If you Google Sen. Gravel or Article V you should be able to find a leading citizens’ initiative in the US. Peter Hollings From: Joshua Petersen [joshupetersen(at)gmail.com] Sent: Saturday, November 12, 2011 9:28 AM To: wddm@world-wide-democracy.net Subject: Re: Little bit of direct democracy triumphed in British Columbia, but not in the crandle of DEMOCRACY GREECE ! Becker, Any chance you know of a comprehensive list of possible methods of citizen initiative in the U.S.? If not, it's cool, but wanting to increase the tools in my belt, so to speak. Thanks, Joshua Petersen 2011/11/11 <Ted Becker> Keep at it George. It's now or never. Even in US, where long forgotten methods of citizen initiative that are buried in old constitutions are being resurrected and used by citizens to reverse laws passed by legislative oligarchs. The momentum grows. You are a true Greek warrior in the front lines of global democracy. Ted ________________________________________ From: Δικηγορικό Γραφείο Γ. Λ. Κόκκα & Συνεργατών [geoko(at)otenet.gr] Sent: Thursday, November 10, 2011 9:19 PM To: wddm@world-wide-democracy.net Cc: dimovoulio(at)gmail.com; 'kyriazis'; 'ΜΙΧΑΛΟΠ ΣΟΦΙΑ'; direct-democracy-movement(at)googlegroups.com Subject: RE: Little bit of direct democracy triumphed in British Columbia, but not in the crandle of DEMOCRACY GREECE ! Congratulations from Greece, where we try to have these opportunities of people-initiated referendum in the middle of a horrible crisis, but the governing oligarchies with IMF do not allow us to do so. So we decided to launch today 11/11/11 a Citizens Parliament called DIMOVOULIO.
Best regards
George L. Kokkas N.G.O Forum for Citizens' Democracy Ippokratous str. 42 - GR-10680 Athens Greece Tel.: +30 2103648300 - Fax: +30 2103610882 e-mail : geoko(at)otenet.gr web: www.dimopolis.gr www.3ddemocracy.eu
-----Original Message----- From: M. Kolar [wddm(at)mkolar.org] Sent: Friday, November 11, 2011 3:22 AM To: wddm@world-wide-democracy.net Subject: Fwd: Little bit of direct democracy triumphed in British Columbia
This did not get through the first time:
-------- Original Message -------- Subject: Little bit of direct democracy triumphed in British Columbia Date: Sat, 27 Aug 2011 09:59:04 -0700 From: M. Kolar <wddm(at)mkolar.org> To: wddm@world-wide-democracy.net
We had a landmark referendum in the province of British Columbia, Canada on a change of the tax system. (I will not go into much detail, you can find them on the Internet if interested. In short, B.C. government introduced the so called Harmonized Sales Tax, that replaced the old federal General Sales Tax and Provincial Sales Tax. This change amounted to shifting part of the tax from corporations to consumers.) People did not like the way how the change was introduced - it was announced shortly after the last provincial elections after the wining Liberal Party was promising there will be no tax change.
Although B.C. has (as the only province of Canada) an Initiative and Referendum and Recall Act, it sets very high threshold on the number of signatures needed to hold a people-initiated referendum. In spite of these obstacles, when people got really angry, they managed to overcome them. The initiative to collect signatures to hold this referendum started two years ago, the referendum was mail-in, the deadline to submit the ballots was August 5, and the referendum results were announced yesterday. People won, 54% voted in favour of rejecting HST and returning to the old GST/PST. B.C. government promised to implement the decision of the referendum.
It is the first time in the British Commonwealth that people had a direct say in how they are taxed!
In the many commentaries about the results of this referendum, on could hear also fear of direct democracy, and the comments that the Initiative Act is apparently not restrictive enough, and the government may want to make it even harder for a people's initiative to be successful and that it may want to repel the Initiative Act altogether!
Mirek
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