Amendment numbering in the state of Colorado is disorganized and confusing. If I reference an amendment number or referendum letter from multiple years, I will denote it as Amendment 11 (1998). Referendum began to be formatted in alphabetical order in 2004.

The most significant passed amendment in 1990 was the implementation of term limits on all elected officials in the state. It passed with a large majority and imposed eight year term limits on elected officials, except for U.S. Senators who were allowed two terms totaling twelve years. The portion covering United State House and Senate members is struck down in 1995. The state limits are still in effect. TABOR failed in 1990, and had failed in 1988 as well.

1992 had two controversial amendments pass, one of which is still causing problems. Amendment 1 is TABOR, the Taxpayer's Bill of Rights, which requires votes on any tax increases and limits governmental growth to a fixed percentage. Amendment 2 was the anti-GLBT amendment, giving no discrimination protection to gay and lesbian citizens. This amendment is stopped by the State Supreme Court and later struck down by the U.S. Supreme Court in Romer v. Evans.

Of the other amendments, all of the expanded gambling votes go down by large margin, and the one further complicating the gambling process is approved. Bear hunting was limited, and school vouchers are rejected by a 2-1 margin. Since TABOR also allows off-year elections for TABOR-related tax referendum and amendments, so there are election results from 1993. Doug Bruce, the author of TABOR, made every year an election year in Colorado, and this provision has survived a counter amendment in 1996 to strip odd-year elections from the constitution and require super majorities for referendum passage. In local elections, over 900 TABOR related proposals have passed, some even permanently removing TABOR over budget control.

Again term limits, and again they pass. Amendment 12 is termed "Election Reform", but is a catch all amendment for multiple changed to the election code, changing petitions, political donations, retaining elections for judges, pension plans, and a few other things. Amendment 12 loses by a significant margin, and a portion is revived and placed on the ballot in 1996, only to lose by 40 percent instead of by 50 percent. Another addition now familiar to voters is the Ballot Information Booklet, commonly called Blue Book. The Blue Book is a non-partisan impartial analysis of proposed amendments and referendum on the state ballot and judge retention votes. Amendment analysis from 1998 onwards is available on the Legislative Council website referenced at the top of this page.

I have to check into this more, but I believe that Referendum A in 1994 was placed on the ballot in response to Amendment 12. The single subject rule for amendments and referenda placed ballot initiatives and amendments under the same rules as the state legislature. Advocates for single-issue bills say that this restriction prevents pork-barrel projects from being attached to every bill to curry favor from representatives.

Frankly, most of these amendments are completely irrelevant. The ones that passed are unconstitutional (12 - U.S. Congressional Term Limits), required due to poor wording in prior amendments (B - Mailing of Ballot Information), or gutted by the legislature (15 - Campaign Finance). Amendment 16, State Trust Lands, takes a portion of the land owned by the state into permanent open space, but the nominated space can be removed from the registry. The only other issue that passed was allowing for counties to set qualifications for county sheriffs.

Of the failed issues, the Property Tax amendment had the potential to anger every constituent group in the state by removing property tax exemptions. The result was the third lowest percentage of yes voters in the 16 years covered here. An amendment to change the petitioning process failed for the second time, which was lumped into the Election Reform amendment in 1994. This issue is dormant for ten years, coming back again in 2006. The 1997 amendment failed by a large margin, the second largest no percentage since 1990. It proposed raising both gasoline taxes and car registration taxes. Car registration taxes are fairly high in this state already, and certain regions have extra taxes to support the E-470 tollway.

In 1998, abortion came back to the ballot, spurred on by President Clinton's vetoes of bills on this subject. The first amendment outlawed partial birth abortions, while Amendment 12 required parental notification. Of the two abortion amendments on the ballot, the partial birth abortion ban failed while parental notification for minors passed, with a 6% swing between the two amendments. Amendment 14 regulated large pig farms and a rare case of voter initiated petitioning. Advocates for the amendment were concerned over contaminated water wells from farm runoff, and the petition required large farms to apply for permits and mitigate the damage to groundwater sources. And since water moves votes, the amendment was adopted. In 1999, Referendum A was the first time the state of Colorado used bonds to pay for transportation projects, including the T-REX project in Denver and other high priority projects.

