

The Maine legislative schedule therefore joined three stages of constitutional-maintenance activity:

Article V application → preservation of the application and supporting state law → potential ratification

The Act assigned different constitutional functions to federal and state legislators while connecting both sets of conduct to the same state-administered incumbent ballot designation:

“VIOLATED VOTER INSTRUCTION ON TERM LIMITS”

The detailed release conditions governing when particular portions of these schedules ceased to apply are addressed separately below.

Governor — Article V Request and Statutory Preservation Duties

Question 1 incorporated the Governor through two distinct forms of prescribed conduct: support for the Legislature’s Article V application and preservation of the enacted Congressional Term Limits Act.

The Governor’s position therefore differed from the constitutional functions assigned to Maine’s Members of Congress and state legislators.

Article V Request

Section 3 was titled:

Governor directed to aid in application and ratification.

Its operative provision stated:

“The Governor shall use all of the Governor's delegated powers to aid the Legislature in making the application specified in Sec. 2 to the Congress of the United States under Article V of the United States Constitution.”

The section heading referred to both application and ratification. The operative sentence addressed the Legislature’s making of the prescribed Article V application.

The enacted sequence was therefore:

Maine Legislature → prescribed Article V application
Governor → aid to Legislature in making the application

Article V assigns the Convention-application function to state legislatures. The Act placed the Governor in a supporting position around that state-legislative activity.

The constitutional status of that directive became one of the questions addressed in the pre-election Opinion of the Justices.

Statutory Preservation Duties

Section 644 separately connected an incumbent Governor to the Act’s ballot-accountability provisions through two state-law duties.

An incumbent Governor was instructed to:

• veto any attempt to amend or repeal the Congressional Term Limits Act; and

• veto any legislation that would “supplement, alter or effect this Act in any way.”

Failure to perform either prescribed duty would result in:

“VIOLATED VOTER INSTRUCTION ON TERM LIMITS”

being printed adjacent to the Governor’s name on primary, general, and special-election ballots.

The gubernatorial pathway therefore connected executive action concerning the state statute to electoral accountability:

enacted Congressional Term Limits Act → prescribed gubernatorial veto conduct → Secretary of State determination → potential ballot designation

These duties concerned preservation of the state-law architecture supporting the constitutional-maintenance effort. They were institutionally distinct from congressional proposal, state-legislative Convention application, and state ratification under Article V.

The Governor’s designation also carried its own stage-specific release condition, addressed below with the Act’s other Regulatory Exit Conditions.

Candidate Pledges and Ballot Designations

Section 646 established separate prescribed pledges for candidates for Congress, Governor, and the Maine Legislature.

Until the specified Congressional Term Limits Amendment became part of the United States Constitution, the Secretary of State was required to offer the applicable pledge before commencement of petitioning for ballot access.

The three pledges reflected the different institutional roles assigned to the offices.

Congressional Candidate Pledge

Candidates for the United States Senate and United States House of Representatives were offered:

“I support term limits and pledge to use all my legislative powers to enact the proposed amendment to the United States Constitution set forth in the Congressional Term Limits Act of 1996. If elected, I pledge to act in such a way that the designation ‘VIOLATED VOTER INSTRUCTION ON TERM LIMITS’ will not appear adjacent to my name.”

The congressional pledge therefore connected candidate commitment to advancement of the specified amendment through Congress.

Gubernatorial Candidate Pledge

Candidates for Governor were offered:

“I support Term Limits and pledge, if elected, to use all my delegated powers to enact the proposed Constitutional Amendment set forth in the Congressional Term Limits Act of 1996. I pledge to use all my delegated powers to cause the Legislature to make application under the United States Constitution, Article V, to the Congress of the United States as set forth in the Congressional Term Limits Act of 1996. I pledge to veto any attempt to amend or repeal the Congressional Term Limits Act of 1996. I pledge to veto any legislation that would supplement, alter or effect the Congressional Term Limits Act of 1996 in any way.”

The gubernatorial pledge combined support for the specified federal amendment, assistance to the Legislature in making the prescribed Article V application, and preservation of the enacted state statute.

