With the passage of Proposal 1, term limits will now change in Michigan – previously, state lawmakers could serve a total of 14 years in the state legislature as long eight of those years were spent in the Senate and the other six years in the House. Now, an individual can serve in the state legislature for 12 total years and spend all of those years in a single chamber. 

It also subjects the governor, attorney general, secretary of state and state lawmakers to rules requiring them to turn over annual financial disclosure reports around assets, sources of income, gifts and travel. Currently, members of the U.S. Congress are subjected to these rules and most states require the same of their state officeholders. 

Jason Cabel Roe, who has been helping promote Proposal 1 through the group Voters for Transparency and Term Limits, said last night the passage of the amendment was interesting because it involved a lot of people who do not usually work together.

“Our opposition never really was able to formulate much of a coherent reason to oppose what we were doing,” Cabel Roe said. “I think the broad coalition that we put together – Republicans, Democrats, labor, business, environmentalists, agriculture – you know it’s a pretty unique coalition that we’ve never really seen in the state in a long time if we ever have.”

As for Proposal 2, advocates said it would allow for the expansion of voting rights and ensure it does not allow for the infringement of rights later. It grants a nine-day window of early voting, gives prepaid postage for absentee ballots, one ballot drop box per every 15,000 voters in an area and requires that military ballots be counted before or on Election Day.