Missouri voters passed a sales tax cap. Under Amendment 4, it would have failed

Under a proposal on the Aug. 4 ballot, that wouldn’t have been enough.

That proposal, Amendment 4, would require citizen-led constitutional amendments to win not only a statewide majority, but also a majority in each of Missouri’s eight congressional districts. That means an amendment could carry the state, win seven of eight districts and still fail if voters in a single district rejected it.

The math can be stark. Analysis last year by The Independent found that, based on 2024 turnout, a bare majority in the lowest-turnout congressional district — about 156,000 voters — could sink a proposal that won everywhere else in the state. That is about 5.3% of the roughly 2.96 million Missourians who cast ballots in the 2024 governor’s race.

And that’s exactly what would have happened to the 2016 tax amendment, according to an analysis by The Independent of certified election returns and county precinct results.

The measure won by more than 375,000 votes statewide. But it lost the 1st Congressional District — anchored in St. Louis and the northern suburbs of St. Louis County — by roughly 31,500 votes. Under Amendment 4, that single district would have blocked a business-backed tax cap approved by a clear majority of Missouri voters.

The example complicates the political story around the proposal, which has been largely framed as a Republican response to recent citizen initiatives on Medicaid, marijuana, sports betting and abortion rights — campaigns backed by coalitions often at odds with the GOP-controlled legislature.

The 2016 tax amendment was not one of them. It was bankrolled by the Missouri Association of Realtors, endorsed by business and professional groups and faced no organized opposition. Yet under the district-by-district rule, it would never have taken effect.

A review of certified returns by The Independent found Amendment 4 would have blocked every citizen-led constitutional amendment Missouri voters have approved since 2020. Medicaid expansion, recreational marijuana, sports betting and abortion rights each passed statewide. None carried all eight districts, based on the congressional map in place when they appeared on the ballot.

In November 2016, Missourians approved an amendment barring new state or local sales taxes on services not already taxed as of Jan. 1, 2015. But in the 1st District, St. Louis voted it down 59% to 41%, casting 51,142 votes in favor and 73,020 against, according to the city Board of Election Commissioners. In the portion of St. Louis County inside the district, voters also rejected it, giving it about 47% support, county precinct returns show.

Combined, the district cast 136,375 votes for the amendment and 167,875 against.

That finding is now part of the campaign against Amendment 4. Missourians for Fair Governance, one of four committees formed to oppose it, reported a $2 million contribution from the Missouri Association of Realtors last week.

Scott Charton, a spokesperson for Missourians for Fair Governance who also represents the Realtors, said the 2016 measure shows voters have used the initiative process to limit taxes when politicians would not.

“The 2016 Taxpayer Protection Amendment barring sales tax on everyday services was embraced by a majority of Missouri voters,” Charton said, “and over the last decade it has spared our citizens from millions of dollars in sales taxes on services such as healthcare, childcare, car repairs and haircuts.”

Amendment 4 would apply only to amendments proposed by initiative petition. Those the legislature places on the ballot would still pass by simple statewide majority. Charton calls that asymmetry evidence the measure is designed to strip voters of their power to take action when “politicians refuse to act.”

Missouri Farm Bureau, one of the state’s most influential agricultural groups, has endorsed Amendment 4 and is urging its members to vote yes. Its president, Garrett Hawkins, said the organization’s members have pushed to overhaul the initiative process since the 1980s, arguing constitutional change has come to reflect money concentrated in cities rather than consensus across the state.

“These significant measures that ultimately are enshrined in the constitution, that have tremendous societal and budgetary implications, don’t start in rural communities,” Hawkins said. “We’re left out of the conversation until we start seeing multimillion-dollar ad campaigns on TV, or until we walk into the ballot box to take a position on them.”

Told that the 2016 tax cap had lost the 1st District, Hawkins said the example only proved his point.

“Clearly those who were working on that measure,” he said, “did not get a consensus in all areas of the state.”

Not every measure voters approved in the last decade would have failed the test. A 2018 medical marijuana amendment carried the state with about 66% of the vote — a margin wide enough that it likely would have cleared all eight districts.

Hawkins did not dispute that Amendment 4 would make it much harder to change the constitution. But the constitution, he said, “should be a framework for government. It shouldn’t be a Christmas tree laden with special interest ornaments.”

The dispute follows years of conflict between Missouri voters and Republican state leaders, who resisted Medicaid expansion, marijuana legalization and sports betting before voters approved them at the ballot box, and defended a near-total abortion ban before voters overturned it.

The August vote comes amid a national fight over direct democracy, as legislatures in states where voters have used ballot measures to bypass them have moved to raise approval thresholds, expand geographic signature requirements and tighten petition rules.

Ohio voters in 2023 rejected a proposal to make constitutional amendments harder to pass, months before approving an abortion-rights measure. Arkansas, Idaho and Florida have each moved to constrain their initiative processes, with mixed results in court.

Missouri’s proposal would go further than raising a statewide percentage or demanding signatures from more places. It would tie final approval of citizen-led amendments to congressional districts — political boundaries drawn by lawmakers.

Amendment 4 was crafted last year during a special legislative session by the GOP-dominated General Assembly. Gov. Mike Kehoe moved it last month from the November ballot to the August primary, when turnout is smaller and more Republican.

Missouri has amended its constitution by simple statewide majority since 1945.

To Hawkins, the change would force a debate that now skips most of the state.

“So many times, folks can focus their resources and attention on Kansas City, St. Louis, Columbia and Springfield,” he said. “If we’re talking about enshrining policies in the constitution, then that conversation should be encompassing all of Missouri.”

Charton cast the measure as an attack on equal voting power and majority rule.

“Amendment 4’s whole scheme kills the sacred principle of one person, one vote, by valuing your vote based on your address,” he said. “It gives voters in a single district veto power over the other seven.”

This was first published by the Missouri Independent, a nonprofit, nonpartisan news organization covering state government, politics and policy, and is reprinted with permission.