Maine Legislative Candidate Pledge

Candidates for the Maine Senate and Maine House of Representatives were offered:

“I support term limits and pledge to use all my legislative powers to cause the Legislature of the State of Maine to make application to the Congress of the United States for a constitutional convention under Article V of the United States Constitution, and to enact the proposed amendment to the United States Constitution set forth in the Congressional Term Limits Act of 1996. If elected, I pledge to act in such a way that the designation ‘VIOLATED VOTER INSTRUCTION ON TERM LIMITS’ will not appear adjacent to my name.”

The legislative pledge therefore connected candidate commitment to the Convention-application pathway and advancement of the specified Congressional Term Limits Amendment.

Refusal-to-Pledge Designation

A candidate who refused the applicable pledge would receive:

“REFUSED TO PLEDGE TO SUPPORT TERM LIMITS”

adjacent to the candidate’s name on primary, general, and special-election ballots.

The Act gave the incumbent-conduct designation priority when both provisions could otherwise apply. Where §§643, 644, or 645 required:

“VIOLATED VOTER INSTRUCTION ON TERM LIMITS”

the separate refusal-to-pledge designation did not appear.

The two designation pathways therefore communicated different information:

incumbent official conduct → “VIOLATED VOTER INSTRUCTION ON TERM LIMITS”

candidate refusal of prescribed pledge → “REFUSED TO PLEDGE TO SUPPORT TERM LIMITS”

The pledge provisions carried the office-specific constitutional and statutory responsibilities forward into candidate commitments, while the incumbent provisions evaluated conduct already undertaken in office.

Secretary of State Administration, Review, Jurisdiction, and Severability

The Congressional Term Limits Act assigned the Maine Secretary of State responsibility for determining whether the prescribed ballot designations applied to incumbent officeholders and candidates.

The Act also established two distinct judicial routes:

individual designation determination → Maine Superior Court review
legal challenge to the Act itself → original action before Maine’s highest court

Secretary of State Determinations

Sections 643 through 646 required the Secretary of State to determine whether a candidate would receive:

“VIOLATED VOTER INSTRUCTION ON TERM LIMITS”

or:

“REFUSED TO PLEDGE TO SUPPORT TERM LIMITS”

The determination was required no later than certification of nomination petitions.

At the same time that nomination-petition certification information became publicly available, the Secretary of State was required to make the designation determination public.

The same basic administrative structure applied to:

• incumbent members of the Maine Legislature;

• the incumbent Governor;

• incumbent Members of Congress; and

• candidates subject to the pledge provisions.

The administrative sequence was therefore:

prescribed conduct or pledge response → Secretary of State determination → public determination → potential ballot designation

Review of Individual Determinations

A candidate or challenger could contest a Secretary of State determination through the same process used for challenges to petition certification under 21-A M.R.S.A. §§337 and 356.

An appeal proceeded by commencing an action in Maine Superior Court under Maine Rule of Civil Procedure 80-B.

The Act placed the evidentiary burden on the Secretary of State.

In the review proceeding, the Secretary was required to show:

clear and convincing evidence

justifying the determination.

The review structure therefore placed state evaluation of candidate or officeholder conduct under judicial scrutiny before the resulting state-authored designation became part of the ballot.

The sequence was:

Secretary of State determination → candidate or challenger appeal → Superior Court review under Rule 80-B → clear-and-convincing-evidence burden on Secretary of State

Jurisdiction Over Challenges to the Act

Section 5 established a separate route for a legal challenge directed at the Congressional Term Limits Act itself.

It provided:

“Any legal challenge to this Act shall be filed as an original action before the Supreme Court of this state.”

This jurisdictional provision concerned the validity of the Act as a whole or of its statutory provisions.

It therefore remained distinct from the Rule 80-B process governing review of an individual Secretary of State designation.

Maine’s internal review architecture was:

designation dispute → Superior Court
challenge to the Act → original action before the state’s highest court

Severability

Section 6 contained an express severability provision.

If a court of competent jurisdiction held any portion, clause, or phrase of the initiative invalid or unconstitutional, the remaining portions, clauses, and phrases were to remain in full force and effect.

The Act therefore contemplated judicial invalidation of less than the whole statutory structure and supplied a rule for preserving unaffected provisions.

