Missouri voters will decide four statewide constitutional amendments—Amendments 3, 6, 7, and 8—plus Proposition A, a referendum on the state’s 2025 congressional map, on November 3, 2026.
These choices are about more than party labels. They concern bodily autonomy, dependable public services, democratic accountability, local law-enforcement oversight, the public’s power to enact laws directly, and whether Missouri should keep placing detailed policy disputes in a constitution that is difficult to amend.
Missouri’s November ballot could also influence political strategy and messaging in other states, especially on reproductive rights, ballot access, citizen-led initiatives, and constitutional policymaking.
Missouri voters approved reproductive-freedom protections in 2024. The Legislature has now placed a 2026 measure on the ballot that would repeal those protections while adding restrictions on gender-affirming care for minors. That makes Amendment 3 a significant national test of whether voter-approved abortion protections can withstand a later legislative repeal campaign.
A No vote on Amendment 3 would signal that a voter-approved constitutional right cannot be casually undone through a later ballot measure, especially when repeal is paired with another polarizing policy issue. A Yes vote would offer anti-abortion and anti-trans-rights groups a model for revisiting and potentially rolling back state constitutional protections elsewhere.
Campaigns, advocacy groups, donors, and lawmakers will study Missouri’s result as they prepare for abortion-related ballot fights already emerging in multiple states in 2026.
The ballot also includes Amendment 6, a citizen-initiative measure supported by Respect MO Voters. The Missouri Supreme Court reversed a lower-court ruling and ordered it onto the November ballot. Amendment 6 would require an 80% vote in each legislative chamber and a subsequent statewide vote before lawmakers could alter or repeal voter-approved initiative measures.
Finally, Proposition A is the referendum on Missouri’s 2025 congressional map, commonly referred to as HB 1. A No vote rejects the Legislature’s 2025 map; a Yes vote approves it. The federal and state litigation over which map will be used for the 2026 congressional election has been changing quickly, but Proposition A itself remains the voter referendum on whether HB 1 should stand.
Recommendations at a glance
| Ballot measure | Recommendation | Why |
|---|---|---|
| Amendment 3 | Vote No | Protect Missouri’s 2024 reproductive-freedom amendment and reject a constitutional ban on specified gender-transition care for minors |
| Amendment 6 | Vote Yes | Protect voter-approved laws and constitutional amendments from being undone without overwhelming legislative support and another statewide vote |
| Amendment 7 | Vote No | Reject constitutionalizing a speculative investment-fund plan intended to eliminate state taxes |
| Amendment 8 | Vote No | Keep sheriff-governance and removal rules flexible and subject to ordinary statutory reform |
| Proposition A | Vote No | Reject the Legislature’s 2025 congressional map |
Amendment 3: Vote No
Amendment 3 would repeal Article I, Section 36, the reproductive-freedom provision Missouri voters approved in 2024. That provision protects abortion access through fetal viability, permits regulation after viability, and preserves an exception when abortion care is necessary to protect a patient’s life or physical health.
The proposed amendment would allow substantially broader abortion restrictions. It would permit abortion only in specified circumstances involving a medical emergency, rape or incest within 12 weeks of gestation, or a fetal anomaly. The amendment would preserve care for ectopic pregnancies and miscarriages. It would also allow regulation of abortion providers and facilities, informed-consent requirements, and parental-consent or judicial-bypass requirements for minors. The Missouri Secretary of State’s ballot-measures page provides the certified measure and official ballot language.
Amendment 3 would also constitutionally prohibit specified gender-transition procedures for minors, including surgeries, cross-sex hormones, and puberty-blocking drugs, subject to stated medical exceptions.
A No vote keeps Missouri’s 2024 reproductive-freedom protections in force. It preserves the principle that patients, families, and qualified medical professionals—not politicians writing constitutional mandates—should make personal health-care decisions.
Amendment 6: Vote Yes
Amendment 6 would strengthen protections for laws and constitutional amendments approved directly by Missouri voters through the initiative-petition process.
Its central provision would require an 80% vote in both chambers of the Missouri General Assembly, followed by statewide voter ratification, before lawmakers could change or repeal a voter-approved initiative. In practical terms, if Missouri voters enact a law or constitutional amendment at the ballot box, politicians in Jefferson City could not simply undo or dilute it later without overwhelming legislative support and another vote of the people.
A Yes vote on Amendment 6 supports this protection. It says that when Missourians make a decision through direct democracy, that decision should be respected—not treated as a temporary obstacle for politicians to work around.
Secretary of State Denny Hoskins initially refused to certify the proposal, arguing it violated the state constitution’s single-subject rule. On August 19, Cole County Circuit Judge Daniel Green upheld that decision. But the Missouri Supreme Court unanimously reversed the lower court and ordered Secretary Hoskins to certify the measure and place it on the November 3 ballot.
