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Thank you We sneak and here's your shmoop too sure

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brought to you by referenda yearly gala for professional referees

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Zebras alright referenda or what And hear potential answers our

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definition of a referenda that's what We're looking for their

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already well in a democracy The power is supposedly in

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the hands of the people But what happens when the

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people give the power Decide they want the power back

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power outage Yeah that's what Wait wait wait It's actually

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called a referendum for the plural referenda and it occurs

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when the public votes directly on an issue That's sure

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to give the politicians shot So our referenda a used

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to vote on constitutional amendments we'll actually when congress decides

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to pass constitutional amendment like lowering the voting age to

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eighteen state legislatures vote on a ratifying the amendment not

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the general public's So we can rule out a would

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referenda b b called for in the constitution Well referenda

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are not mentioned in the constitution and they haven't really

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ever received congressional approval so bee's out to our referenda

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See a feature of representative systems of government well in

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a representative democracy we elect someone to vote on laws

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So that we don't have toe deal with it That's

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Why we go to the whole rig a mapple in

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the first place right all right could referenda b d

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frequent on the national level but not on the state

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level Well we already said that the constitution doesn't mention

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referenda so we know the general population doesn't really get

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involved in the sausage making of washington political pork which

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means that referendum we do not occur on the national

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level But sometimes due on the state level some states

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like california utilize a direct popular vote on certain issues

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and referendum questions about things like taxes or marriage equality

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might appear on ballots along with candidates for office Option

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is the correct answer If public opinion held absolute power

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then democracies would settle everything with referendum votes So the

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choice is ours whether or not to have to make 00:02:06.886 --> [endTime] that choice in the first place Whoa

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