That severability provision later became significant because the binding federal judgment in League of Women Voters of Maine v. Gwadosky enjoined implementation and enforcement of the entire Act. No portion of the ballot-instruction architecture remained operative under the injunction.

Regulatory Exit Conditions

The Congressional Term Limits Act tied particular duties and ballot designations to completion of the constitutional-maintenance work assigned to each class of officeholder.

Maine Legislators

Section 643 divided the state-legislative conduct schedule into application-stage and ratification-stage duties.

For paragraphs A through K, the incumbent designation ceased to apply when either:

• Maine had made the prescribed Article V application and the application remained unwithdrawn; or

• the specified Congressional Term Limits Amendment had been submitted to the states for ratification.

For paragraphs L and M, the designation ceased to apply once Maine had ratified the specified amendment.

All state-legislative designation criteria ended once the specified amendment became part of the United States Constitution.

The sequence was:

application pending → application-stage accountability remains

application made and remains unwithdrawn, or amendment submitted → application-stage accountability ends

Maine ratification completed → ratification-stage accountability ends

federal constitutional adoption → remaining designation criteria end

Members of Congress

Section 645 tied the congressional designation to the proposal stage.

The designation ceased to apply once either:

• the specified amendment had been submitted to the states for ratification; or

• the specified amendment had become part of the United States Constitution.

The congressional sequence was:

congressional proposal pending → congressional accountability remains

amendment submitted to the states → congressional designation ends

Governor

Section 644 supplied a separate stopping condition for the gubernatorial designation.

The designation ceased to apply when either:

• the specified amendment had been submitted to the states and Maine had ratified it; or

• the specified amendment had become part of the United States Constitution.

The gubernatorial sequence was:

statutory preservation duties → federal submission → Maine ratification → designation ends

Federal constitutional adoption supplied an independent terminal condition.

Candidate Pledges

Section 646 continued the applicable candidate pledge until the specified amendment became part of the United States Constitution.

The candidate sequence was:

federal amendment pending → pledge requirement remains

federal constitutional adoption → pledge requirement ends

Separate Statutory Repeal

The Act used stage-specific conditions to terminate particular duties and ballot designations while leaving repeal of the statute itself to separate legislative action.

That distinction became visible after the 1997 federal injunction. Sections 641–646 remained in Maine’s statutory compilation until their formal repeal in 2002.

Pre-Election Advisory Review — Opinion of the Justices

Question 1 received constitutional review before it reached Maine voters.

On April 3, 1996, the Justices of the Maine Supreme Judicial Court responded to questions submitted by the Maine House of Representatives concerning Initiated Bill 6, LD 1827.

Advisory Character

The proceeding was an advisory Opinion of the Justices issued under Article VI, §3 of the Maine Constitution.

The Justices emphasized that such opinions were the views of the individual Justices and did not constitute a binding judicial judgment between litigating parties.

Four Justices addressed the principal constitutional questions. Three Justices declined to resolve Questions One and Two before the electorate had acted.

Future Legislatures

The four Justices first considered whether the proposed Act could bind later Maine Legislatures.

They advised that an enacted initiative would occupy the same legal position as other statutory law. A subsequent Legislature retained authority to follow, amend, repeal, or disregard it.

The state-law relationship was therefore:

initiated statute → current statutory instruction → continuing legislative authority to amend or repeal

This supplied an institutional boundary independent of the federal Article V questions.

Congressional Delegation

The four Justices also addressed whether Maine electors or the Maine Legislature could direct Maine’s Members of Congress in performing their congressional duties.

They advised that state actors could petition or urge Members of Congress, while congressional functions remained exercises of federal constitutional authority beyond state legislative control.

That distinction placed the congressional instruction within a federal constitutional boundary:

state voter or legislative instruction → congressional constitutional function → independent federal authority

Article V Convention Application

The Justices then distinguished the authority of the current Maine Legislature from the authority of the electorate.

The four Justices advised that the current Legislature could itself choose to make an Article V Convention application. It could enact the initiated bill and thereby bind itself during the remaining legislative session, or it could vote directly on an application.

The electorate occupied a different constitutional position.

Article V assigns the Convention-application function to the legislatures of the states. The four Justices therefore advised that the electorate could petition or urge the Legislature to act, while an initiated statute could not transfer the Legislature’s Article V judgment to the electorate.