The measure also seeks to protect the initiative-petition process itself from future legislative restrictions and preserve standards for fair, accurate ballot language. Supporters collected more than 330,000 signatures for the proposal.
A Yes vote is a vote for direct democracy: preserving the public’s ability to make law when the Legislature will not, and preventing the Legislature from quickly undoing what voters have already chosen.
Amendment 7: Vote No
Amendment 7 would create the “Show-Me Prosperity Fund,” a permanent public endowment intended to generate enough investment earnings to eliminate state-imposed taxes without spending the fund’s principal. The fund could receive legislative appropriations, gifts, grants, donations, and bequests, while the state treasurer would invest it in exchange-traded funds that track the S&P 500.
The measure would cap annual appropriations from the fund at 3% of its average market value over the preceding five fiscal years. It would prohibit appropriating, pledging, or borrowing against the principal, and it would prevent expenditures until the state treasurer determines that investment earnings could replace state-imposed taxes. The Missouri Senate’s official bill record for SJR 95 describes the proposal’s fund structure and tax-replacement goal.
The amendment includes an emergency provision: if the fund becomes insolvent, suffers a revenue shortfall, or otherwise fails to meet its obligations, the Legislature could raise revenue or enact and increase taxes to preserve state programs. But that contingency does not make the underlying model prudent.
Missouri’s schools, Medicaid and other health services, roads, libraries, emergency response, higher education, and public workforce need stable, democratically accountable revenue. Financial markets can fall precisely when community needs rise.
A No vote rejects embedding a speculative tax-elimination model in the Constitution. Missouri can debate and revise tax policy through ordinary legislation as conditions change rather than locking a broad fiscal experiment into the state’s foundational document.
Amendment 8: Vote No
Amendment 8 would amend the Missouri Constitution to require the election of a sheriff every four years in every county except St. Louis City, St. Louis County, and St. Charles County.
It would also place specified duties and qualifications for sheriffs in the Constitution, including language requiring sheriffs to commit “felons and traitors” to jail.
Most consequentially, Amendment 8 would provide that an elected sheriff could be removed only through a quo warranto petition brought by the Missouri Attorney General. The Missouri Senate’s official record for SJR 87 describes the four-year election requirement, jurisdictional exceptions, and attorney-general-initiated removal provision.
Much of Missouri’s existing framework for sheriffs—including duties and office administration—appears in Chapter 57 of Missouri law. Amendment 8 would instead place detailed office rules and a single removal pathway in the state Constitution, making future reform significantly harder.
Sheriffs exercise sweeping authority over policing, detention, county jails, use-of-force practices, and cooperation with other agencies. Missouri should preserve flexible, responsive oversight when a sheriff abuses power, neglects duties, or cannot serve. It should not create another constitutional barrier that concentrates removal authority in a single statewide official.
A No vote keeps sheriff governance primarily in statute, where the Legislature can respond to problems with reforms rather than requiring another statewide constitutional amendment to revise constitutional rules.
Proposition A: Vote No
Proposition A is the referendum on Missouri’s 2025 congressional map, enacted as HB 1 during a special legislative session.
The map substantially reshaped Missouri’s congressional districts, including the Kansas City-area 5th Congressional District represented by Democratic U.S. Rep. Emanuel Cleaver. Critics argue the change was designed to make the district more favorable to Republicans and give the GOP an advantage in seven of Missouri’s eight congressional districts.
People Not Politicians organized the referendum campaign and submitted more than 300,000 signatures. The Missouri Supreme Court subsequently ordered the referendum onto the November ballot.
The constitutional question is straightforward:
- A Yes vote approves HB 1, the Legislature’s 2025 congressional map.
- A No vote rejects HB 1, the Legislature’s 2025 congressional map.
A No vote rejects the mid-decade gerrymander and supports fairer, more stable congressional representation.
The map litigation has continued to move rapidly, including federal-court intervention over which map must be used in the immediate November congressional election. That immediate question does not change what Proposition A means: a No vote rejects HB 1; a Yes vote approves it.
Your ballot checklist
- Amendment 3 — Vote No: Protect Missouri’s reproductive-freedom amendment and reject a constitutional rollback of abortion access and specified gender-transition care for minors.
- Amendment 6 — Vote Yes: Protect voter-approved laws and constitutional amendments from legislative repeal or weakening without an 80% legislative vote and statewide ratification.
- Amendment 7 — Vote No: Reject constitutionalizing an investment-fund model intended to replace state taxes and putting essential public-service funding at risk.
- Amendment 8 — Vote No: Reject constitutional rules that entrench sheriff-office requirements and limit removal to an attorney-general-initiated court action.
- Proposition A — Vote No: Reject Missouri’s 2025 congressional map.
Missouri’s Constitution should safeguard rights, preserve democratic accountability, and support the public institutions people rely on. For the November 3 ballot as it currently stands: vote No on Amendments 3, 7, and 8; vote Yes on Amendment 6; and vote No on Proposition A.
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