I. Background

1 The permissibility of inspecting the submitted signature lists was already an issue in the 19th century. The administration occasionally allowed inspection and in 1882, in connection with a specific request for a referendum, the Federal Council addressed the question of whether third parties should be allowed to inspect the submitted signatures. The Federal Council allowed inspection (including by the press), but required prior notification. This practice subsequently became a talking point in parliament, and an unsuccessful motion was tabled to urge the Federal Council to no longer allow third-party inspection in the future. In addition, in 1894, in a case of appeal from the Canton of Nidwalden, the Federal Supreme Court recognized a general right to inspect signatures that had been declared invalid.

2 In 1956, the Federal Department of Justice and Police explicitly stated that signature lists submitted to the competent federal authority must not be returned to the initiative committees in order to protect the signatories. Legal scholars welcomed this practice and emphasized that the names of supporters must not be published. The Federal Act on the Procedure for Popular Petitions for the Revision of the Federal Constitution (Popular Initiative Act) codified the practice and explicitly stipulated in Art. 4 para. 5 that signatures submitted to the Federal Council could neither be returned nor inspected.

3 Although the statutory regulation only applied to the right of popular initiative, in practice it was also applied by analogy to signature lists for optional referendums. The Federal Act on Political Rights (PPA) subsequently adopted the regulation for both the popular initiative (Art. 71 PPA) and the optional referendum (Art. 64 PPA).

4 Art. 64 of the BPR originally had the heading “Submission”, as does Art. 71 of the BPR concerning the popular initiative. The original provision in Art. 64 para. 1 of the BPR related to submission and was moved to the newly created Art. 59a of the BPR with the amendment of the law in 1996 in a more precise form. At the same time, Art. 64 FPR was given the heading “Exclusion of Inspection”. The heading only refers to the exclusion of inspection, not to the exclusion of return, which means that the content of the standard is not fully reflected.

II. Significance of the Provision

A. General

5 The Federal Council justified the regulation in the Initiative Act of 1962 on the one hand by stating that the signature lists become official records upon submission and therefore cannot be returned to the initiative committee even if it withdraws the popular initiative. On the other hand, the Federal Council stated that the regulation would “protect citizens from the economic, political and other pressures to which they are occasionally exposed when exercising their political rights”. In other words, the purpose of the provision is to protect voting secrecy.

6 The level of protection afforded by voting secrecy when signatures are being collected is less than when people are casting votes in elections and ballots. In particular, it does not constitute a violation of voting secrecy if the people entrusted with checking the signature lists become aware of the respective expression of will. The Federal Chancellery is also permitted to process the data in accordance with data protection regulations. Since the information concerns political views and activities, the data qualifies as particularly worthy of protection in accordance with Art. 5 let. c no. 1 of the Federal Data Protection Act (DSG).

7 The secrecy of the vote when collecting signatures for referenda and initiatives also applies in principle before the signature lists are submitted to the Federal Chancellery. Accordingly, Art. 19 para. 6 of the Ordinance on Political Rights (VPR) requires the offices responsible for the voter certificate to maintain voting secrecy. The handling of the data is also governed by cantonal data protection law.

B. Comparative law

8 The cantons often explicitly prohibit the return of the signature lists that have been submitted and the inspection of these lists.

9 However, some cantons provide for exceptions to the ban on inspection. In the Canton of Zurich, for example, the committee and the signatories concerned may inspect the signature lists if the referendum or initiative does not come into being and if inspection of the lists is necessary to safeguard their rights. In the cantons of Ticino and Geneva, the committees or their representatives may inspect the signatures that have been declared invalid; in the canton of Neuchâtel, this right is granted to the voters. The canton of Schaffhausen stipulates that information may be requested about the invalidation, and the canton of Fribourg informs the persons concerned directly about the invalidated signatures if the request does not come about as a result of the invalidation.

10 Some cantons expressly stipulate that the signature lists are to be destroyed once their legally valid establishment has been confirmed. The Canton of Vaud expressly forbids committees from keeping copies of signature lists.

III. Commentary on the standard text

A. Exclusion of the return of signature lists

11 The regulation in Art. 64 para. 2 OPR governs the prohibition on the return of signature lists. Persons and/or organizations who were originally in possession of the signature lists lose the power of disposition over the signature lists upon submission to the Federal Chancellery. From this point on, these are considered official files and are kept by the federal authorities.

