There are some half-dozen classes of technical requirements which make the amending of many state constitutions wellnigh impossible.  Some states have never been able to amend; others have had to submit the same amendment again and again before it passed, even in the case of measures which were not unpopular.  The Legislatures of Nebraska and Alabama have occasionally succeeded in passing amendments favored by politicians, by resorting to clever tricks to circumvent the constitutional handicaps.  Only by outwitting the framers have they been able to make changes in their constitutions.

Among the common technical requirements are the passing by a set proportion much larger than a mere majority of the legislature; the passing of the people’s vote by a majority of those voting for candidates and not merely of those voting on the amendment itself; the setting of special time and other limits for the submission of amendments, etc.  Many states combine three or more of these requirements.

No impediment seems more vexatious than that which prevented the Arkansas bill from coming before the people after the Legislature of 1915 had approved submission.  Nor is Arkansas alone in limiting the number of amendments to be submitted to the people at one time; Kentucky goes farther and makes the limit two and Illinois allows but one at a time.

The other six states whose bill failed at the last session belong to a group of fifteen which require a special “constitutional majority” of two-thirds or three-fifths favorable in the vote of both houses on an amendment bill.[A] In South Carolina and Mississippi it must pass two legislatures by this large vote, one before and one after the referendum; in Mississippi this means four years’ delay for its sessions are quadrennial.  In thirteen states the amendment bill must pass two legislatures, in some by a constitutional majority at one passage.[B]

Alabama is one of the states whose bill failed through the constitutional majority rule in 1915.  In that state another suffrage bill must wait four years for the next legislative session.  If this time it surmounts the hazard of a three-fifths favorable vote it will be faced by another hazard; for Alabama is one of nine states in which an amendment must pass the

[Footnote A:  South Carolina, Georgia, Illinois, Maine, Michigan, West Virginia, Louisiana, Texas and Mississippi—­all a two-thirds vote, and Alabama, Florida, North Carolina, Ohio, Maryland and Kentucky a three-fifths vote.]

[Footnote B:  In Connecticut, Massachusetts, Tennessee, Vermont by a two-thirds majority of one Legislature or of one house or both; in Iowa, Indiana, North Dakota, Pennsylvania, Virginia, Wisconsin, New Jersey, New York and Rhode Island by majorities.  All but the last three have biennial Legislatures.] referendum not by a majority on the amendment but by a majority of all voting for candidates at this general election.[A]