SALT LAKE CITY — Three Utah men want the Utah Supreme Court to allow a referendum on the medical marijuana bill state lawmakers passed last week to replace voter-approved Proposition 2.

Steve Maxfield, of Kanosh, Bart Grant, of Monroe, and Daniel Newby, of Taylorsville, filed an emergency petition with the state's top court to allow Utahns to vote on the Legislature's action. They also petitioned the court to overturn the law and restore Proposition 2 as approved by voters in November.

The lieutenant governor's office, which oversees state elections, rejected Maxfield's application last week for a referendum, citing lawmakers' two-thirds majority vote on the bill. Maxfield, who heads a group called The People's Right, wants the Supreme Court to reverse the decision so he can start collecting signatures to get the issue on the November 2020 ballot.

Maxfield said he wants the court to decide whether residents have the right to change the government through the initiative or referendum process.

"We either do have the right or we don't. I want them to clarify it," he said.

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Gov. Herbert signs medical marijuana compromise into law

Gov. Gary Herbert has signed into law a medical marijuana bill to replace the ballot initiative that voters approved on Nov. 6.

According to the petition, the court has given "lip service" to the "co-equal and superior right of the people" to make laws.

"The people formed this government and only they can alter, reform or abolish it. Meaningful referendum and initiative powers represent the only non-violent repository the people have in their box as an effective check and balance on a legislature corrupted by special interests,” the petition says.

“If this court fails to act and correct this aberration, unchecked power grab by the respondents, the initiative and referendum power of the people is dead, and should be given a proper and honorable burial by this court as an antiquated and outdated relic of an earlier time.”

Should the court reverse the lieutenant governor's denial of the referendum petition, Maxfield would have 40 days from the day the law was passed to collect nearly 114,000 signatures to get it on the ballot under Utah law.

"It's unfair, it's unconscionable but that is what it is," he said.

Maxfield said the The People's Right came out as politically neutral on Proposition 2. But as he became involved with initiative backers "it became painfully clear there has been a division over Prop. 2 and the patients that actually need it as was written knew that the Legislature was going to eviscerate it and take away that right," he said.

Related:

Patient groups ask court to invalidate Utah's medical marijuana compromise

Two patient advocacy groups are suing to invalidate the medical marijuana compromise bill passed by the Utah Legislature Monday that supersedes the voter-approved Proposition 2.

Utah House Speaker Greg Hughes, R-Draper, brokered the compromise legislation through dozens of hours of private negotiations. Groups involved in those talks included the Utah Patients Coalition, the initiative campaign organizer that helped write Proposition 2; Libertas Institute, which had supported the measure; and influential anti-Prop. 2 groups the Utah Medical Association and The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

Together for Responsible Use and Cannabis Education, or TRUCE, and the Epilepsy Association of Utah sued Gov. Gary Herbert and Dr. Joseph Miner, executive director of the Utah Department of Health, seeking to invalidate the legislation last week.

Maxfield has filed referendum petitions to undo Utah laws in the past.

In 2010, his name was added to the election ballot as an independent candidate for lieutenant governor after the Utah Supreme Court ruled the electronic signatures he submitted were valid. He filed a voter initiative seeking to reverse a bill the Legislature subsequently passed banning e-signatures for ballot measures.

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