The Proposal Authority relationship was:

citizen initiative → prescribed Article V conduct → state-legislative Proposal Authority boundary

The four Justices advised that this portion of the initiative did not conform to Article V.

Governor

The four Justices separately considered the initiative’s direction that the Governor use all delegated powers to aid the Legislature in making the Article V application.

They concluded that a state governor possesses no delegated authority under Article V.

They therefore characterized §3 as precatory: a request to the Governor to assist the effort.

This reinforced the distinction among the institutional roles identified elsewhere in the Act:

Congress → constitutional proposal
Maine Legislature → Convention application and potential ratification
Governor → requested assistance and separate state-law preservation duties

Three-Justice Response

Justices Glassman, Clifford, and Lipez agreed that the initiative had to proceed to the electorate and agreed with the answer concerning the ballot question.

They declined to answer the principal constitutional questions concerning future legislative authority and the Article V instructions at that stage.

Their response treated those questions as insufficiently ripe for advisory determination before the electorate had acted.

The advisory proceeding therefore contained two approaches:

four Justices → constitutional questions addressed before election
three Justices → constitutional questions reserved until a concrete post-election controversy

Ballot Submission

All seven Justices agreed that the Maine Constitution required Initiated Bill 6 to proceed to the electorate if the Legislature did not enact it without change.

Article IV, Part Third, §18 supplied a mandatory submission rule for an initiated bill in that posture.

The legal sequence therefore remained:

constitutional concerns identified → initiated bill retains ballot entitlement → electorate decides

The advisory opinion did not itself terminate the measure. The constitutional questions remained available for later binding adjudication if the initiative became law.

Ballot-Question Reformation

The House also asked whether the Legislature could reform the ballot question prepared by the Secretary of State.

The concern arose because the question printed on the initiative petition did not fully describe the provisions directing the Legislature, Governor, and congressional delegation toward the Convention-related activity contained in the bill.

All seven Justices answered that question in the negative.

They advised that Maine law had assigned preparation of the initiative ballot question to the Secretary of State at the petition-certification stage. Although the Legislature retained authority to change that allocation for future measures, interference with the already-exercised drafting authority for this specific initiative was inconsistent with the structure of Maine’s citizen-initiative process.

The resulting sequence was therefore:

ballot-question concern identified → legislative reformation unavailable at that stage → initiated bill proceeds under the existing submission process

Maine’s pre-election review consequently produced an unusual combination of institutional findings:

Article V concerns identified
future legislative autonomy preserved
gubernatorial Article V authority absent
ballot-question concern identified
legislative reformation unavailable
ballot submission constitutionally required
voter decision proceeds

The advisory character of the proceeding left the enforceability of the enacted system for later binding judicial review.

Electoral Outcome and Statutory Effectiveness

Question 1 proceeded to the November 5, 1996 general election after the Opinion of the Justices identified constitutional concerns while confirming the initiative’s entitlement to ballot submission.

Election Result

Maine voters approved Question 1:

Yes: 318,119

No: 225,620

The approved initiative established the Congressional Term Limits Act of 1996.

Enactment and Effective Date

Governor Angus King signed the initiated legislation on December 3, 1996.

The Act took effect on January 2, 1997 and was codified at 21-A M.R.S.A. §§641–646.

Maine’s sequence had therefore advanced through:

pre-election advisory review → voter approval → gubernatorial signature → statutory effectiveness

Question 1 consequently became effective state law before a binding court resolved the federal constitutional challenge.

That distinction separates Maine from ballot-instruction measures whose judicial disposition prevented the voter-approved architecture from entering operative law.

Binding federal review followed in League of Women Voters of Maine v. Gwadosky.

Judicial Invalidation — League of Women Voters of Maine v. Gwadosky

After the Congressional Term Limits Act became effective, its constitutional status returned to court in a binding federal action.

On May 19, 1997, the United States District Court for the District of Maine decided League of Women Voters of Maine v. Gwadosky, 966 F. Supp. 52.

The plaintiffs challenged the Act under Article V and other provisions of the United States Constitution.

Article V Holding

The district court held that the Act violated Article V.

