Constitution of California

Colton Hall, in Monterey, site of the Constitutional Convention of 1849

The constitution has undergone numerous changes since its original drafting. It was rewritten from scratch several times before the drafting of the current 1879 constitution, which has itself been amended or revised (see below).

In response to widespread public disgust with the powerful railroads that controlled California's politics and economy at the start of the 20th century, Progressive Era politicians pioneered the concept of aggressively amending the state constitution by initiative in order to remedy perceived evils.[6] From 1911, the height of the U.S. Progressive Era, to 1986, the California Constitution was amended or revised over 500 times.[7]

The constitution gradually became increasingly bloated, leading to abortive efforts towards a third constitutional convention in 1897, 1914, 1919, 1930, 1934 and 1947.[8] By 1962, the constitution had grown to 75,000 words, which at that time was longer than any other state constitution but Louisiana's.[9]

That year, the electorate approved the creation of a California Constitution Revision Commission, which worked on a comprehensive revision of the constitution from 1964 to 1976. The electorate ratified the commission's revisions in 1966, 1970, 1972, and 1974, but rejected the 1968 revision, whose primary substantive effect would have been to make the state's superintendent of schools into an appointed rather than an elected official.[10] The Commission ultimately removed about 40,000 words from the constitution.[9]

The California Constitution is one of the longest in the world.[3] The length has been attributed to a variety of factors, such as the influence of previous Mexican civil law, a lack of faith in elected officials and the fact that many initiatives take the form of a constitutional amendment.[11] Several amendments involved the authorization of the creation of state government agencies, including the State Compensation Insurance Fund, the California Department of Alcoholic Beverage Control, and the State Bar of California; the purpose of such amendments was to insulate the agencies from being attacked as an unconstitutionally broad exercise of police power or inherent judicial power.[12]

Unlike other state constitutions, the California Constitution strongly protects the corporate existence of cities and counties and grants them broad plenary home rule powers.[13] The constitution gives charter cities, in particular, supreme authority over municipal affairs, even allowing such cities' local laws to trump state law.[14] By specifically enabling cities to pay counties to perform governmental functions for them, Section 8 of Article XI resulted in the rise of the contract city.[15]

Article 4, Section 8(d) defines an "urgency statute" as one "necessary for immediate preservation of the public peace, health, or safety"; any proposed bill including such a provision includes a "statement of facts constituting the necessity" and a two-thirds majority of each house is required to also separately pass the bill's urgency section.[16]

Many of the individual rights clauses in the state constitution have been construed as protecting rights broader than the Bill of Rights in the federal constitution.[17] Two examples include (1) the Pruneyard Shopping Center v. Robins case involving an implied right to free speech in private shopping centers, and (2) the first decision in America in 1972 found that the death penalty is unconstitutional. California v. Anderson, 6 Cal. 3d 628. This noted that under California's state constitution a stronger protection applies than under the U.S. Constitution's Eighth Amendment; the former prohibits punishments that are "cruel or unusual", while the latter only prohibits punishments that are "cruel and unusual". The constitution also confers upon women equality of rights in "entering or pursuing a business, profession, vocation, or employment." This is the earliest state constitutional equal rights provision on record.[18]

Two universities are expressly mentioned in the constitution: the public state-run University of California and the private Stanford University. UC is one of only nine state-run public universities in the United States whose independence from political interference is expressly guaranteed by the state constitution.[19] Since 1900, Stanford has enjoyed the benefit of a constitutional clause shielding Stanford-owned property from taxes as long as it is used for educational purposes.[20]

The California Constitution distinguishes between constitutional amendments and constitutional revisions, the latter of which is considered to be a "substantial change to the entire constitution, rather than ... a less extensive change in one or more of its provisions".[21] Both require passage of a California ballot proposition by the voters, but they differ in how they may be proposed. A constitutional amendment may be placed on the ballot by either a two-thirds vote in the California State Legislature or by signatures equal to 8% of the votes cast in the last gubernatorial election through the exercise of the initiative power by the voters. The signature requirement for constitutional amendments is among the lowest thresholds for similar measures of any U.S. state.[22]

As of 2023, this was 874,641 signatures[23] compared to a 2020 population of 39,538,223. A constitutional revision originally required a constitutional convention but today may be passed with the approval of both two-thirds of the Legislature and approval by a majority of voters; while simplified since its beginnings, the revision process is considered more politically charged and difficult to successfully pass than an amendment.[24] Voters exercising the initiative power are not permitted to propose a constitutional revision.

Signatures of the 1849 California Constitution

Many of the signatories to the state's original 1849 constitution were themselves prominent in their own right, and are listed below.[25][26][27] The list notably includes several Californios (California-born, Spanish-speaking residents).

• Government of California
• Politics of California
• Law of California

• Grodin, Joseph R.; Massey, Calvin R.; Cunningham, Richard B. (1993). The California State Constitution: A Reference Guide. Westport, Connecticut: Greenwood Press. ISBN 978-0-313-27228-8.
• Korey, John L. (2002). California Government (Third ed.). Boston, Massachusetts: Houghton Mifflin Company. ISBN 978-0-618-12284-4.
• Lee, Eugene C. (1991). "The Revision of California's Constitution" (PDF). CPS Brief. 3 (3). Archived from the original (PDF) on 2016-12-26. Retrieved 2010-09-03.

Wikisource has original text related to this article:

Constitution of California

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Constitution of California.

• Official current text of the California Constitution
• Records of the Constitutional Convention of 1849, California State Archives
• 1849 California Constitution, full original English text, California State Archives
• 1849 California Constitution (Spanish:Constitución del Estado de California), full original Spanish text, California State Archives
• 1879 California Constitution, original unamended full text, California State Archives
• 1878–1879 Constitutional Convention Working Papers, California State Archives