Missouri's Supreme Court judges were asked Wednesday to order new elections, with new ballot language, for two constitutional amendments voters approved last August.
Amendment 1, the "Right to Farm" proposal, drew more than 997,500 votes, and passed by a 2,375-vote margin.
Amendment 5, modifying part of the existing "Right to Bear Arms" section of Missouri's Bill of Rights, drew more than 989,000 votes, and passed with a 216,555-vote margin.
Although the seven-member court heard arguments about the two amendments separately, many of the attorneys talked about issues common to both cases.
For instance, Jefferson City lawyer Chuck Hatfield filed the challenge to the weapons measure.
"The substantive issue here, as the court knows, is whether the Legislature properly summarized a proposed amendment to the Missouri Constitution," Hatfield explained, "or whether the summary's failure to include major components of the amendment resulted in an election irregularity."
Anthony DeWitt, another Jefferson City lawyer, told the court the "Right-to-Farm" amendment case "is really about using cleverly chosen words to obtain an electoral result. What we really need to have is the right words that preserve the integrity of the electoral result - and this court is the guardian of that electoral fairness."
With the farming amendment, he argued, the ballot language said "Missouri citizens" when the amendment really affected only "farmers and ranchers."
DeWitt said the real issue for the court to consider is "whether or not the language chosen has the capacity to mislead the average voter."
Representing Secretary of State Jason Kander's office, Jeremiah Morgan, the state's deputy solicitor general, said Missouri law requires the language to be challenged before an election, not after - and the high court should reject both post-election challenges and leave unchanged the results of votes cast "by nearly a million people."
DeWitt's clients didn't challenge the "Right-to-Farm" ballot title before the August election. He said they didn't have to.
"The statute says, "A challenge "may' be mounted,'" DeWitt explained, "and if you do, you have to do it within 10 days."
But it's "not mandatory," he said, since the law allows a post-election challenge as well.
Noting voters see only a summary on the ballot when casting their votes, Hatfield argued "no one, no other branch of government reviewed that summary or commented on it," and that means there must be "some opportunity to have this summary statement reviewed."
Because Gov. Jay Nixon placed the two amendments on the Aug. 5 primary ballot - and existing state law says no ballot changes can be made within six weeks of the election - Hatfield said: "The state argued that my clients were, simply too late, even though it's undisputed that my clients sued on the first day they could, possibly, sue."
He challenged the election results directly to the Supreme Court after they were certified - still arguing the ballot title lawmakers wrote didn't explain the issue well enough for voters.
"The only evidence you need is the summary and the language," he told the judges.
State Sen. Kurt Schaefer, R-Columbia, wrote the right-to-bear arms amendment.
"There is no evidence in this record - even the plaintiffs don't admit that they were misled" by the ballot language they challenged, he told the court.
St. Louis attorney Mark "Thor" Hearne II said there's no requirement that ballot language always be clear.
"We have, in this country, for 250 years been debating the meaning of the phrase that "Congress shall make no law establishing religion,'" Hearne explained. "In this case, the question is, "Did this ballot title communicate the purpose of protecting the right to farm?'
"And the answer is, clearly, yes."
Attorney David Welch, representing lawmakers, agreed with Morgan that the August election results should be kept.
The amendments "became part of the Constitution 30 days after the election," Welch said. They are "in-effect now."