The court focused on the relationship between the detailed statutory instructions, the prescribed ballot designations, and the independent deliberative responsibilities assigned to state and federal legislators within the constitutional amendment process.

The Act prescribed conduct concerning:

• congressional proposal of the specified amendment;

• advancement of the prescribed Article V application;

• committee and floor procedure;

• preservation of the application and supporting state law;

• potential state ratification; and

• opposition to competing congressional term-limit amendments containing longer limits.

Departure from those instructions would produce the state-authored designation:

“VIOLATED VOTER INSTRUCTION ON TERM LIMITS”

The court concluded that Article V protects independent legislative deliberation by the institutions assigned proposal, application, and ratification functions.

The operative relationship identified by the court was:

voter instruction → prescribed Article V conduct → threatened electoral designation → pressure on independent legislative deliberation

The court held that an instruction system need not eliminate every possibility of independent legislative action to violate Article V. Electoral consequences attached to departure from the prescribed course could themselves place constitutionally impermissible pressure on the Article V decision.

Character of the Ballot Designations

The court rejected the characterization of the Act’s ballot labels as neutral voter information.

It examined both prescribed designations:

“VIOLATED VOTER INSTRUCTION ON TERM LIMITS”

“REFUSED TO PLEDGE TO SUPPORT TERM LIMITS”

The court treated these as state-created evaluative messages carrying foreseeable electoral consequences.

Their constitutional significance therefore arose from the combination:

state-defined constitutional-maintenance conduct → state evaluation → adverse state-authored ballot message

That relationship placed the ballot itself within the Article V conflict.

Observed Interaction with the 1997 Congressional Debate

The litigation also supplied evidence that the state ballot-instruction laws had entered actual congressional deliberation.

Intervenor defendants pointed to Maine Representative Tom Allen’s February 1997 vote against congressional term-limit proposals as evidence that the Maine Act had preserved independent judgment.

They also relied on Nebraska Representative Doug Bereuter’s statements during the same House debate.

Bereuter acknowledged the potential ballot consequence and stated:

“I might have a scarlet letter next to my name on the ballot next year.”

He nevertheless explained that he would vote according to his judgment concerning the national interest.

The defendants offered Allen’s vote and Bereuter’s statement as evidence that ballot-designation laws did not compel legislative conformity.

The court drew a different structural inference.

It treated the necessity for Members of Congress to weigh their constitutional judgment against an adverse ballot designation as evidence that state ballot-instruction laws had entered the Article V deliberative process itself.

The observed sequence was therefore:

state ballot-instruction law → anticipated ballot consequence → congressional awareness during Article V debate → legislative decision under electoral pressure

Maine thus provides direct evidence that the 1996 ballot-instruction architecture moved beyond statutory text and into an actual congressional amendment debate.

Relationship to the Pre-Election Advisory Opinion

The federal judgment converted the Article V concern identified in the 1996 Opinion of the Justices into a binding judicial disposition.

The Maine sequence was:

pre-election advisory Article V concern → voter approval → statutory effectiveness → binding federal Article V judgment

The advisory opinion had left the initiative entitled to proceed through Maine’s constitutional ballot process.

Gwadosky addressed the enforceability of the resulting statute after enactment.

Disposition

The district court granted summary judgment to the plaintiffs.

It enjoined Maine officials from:

implementing or enforcing any portion of the Congressional Term Limits Act

Because the Article V holding resolved the case, the court did not decide the remaining federal constitutional claims.

The direct Maine disposition was therefore:

Article V invalidation → injunction against the entire Act

The Act’s severability clause did not produce a surviving operative remainder.

Maine’s state-authored instruction, pledge, determination, and ballot-designation architecture ceased to have enforceable effect under the federal injunction.

Post-Injunction Statutory Presence and 2002 Repeal

The May 19, 1997 federal judgment ended operative enforcement of the Congressional Term Limits Act.

In League of Women Voters of Maine v. Gwadosky, the United States District Court for the District of Maine enjoined state officials from implementing or enforcing any portion of the Act.

The statutory architecture therefore ceased to operate in 1997 through direct judicial invalidation.

Continuing Statutory Presence

The invalidated provisions remained in the Maine Revised Statutes after the 1997 injunction.

