The Wisconsin Supreme Court upheld Gov. Tony Evers’ (D) use of a partial veto in the state’s biennial budget on April 18, 2025. His partial veto extended a two-year school funding increase into a 402-year provision. At the center of the case were constitutional provisions that had been added or amended through three ballot measures between 1930 and 2008:
- Question 1 of 1930: Established the governor’s partial veto for appropriation bills
- Question 1 of 1990: Prohibited the governor from using the partial veto to create new words from individual letters
- Question 1 of 2008: Prohibited the governor from using the partial veto to create a new sentence by combining parts of two or more sentences
In the Wisconsin State Legislature, Republicans have proposed two constitutional amendments related to the partial veto. One could appear on the ballot in 2026, and the other in 2027.
Ballotpedia maintains a full inventory of Wisconsin’s 258 ballot measures, including the three amendments related to the governor’s partial veto power. As part of Ballotpedia’s Historical Ballot Measure Factbook project, this resource offers detailed, nonpartisan information on how ballot measures have shaped state constitutions, addressed major policy debates, and influenced the balance of power in state governance.
1930: Origin of Wisconsin’s Partial Veto
In 1930, voters in Wisconsin approved Question 1, granting the governor the power to issue partial vetoes on appropriation bills. Question 1 inserted the following language into Section 10 of Article V: “Appropriation bills may be approved in whole or in part by the governor, and the part approved shall become law, and the part objected to shall be returned in the same manner as provided for other bills.”
State Sen. Thomas Duncan (Socialist) sponsored the proposal, arguing that the governor needed partial veto power because the legislature had “completely overhauled the budget system of the state” in the previous session. He said, “[Currently,] the governor can block bad budget legislation only by vetoing the entire bill. The item veto is absolutely indispensable to the successful operation of the Wisconsin budget plan, in which all appropriations are made in a single bill.”
Phillip La Follette (R), who was campaigning for governor, opposed Question 1. He said, “Passage of the amendment would be another step in the concentration of power in the executive office. … The arguments in favor of this tendency are all based upon the argument in favor of dictatorship as opposed to self-government.” La Follette won the gubernatorial election with 64.8%, and Question 1 was also approved, with 62.2% support.
1990: Can’t Remove Individual Letters to Form New Words
The first amendment to the partial veto provision of the Constitution was not adopted until 1990. Titled Question 1, the vote was 60.5% to 39.5%. The ballot measure prohibited the governor from using the partial veto to form new words by removing individual letters from words in appropriation bills.
Before proposing Question 1, the Democratic-controlled Wisconsin Senate filed a lawsuit against Gov. Tommy Thompson (R) over his use of the partial veto. In its June 1988 decision, the Wisconsin Supreme Court held that “any claimed excesses on the part of the governor in the exercise of this broad partial veto authority are correctable not by this court, but by the people, either at the ballot box or by constitutional amendment.”
In 1990, the Associated Press described the conflict that led to the constitutional amendment: “The constitutional amendment was backed by Democrats angered by Gov. Tommy G. Thompson’s use of hundreds of partial vetoes to rewrite legislation sent to him by the Democratic-controlled Legislature since 1987.” At the time, Wisconsin had a divided government—Democrats controlled both chambers of the legislature, while Gov. Thompson was a Republican.
2008: Can’t Combine Parts of Two Sentences to Form a New Sentence
In 2008, voters approved a constitutional amendment modifying the governor’s partial veto authority. The amendment prohibited the governor from creating a new sentence by combining parts of two or more sentences in an appropriation bill. The measure passed with 70.6% of the vote.
In the 2005 biennial budget, Gov. Jim Doyle (D) selected 20 words from a 752-word section to form a new sentence authorizing the transfer of $427 million from the transportation fund to the general fund to support public school operations. This method—constructing new sentences from fragments of multiple, sometimes unrelated, sentences—was referred to as a Frankenstein veto.
According to the Wisconsin Legislative Reference Bureau, “Largely in response to Governor Doyle’s aggressive use of the editing veto in the 2005 biennial budget, the 2005 legislature, in a bipartisan vote, adopted 2005 Senate Joint Resolution 33, which proposed amending the constitution to ban the Frankenstein veto. … The 2007 legislature adopted the proposal on second consideration almost unanimously.”
