National referenda would likely first target the income tax

Evidence

Do you think the first successful referenda would be on abortion rights, or prayer in the schools, or a balanced budget? I think it would be a bar on the imposition of the income tax. For all our folly, the system we have functions smoothly and strategically compared to a system whose finances do not have the bare protection of the biennial appropriation and representative government. — Philip Chase Bobbitt, Reflections Inspired by My Critics, 274

Categorization

• QUESTION: A speculative and testable prediction worth scrutinizing against real referenda outcomes elsewhere.
• SEED: Could seed an essay on the fiscal logic of direct democracy versus representative budgeting.