Abstract
Thanks to the recall of California Governor Gray Davis in 2003, and his replacement by international movie star Arnold Schwarzenegger, the recall gained a spotlight. While this may be part of an expansion of the recall throughout the globe, a look back at US history shows that it has been popular before, only to crash back into disuse. The recall is currently in a boom phase, as jurisdictions in the US have adopted the recall over the last decade, and it may be growing in use. There are technological reasons to believe that the recall will not effectively disappear in the future and may continue to grow. However, there are also practical hurdles that will prevent the recall from becoming a major player in US politics, even in many of the states that possess what this part of what the Los Angeles Times once called “freak legislation.”
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- 1.
Additionally, at least eight officials who were facing recall attempts in the last two years were thrown out of office by a legislative or executive body.
- 2.
House leaders also faced recalls in California in 1995 and in Colorado in 2013, though those all had other policy as well.
- 3.
In 2012, Michigan changed its laws to remove special election recalls and require all recalls to take place on either a primary or general election date.
- 4.
The recall of judicial decisions was an attempt to allow the populace to prevent judges from declaring acts unconstitutional. According to Bird and Ryan, after the Supreme Court of Colorado declared it void in 1921, the issue disappeared.
- 5.
Bird and fellow Supreme Court Justices Cruz Reynoso and Joseph Grodin were all eventually ousted in a mandatory retention election. Many observers have confused judicial retention elections with recalls, but the retention elections are simply regular elections.
- 6.
State legislative recalls have taken places against 1 Arizona State Senator; a California Governor and 9 state legislators; 2 Colorado Senators; 2 Idaho legislators; 4 Michigan legislators; 3 Oregon legislators; the Governor, Attorney General and Commissioner of Agriculture in North Dakota; 16 Wisconsin state legislators as well as the Governor and Lieutenant Governor; and 1 Washington State Senator.
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Spivak, J. (2020). Recall Elections in the US: Its Long Past and Uncertain Future. In: Welp, Y., Whitehead, L. (eds) The Politics of Recall Elections. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-37610-9_5
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