The following editorial appeared Tuesday in the Longview Daily News.

Oregon lawmakers, rushing to wrap up their six-month-long session before the end of the month, had a productive weekend. Most welcome was the Senate vote on Sunday to tighten controls over Oregon’s undisciplined initiative and referendum process.

The legislation, supported by Oregon Secretary of State Bill Bradbury, would require that paid signature gatherers register and complete training. It would prohibit people convicted of forgery, fraud or identity theft within the past five years from gathering signatures for initiatives or referendums.

And, finally, the bill would require signature-gathering campaigns to keep payroll records so that the state could make sure they are not violating the state’s ban on paying petitioners by the signature. These are reasonable requirements.

Critics complain that so burdening campaigns which must gather a large number of signatures in a short time is unfair. They argue that many would-be petitioners will be deterred by the requirements.

Perhaps. But when money is the motivation, that’s not a great concern.

The fact is, the threshold for initiatives should be relatively high. The initiative petition is a poor substitute for the more deliberative legislative process. Initiatives lacking a truly motivated citizenry shouldn’t survive.

Increasingly, however, the popularity of an initiative isn’t the chief factor in determining whether or not it ends up on a statewide ballot. Money often plays the biggest role in that determination. The emergence of professional signature gatherers has played a big part in the transformation of the initiative process from its historical role as a kind of safety valve for the expression of grass-roots sentiment to an easily manipulated tool of wealthy special interests.

The Oregon Legislature cannot take that special interest money out of process. Professional petition circulators are here to stay. The courts have ruled consistently that prohibiting the use of paid signature gatherers violates free speech rights. But the courts have upheld Oregon’s ban on per-signature payments, viewing such bans as a limited burden that is far outweighed by the need the integrity of the initiative process.

Prohibiting per-signature payments has not entirely eliminated fraud in Oregon’s initiative process, but it undoubtedly has moderated it. The additional requirements contained in the Senate bill approved Sunday have the potential of further reducing fraud and strengthening public confidence.