The statutory text therefore remained formally present while federal judgment barred its enforcement:

statutory presence → enforcement barred by federal judgment

Legislative Repeal

In 2002, Maine formally removed the Congressional Term Limits Act from its statutory law.

Public Law 2001, chapter 516, §8 repealed 21-A M.R.S.A. §§641–646.

The complete sequence was:

1996 voter approval
→ January 2, 1997 statutory effectiveness
→ May 19, 1997 federal injunction
→ continued statutory presence
→ 2002 legislative repeal

The Maine Revised Statutes now identify the former sections as repealed.

Maine therefore maintains no operative congressional term-limit ballot-instruction system under Question 1.

The final legal-status sequence distinguishes three separate institutional events:

enactment → loss of enforceability → formal statutory removal

That distinction completes Maine’s transition from voter-authorized statutory architecture to judicially inoperative law and, ultimately, legislative repeal.

Structural Significance

Maine Question 1 makes visible the separation among voter authorization, Article V authority, legislative independence, and operative legal effect.

Electoral Authorization and Article V Authority

The April 1996 Opinion of the Justices identified constitutional boundaries before the electorate acted while preserving the initiative’s entitlement to ballot submission.

Maine voters subsequently approved Question 1, and the measure became effective state law.

The resulting sequence distinguishes two institutional questions:

voter authorization → enactment of state law

Article V authority → exercise by the constitutionally designated institutions

Maine therefore shows that electoral authorization and constitutional authority can operate as separate stages within the same reform sequence.

Advisory Review and Binding Adjudication

Maine also distinguishes advisory constitutional review from binding judicial disposition.

The Opinion of the Justices identified Article V concerns before the election but did not terminate the initiative process.

After enactment, League of Women Voters of Maine v. Gwadosky supplied the binding federal judgment and enjoined implementation and enforcement of the entire Act.

The sequence was:

advisory constitutional review → voter approval → statutory effectiveness → binding Article V invalidation

Observed Congressional Deliberation

The Gwadosky record also documents the ballot-instruction architecture entering actual congressional deliberation.

During the 1997 congressional term-limits debate, Members of Congress confronted the possibility that their Article V votes could produce state-authored ballot consequences. The litigation examined Maine Representative Tom Allen’s vote and Nebraska Representative Doug Bereuter’s discussion of that prospective designation.

The observable relationship was:

state ballot-instruction law → anticipated electoral consequence → congressional awareness → Article V deliberation

Maine therefore supplies direct evidence connecting the enacted state architecture with the constitutional-amendment process it was designed to influence.

Operative Sequence

Question 1 ultimately moved through:

voter instruction → advisory constitutional review → voter approval → statutory effectiveness → congressional deliberation → binding Article V injunction → statutory persistence → legislative repeal

Maine’s distinctive contribution to the Ballot Instruction Phase is the visibility of each stage as a separate institutional event.

Sources

Official Maine Materials

Maine Legislature — Initiated Bill 1995, Chapter 2, An Act to Seek Congressional Term Limits
Official enacted text of Question 1. Provides the specified Congressional Term Limits Amendment, prescribed Article V application, actor-specific conduct requirements, candidate pledges, ballot designations, administrative provisions, review procedures, severability, and Regulatory Exit Conditions.

Maine Legislature — Votes on Maine Initiated Bills, 1911–Present
Official legislative record identifying LD 1827 / IB 6 as Question 1 at the November 5, 1996 election. Records approval by 318,119 votes to 225,620, enactment as 21-A M.R.S. §§641–646, and repeal by Public Law 2001, chapter 516, §8.

Maine Legislature — Legislative History of Citizen Initiated Legislation
Official initiative history for LD 1827 / IB 6. Connects the measure with the 1996 Opinion of the Justices, League of Women Voters of Maine v. Gwadosky, enactment of the Congressional Term Limits Act, and its 2002 repeal.

Maine Revised Statutes — Title 21-A, Chapter 9, Subchapter 1-A
Current statutory record of the Congressional Term Limits Act of 1996. Identifies §§641–646 as repealed.

Maine Revised Statutes — §646, Pledge to Support Term Limits
Current Revisor record for the candidate-pledge provision. Identifies enactment through IB 1995, chapter 2, §1 and repeal through Public Law 2001, chapter 516, §8.