Wisconsin Supreme Court on Gov. Evers’ Partial Veto for School Funding Change
In Lemieux v. Evers, decided on April 18, 2025, the Wisconsin Supreme Court upheld Gov. Tony Evers’ (D) partial veto extending a two-year school funding provision to 402 years. The 4-3 decision followed the court’s ideological divide, with the liberal bloc in the majority and the conservative bloc dissenting.
Petitioners argued the partial veto violated Section 10(1)(b) of Article V of the Wisconsin Constitution. This language was part of the original constitutional amendment approved in 1930: “Appropriation bills may be approved in whole or in part by the governor, and the part approved shall become law.” Petitioners said the governor’s action was not akin to approving the ‘appropriation bills… in part.’ Justice Jill Karofsky, writing the court’s opinion, stated that the partial veto followed four deletion-veto principles established in prior case law. Justice Brian Hagedorn dissented, writing, “This is not a policy that was presented to the governor for approval.” He also critiqued earlier decisions that formed part of the precedent cited in the court’s opinion.
Under Section 10(1)(c), added in 1990 and then amended in 2008, the constitution prohibits the governor from creating a new word through deleting individual letters from words. Petitioners argued that deleting digits from the phrase ‘2023–24 school year, or 2024–25 school year‘ to create the number 2425 violated Section 10(1)(c). Karofsky wrote, “The plain meaning of ‘word’ does not include numbers written out using digits, and the plain meaning of ‘letters’ does not include digits.” Hagedorn did not dispute the meaning, but stated, “Changing durations, with the effect of creating new policy that was never proposed nor passed by the legislature, doesn’t neatly fall into any of these restrictions, so it must be constitutional. This logic flouts the constitution’s text and structure, and the wisdom that underlies both.”
The Wisconsin Supreme Court also addressed how the partial veto relates to the state constitution’s separation of powers. Karofsky, citing the ruling from 1988, wrote, “Even when that change is considerable… the governor’s constitutionally-vested, quasi-legislative role defeats any separation of powers-type argument.” Hagedorn wrote, “While [Question 1 of 1930] certainly conferred significant power on the governor, nothing from the debates at the time, early cases, or language suggests this kind of veto was a grant of magical, unilateral power to make law.”
Future Amendments: Legislative Republicans Propose Changes
In the legislature, Republicans have introduced constitutional amendments to further change the governor’s partial veto powers. In Wisconsin, a constitutional amendment must be approved during two legislative sessions.
In 2024, legislators passed Assembly Joint Resolution 112 (AJR 112), which would prohibit the governor from using the partial veto to create or increase a tax or fee. In the state House and state Senate, Republicans supported AJR 112, and Democrats opposed the proposal. The constitutional amendment must be approved again during the 2025-2026 legislative session to appear on the ballot in 2026. As of April 20, the proposal has not been reintroduced into the legislature.
Fifteen House Republicans, along with three Senate Republicans, introduced a different constitutional amendment into the legislature on February 17, 2025. The proposal would limit the governor’s partial veto power by allowing vetoes only of entire sections of an appropriations bill, and only if those sections could stand alone as complete and workable laws. If approved by the legislature twice, the earliest possible election date for the constitutional amendment is April 6, 2027.
In an email to legislators, three of the amendment’s sponsors wrote, “Unfortunately, in Wisconsin, this veto ‘in part’ has turned our chief executive into a super law maker. The people of Wisconsin have strongly affirmed limiting this out-of-control governor veto power each time a chance has been given to them by way of constitutional referenda. This proposed constitutional amendment would move beyond trying to plug specific loopholes and instead return the Wisconsin Constitution to the original intent by only allowing a governor to veto specific bill sections.”
Britt Cudaback, a spokesperson for Gov. Evers, responded, “[It] says a lot about Republicans’ priorities that they are attempting to put yet another Republican-drafted and Republican-backed constitutional amendment on the ballot while they refuse to give the people of Wisconsin that same opportunity… they should approve Gov. Evers’ plan to give the people of Wisconsin the power to pass policies by a majority vote at the ballot box.” Cudaback is referencing a citizen-initiated ballot measure process. While Wisconsin does not have a ballot initiative process, voters did decide the issue once before, 16 years before the partial veto question appeared on the ballot. In 1914, voters rejected Question 2, which would have created an initiative and referendum process in Wisconsin.
Additional:
Wisconsin Question 1, Governor Partial Veto Power for Appropriation Bills Amendment (1930)