One of the bizarre notions of Referendum C (1998) is that the formation of Broomfield County could have been done without the explicit consent of the voters who would now form the county. The City of Broomfield was split between four counties and proposed a new county to remove the complication of sales taxes and also allowed them to use both county and city sales tax proceeds from both Interlocken and Flatiron Crossing to build out a large amount of services. They also built the Northwest Parkway, a toll road which connects US-36 to I-25. Using wildly inflated numbers, the road was built and not enough cars came. Now they seek to lease the road to a private company before the bond payments become impractical and the road defaults. The problems with the Northwest Parkway have provided ample cause for opponents of completing the 470 loop, since most routings use a toll road and pass through Golden, where a large center of opposition resides.

The amendments and referenda in 2000 and 2001 are strange as the results show a wide variety of opinion on the local level. Medicinal marijuana passed by a small margin, along with an amendment closing the gun show loophole. Amendment 23 also passed, specifying mandatory budget increases in K-12 education. All three of these amendments were largely opposed by the Republican legislators and Governor Owens. In El Paso County, all three measured had a majority voting yes. Conversely, Amendment 25 failed by a large margin, 60% to 40%. Even though vows were made to petition again in the future, none have come and the issues appears to have been placed on hold while gay marriage and illegal immigration.

These amendments may have played a role in the Republican loss of the State Senate, as the amendments that passed were not supported by Republicans, while the ones that failed did. All three losses were in the Denver metro area, which voted the same way as the state did overall for all four amendments. The last amendment was Doug Bruce's latest invention, Amendment 21. It lost by a large margin, and didn't gain a majority of votes in any county. This amendment would have reduced every tax by 25 dollars every year, eventually crippling government. In Sedgwick County it lost badly: 964 no votes to 29 yes votes.

In 2002, the campaign finance reform act passed and has had a significant impact on the fundraising capability of state officials in Colorado. These limits dropped the amount a person could donate to a candidate and party, while also setting voluntary caps on spending. These limits are not indexed to inflation or anything, so they will eventually have to be fixed. This amendment is the only one of five election related questions to pass, with the other four losing by large margins. The English-only amendment also failed, since it would take a bit longer for the anti-illegal immigration movement to pick up enough real and manufactured outrage.

In 2003, Referendum A was proposed after multiple years of drought in the state. Governor Owens was one of the main proponents of the measure, which asked for two billion dollars to fund new water infrastructure projects. The Western Slope claimed this would be for inter-basin water transfers across the Continental Divide, and opponents touted conservation over unknown water storage projects. The referendum failed in every county. On the Western Slope, supporting Referendum A is a difficult bias to overcome.

The 2004 ballot was relatively quiet in comparison, with Amendment 37 opposed by some energy companies and citizen groups as a mandatory rate increase. Referendum A was a proposal to reform the civil service system, backed by Governor Owens. The budget cuts caused by TABOR were a huge problem, but the proposal by the Bighorn Center was pulled and the legislature could not agree on a solution. Referendum A lost by a large margin, and Amendment 37 passed.

Governor Owens, moderate Republicans, and the Democratic caucus crafted two amendments for the budget crisis caused by TABOR. Referendum C and D in 2005 was the most significant odd-year election battle, with a bizarre alliance of Republicans and Democrats against the anti-tax faction of the electorate. Due to the relative incompetence of the Ref. C opponents and the moderate Republican/Democrat campaign co-operation produced a Referendum C win. Referendum D was an additional measure similar to the 1999 Transportation Referendum; it failed by a small margin. The passage of Referendum C broke the TABOR ratchet and has prevented budget cuts. Doug Bruce is planning on suing the government in 2010 over the budget level for 2011.

In 2006, both Democrats and Republicans tried to place ballot issues to drive like-minded individuals to the polls. A proposed illegal immigration amendment was struck down by the State Supreme Court for violating the single issue statue (Ref A - 1994). A special session was called, which passed a law with a similar result without the legal clauses attached. Referendum K was also placed on the ballot, asking voters whether or not they wished to sue the U.S. Government over the cost of illegal immigrants. Four amendments were placed to favor Republicans, and one major one for Democrats, an increase in the minimum wage.

The election results were a mix, as usual. Gay marriage was voted into the constitution, and civil unions were rejected. However, the minimum wage hike passed, and all three of the right-wing supported amendments failed. Republican efforts to allow for easier petitions, Supreme Court term limits, and limit school spending all failed by significant margins. Amendment 41 passed, which limited gifts to any state employee and has subsequently been a fight over is a gift and what is not a gift.

For 2007, the petition meetings have just begun, and voter initiated amendments have until summer to turn in signatures. Time will tell on what brilliant or idiotic amendments make it on the ballot. If there is no election, it will be the first time there is no election since TABOR instituted odd-year elections.