Judicial and Constitutional Authority

Maine Supreme Judicial Court — Opinion of the Justices, 673 A.2d 693 (Me. 1996)
Pre-election advisory review of Initiated Bill 6. Addresses future legislative authority, congressional independence, the state-legislative Article V Convention-application function, the Governor’s absence of delegated Article V authority, ballot-question reformation, and the Maine constitutional requirement that the initiated measure proceed to the electorate.

U.S. District Court for the District of Maine — League of Women Voters of Maine v. Gwadosky, 966 F. Supp. 52 (D. Me. 1997)
Binding post-election review of the enacted Congressional Term Limits Act. The court held the Act unconstitutional under Article V, examined its interaction with legislative deliberation, and enjoined implementation and enforcement of every portion of the statute.

U.S. Constitution — Article V
Federal constitutional allocation of amendment proposal, state-legislative Convention application, and ratification authority.

U.S. Supreme Court — U.S. Term Limits, Inc. v. Thornton, 514 U.S. 779 (1995)
Federal constitutional boundary preceding the Ballot Instruction Phase. Held that states may not impose additional qualifications for congressional office beyond those established by the Constitution.

U.S. Supreme Court — Cook v. Gralike, 531 U.S. 510 (2001)
Later Elections Clause decision addressing Missouri’s state-authored congressional ballot designations. Provides a comparative federal boundary for the Ballot Instruction Phase; Maine’s direct operative invalidation occurred earlier under Article V in Gwadosky.

Questions for Further Exploration

• What did Maine voters seek to accomplish by specifying a congressional term-limit amendment while assigning different responsibilities to their Members of Congress, state legislators, and Governor?

• Why did Question 1 assign different forms of constitutional-maintenance conduct to those three classes of elected officials while directing them toward the same congressional term-limit objective?

• After Maine voters approved Question 1, what actions did Maine’s Members of Congress take in response to the instruction to advance the specified Congressional Term Limits Amendment?

• What actions did members of the Maine Legislature take in response to the voters’ instruction to make and preserve the prescribed Article V application and, if presented, support ratification of the specified amendment?

• What actions did the Governor take in response to the voters’ request for assistance with the Convention application and the Act’s separate statutory-preservation duties?

• When the possibility of a state-authored ballot designation entered the 1997 congressional term-limits debate, what does that reveal about the relationship between voter instruction, electoral accountability, and independent legislative judgment?

• If constitutional objections had been identified before the election but Maine voters nevertheless approved Question 1 and the Act became effective law, what significance should that electoral authorization have carried for the officials to whom the instructions were directed?

• When Gwadosky eliminated the legal enforcement of those instructions, what forms of political or electoral accountability remained for evaluating the subsequent conduct of the officials who had received them?

• If representatives retain constitutional authority to exercise independent judgment, what weight should Maine’s expressly adopted voter instruction carry in judging whether their subsequent conduct faithfully represented the electorate?

• If Article V assigns independent constitutional judgment to legislators while Maine voters expressly communicated the constitutional course they wanted their representatives to pursue, how should the legitimacy of representation be evaluated when the two diverge?

Related Pages

→ Congressional Term Limits
Connects Maine’s specified 3/2 amendment, prescribed Article V application, actor-specific conduct schedules, and transition treatment to the broader development of congressional term-limit proposal strategies.

→ Maine — Congressional Term Limits (1993–1995)
Provides Maine’s preceding state-administered congressional eligibility architecture and the pathway displaced after U.S. Term Limits, Inc. v. Thornton.

→ Proposal Authority
Provides the governing distinction between voter authorization and the institutions assigned amendment proposal, Convention application, and ratification functions under Article V.

→ Congressional Ballot Instruction Phase (1996–2000)
Places Maine within the 1996 state-authored ballot-instruction cohort and the broader use of voter instruction to advance congressional proposal and state-legislative Article V application pathways.

→ Worked Example — Institutional Response Sequence to Congressional Term-Limit Initiatives (1990–2001)
Locates Maine’s post-Thornton ballot-instruction architecture, Article V litigation, and eventual judicial foreclosure within the broader congressional term-limit response sequence.