12 The ban on return also applies to the individual signatories of a referendum request. They too cannot demand the return of their signature or withdraw it.

B. Exclusion of inspection of the signature lists

13 The provision in Art. 64 BPR excludes the inspection of the signature lists after their submission to the Federal Chancellery. As a special provision under Art. 4 of the Federal Act on Freedom of Information in the Administration (BGÖ), it takes precedence over the right of access to official documents.

14 The signatories of referendums (and, according to Art. 71 para. 2, of popular initiatives) are protected from the public taking note of their political expression of will. By contrast, signatories of election proposals for the National Council elections do not enjoy such protection. According to Art. 26 BPR, the voters of the respective constituency can inspect the election proposals and thus the names of the signatories at the competent authority. In the opinion of the Federal Council and the Federal Supreme Court, the authors of election proposals would fulfill a public function, and the electorate has a legitimate interest in knowing who is behind an election proposal. The public interest – particularly with regard to the freedom of choice and freedom of voting – takes precedence over the interest in keeping the names of the signatories of election proposals secret.

15 The exclusion of inspection means that the submitted signature lists are not archived in the Federal Archives because this would undermine the purpose of Art. 64 para. 2 FPR. Instead, the lists are destroyed as soon as they have fulfilled their purpose. In practice, the Federal Chancellery destroys the submitted signature lists as soon as the result of the popular vote on the respective bill is known or, if the request does not materialize, as soon as the related ruling on the non-materialization has become legally binding. An empty copy of the signature list is archived in the Federal Archives, which satisfies archiving interests.

16 With regard to the question of whether Art. 64 para. 2 BPR allows inspection in exceptional cases, different views are represented. Some legal scholars, based on an old Federal Supreme Court ruling from 1894, assume that there is a right to inspect the lists if the competent authority declares so many signatures invalid that the request fails or threatens to fail. This legal interpretation would correspond to the possibilities of inspection as regulated by law in the Canton of Zurich. According to other legal experts, however, allowing the signature lists to be inspected would violate the secrecy of the vote and is therefore not permitted.

17 The Federal Chancellery has a strict practice of not allowing signature lists to be inspected, even if a request does not materialize. In the past, the rulings on the failure of a proposal to reach the required number of signatures always explicitly stated that the signatures submitted remained under seal and in the custody of the federal authorities. The relevant passage is no longer part of the rulings on the failure of a proposal to reach the required number of signatures. However, this does not change the practice. Nevertheless, it is entirely legitimate to question whether access is excluded even in cases in which effective legal protection against the ruling on non-occurrence (see Art. 80 para. 2 BPR) would be impossible without access. The purpose of Art. 64 para. 2 BPR is to protect the voting secrecy of the signatories. An overly rigid interpretation of the provision could go against the interests of the signatories, because disputes over the failure of a referendum are ultimately about the protection of the political rights of the signatories.

18 Since 2022, the Federal Chancellery has filed several criminal complaints in connection with allegedly forged signatures. In doing so, it also granted the prosecuting authorities access to the signature lists submitted to it. Under Article 194 paragraph 2 of the Swiss Criminal Procedure Code (CrimPC), administrative authorities must make their files available for inspection by the public prosecutor or the courts if there are no overriding public or private interests of confidentiality to prevent their disclosure. In particular, files may be disclosed in proceedings for electoral fraud. In the specific cases, the secrecy of the vote did not prevent the files from being handed over. This is because the protection of the will of the people, which is the purpose of the criminal proceedings under Art. 279 et seq. of the Swiss Criminal Code (SCC), outweighed the individual interest in secrecy.

19 In its report of 20 November 2024 in response to postulate 21.3607, the Federal Council addressed the issues of e-collecting signatures for the purposes of state policy. At the same time, it instructed the Federal Chancellery to make preparations for conducting limited practical trials of e-collecting. Furthermore, it is likely that Parliament will instruct the Federal Council to take action in the same direction. The protection of voting secrecy will also have to be ensured in the case of e-collecting, although both opportunities and risks will arise in this regard. In view of developments in this area, the question will arise sooner or later as to what extent the provision in Art. 64 BPR needs to be adapted or clarified in the light of new issues.

Thanks to Julien Fiechter and Valentina Beti for proofreading the article and for their suggestions.

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Materials

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