Tim Eyman is agitated. But, then, when is Eyman not agitated?

This time, however, he has a point. The man who turned Washington state’s initiative process from a grass-roots expression into a personal cash crop is steamed over a proposal in the Legislature that people and businesses who circulate initiative petitions for pay should have to register with the Public Disclosure Commission.

The stated reasons for this bill include the fear that unscrupulous signature collectors may not only corrupt the election system, they might even be predatory sex offenders and identity thieves. Past examples to support this thesis have not been offered.

A more plausible explanation is that Eyman and others like him annoy state lawmakers when the initiative and referendum process infringes on their role. Call it the inescapable messiness of government by the people.

Substitute House Bill 2601 unreasonably attempts to avoid the mess by making it harder for citizens to use the initiative and referendum recourse that has been available to them for nearly a century. The measure would apply only to businesses or individuals who are paid for their signature-gathering efforts. Sex offenders and identity thieves who volunteer their time apparently are not deemed a problem.

Under the bill, paid signature collectors would have to provide their names, street addresses, signatures and photographs. They would have to swear that they had not been convicted of fraud, forgery, ID theft, election-related offenses or sex crimes. They would need to undergo training and get a signed statement from the measure’s sponsor accepting liability for any violations the signature-gatherer commits.

And if the person intended to circulate more than one initiative or referendum, each would require separate registration. That is cumbersome if not onerous – all to discourage citizens from writing their own laws or repealing those passed by the Legislature.

We, too, think Eyman is pretty much a pest. And we think that the deliberative process used by the Legislature – to include hearings, testimony, amendment and debate – is far more thoughtful than the take-it-or-leave-it choice to which initiatives and referendums are subjected.

But those are decisions for the electorate to make. And although the process has created only 82 laws since 1912, sometimes it’s the only way. If the citizen activists who put the state’s Public Disclosure Act on the ballot three decades ago had waited on elected legislators to do it, they would be waiting still.

We’re not crazy about paying people to collect signatures, but given the size of the state and the growth of its population, that’s become a standard practice. Ultimately, individual voters still choose whether to sign a petition and how to vote. The Legislature is facing a plan that would restrict those choices.

The plan needs to be rejected – if for no other reason than to deprive Eyman the satisfaction of overturning it with a referendum.