Ballotpedia Data Client Documentation
  • Introduction
  • Geographic APIs
    • Getting started with geographic APIs
    • About redistricting
    • /districts
    • /officeholders
    • /election_dates
    • /elections_by_point
    • /elections_by_state
    • Practical guide
  • Rate limiting
  • Bulk data
    • Downloading bulk data via the client portal
  • Downloading bulk data via API
  • Dictionaries and Terms
    • About the Candidates data set
    • Data dictionary: Voting rules
    • Data dictionary: Officeholders
    • Data dictionary: Ballot Measures
    • Data dictionary: Candidates
    • Terms of Use
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On this page
  • Ballot measure status definitions
  • Pre-Certification
  • Not on the ballot
  • Indirect initiatives
  • Certified for Ballot
  • Post-Election Results:
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  1. Dictionaries and Terms

Data dictionary: Ballot Measures

column_name
description

name

The name or title of this ballot measure, including year

short_name

Abbreviated name of measure

district

Ballotpedia's unique district ID that this ballot measure covers

district_name

Name of district (typically a State)

district_type

Type of district

ocdid

election_date

Date on which this measure will be on the ballot

status

Options:

  • Proposed

  • Gathering signatures

  • Signatures submitted

  • Certified to the legislature

  • Qualified for the ballot

  • On the ballot

  • Approved

  • Defeated

  • Not on the ballot

  • Pending official review

  • Pending judicial ruling

  • Too close to call

type

The type of this ballot measure

Options:

  • Advisory question

  • Amendment

  • Automatic ballot referral

  • Bond issue

  • Bond question

  • City charter amendment

  • Combined initiated constitutional amendment

  • Commission-referred ballot measure

  • Constitutional amendment

  • Indirect initiated state statute

  • Initiated amendment

  • Initiated amendment and statute

  • Initiated constitutional amendment

  • Initiated state statute

  • Initiative

  • Initiative to the Legislature

  • Initiative to the People

  • Legislative referral

  • Legislatively referred constitutional amendment

  • Legislatively referred state statute

  • Local

  • Referendum

  • Referral

  • Referred ordinance

  • Statute

  • State statute

  • Veto referendum

topics

One or more (semicolon-separated) topics this ballot measure covers

summary

A summary of the measure

yes_vote

A custom explanation of what a YES vote means

no_vote

A custom explanation of what a NO vote means

yes_votes_total

The number of YES votes this ballot measure received

no_votes_total

The number of NO votes this ballot measure received

ballot_question

Text of the question to appear on the ballot.

source

A URL to the source of election results

url

The URL to a Ballotpedia page about this ballot measure

Ballot measure status definitions

Pre-Certification

  • Proposed - The ballot measure has been proposed.

  • Pending official review - The ballot initiative has been filed with election officials but has not yet been cleared for signature gathering

  • Cleared for signature gathering - The ballot initiative has been cleared for signature gathering (campaigns can collect signatures).

  • Pending judicial ruling pre-election - Courts need to decide a case about the ballot measure before it can be certified for the ballot.

  • Signatures submitted - Signatures have been submitted for a ballot initiative and they are pending verification.

Not on the ballot

  • Not on the ballot - The proposed ballot measure has failed to make the ballot.

Indirect initiatives

  • Approved by the legislature - This is an indirect initiative that legislators approved. In other words, the initiative was enacted by the legislature, rather than voters.

Certified for Ballot

  • On the ballot - The ballot measure has been certified for the ballot.

  • Qualified for the ballot - This is a technicality. The ballot measure hasn’t been certified for the ballot but has qualified for the ballot. In California, for example, citizen-initiated ballot measures qualify for the ballot after enough signatures have been verified. However, the secretary of state doesn’t declare they’re on the ballot until 131 days before the election.

Post-Election Results:

  • Approved - Voters approved the ballot measure.

  • Defeated - Voters rejected the ballot measure.

  • Too close to call - The election has happened, but we have not called the measure approved or defeated. Like candidate elections, when results are close, sometimes you need to wait for 100% of precincts to report results and/or absentee ballots to be received.

  • Pending judicial ruling post-election - There are cases in which voters decide a ballot measure but whether the ballot measure results will be certified or not is dependent on a court ruling. In 2019, for example, a majority of voters approved Marsy’s Law in Pennsylvania. However, results were never certified pending a court ruling (and the court ultimately ruled that votes could not be certified).

  • Overturned - Voters approved the ballot measure, but courts later overturned the measure as unconstitutional or otherwise invalid.

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Last updated 8 months ago

The project seeks to assign somewhat predictable and globally unique identifiers to political divisions. This field is not uniformly filled due to data availability.

The status of this ballot measure. For further detail on each of these, see below.

Certified to the legislature - When signatures are verified for an , they are sent to the legislature before being certified for the ballot. This gives the legislature the option to pass an initiative outright, rather than having it go to voters.

indirect initiative
Open Civic Data Division Identifiers
status definitions