STLPR0%
Missourians will not be able to enshrine St. Louis sheriff elections in constitution 4%
By Lilley Halloran0% Brian Munoz0%
5/15/2026, 9:59:53 PM
BS Summary: This article contains 7 faulty reasoning types, including Status Quo Bias, Burden of Proof, and Framing Effect, with Post Hoc (False Cause) as the most egregious example at 7.7% saturation with 40 hits. Analysis detected 143 faulty-reasoning hits from 518 analyzed words, generating a BS Score of 18.1% and a BS Rank of 4% (16,204 of 16,813 articles). This article is better (less manipulative) than 96.40% of the article peer group.
An effort to ask Missouri voters if the St.
Louis sheriff should be elected failed to make it across the finish line in the legislative session that ended Friday.
Because St.
Louis sheriff is already an elected position, there won’t be a change to the status quo, even with the exclusion of St.
Louis from the ballot measure.
The state Senate voted 24-9 Friday in favor of legislation to put a constitutional amendment in front of voters that would require most of the state’s sheriffs to be elected.
On the same day, the House voted 95-46 in favor of the resolution.
Although most sheriffs in Missouri, including in St.
Louis, are typically already elected, the proposed constitutional amendment would enshrine that process in the state constitution.
In addition to St.
Louis, St.
Louis and St.
Charles counties are excluded from the resolution.
The latter two exceptions are rooted in voter-led actions.
In 1955, voters in St.
Louis County approved a measure eliminating their sheriff’s office and replacing it with a county-wide police department.
In 2012, St.
Charles voters approved the creation of the St.
Charles County Police Department and effectively replaced the sheriff as the county’s top law enforcement official.
But the inclusion of St.
Louis has been a point of contention in the legislature.
The city’s sheriff’s department was included in legislation that would require it to be constitutionally elected, after an amendment offered by Sen.
Karla May, D-St.
Louis was passed by the Senate.
But last month, the House Crime and Public Safety Committee chair, Rep.
Jeff Myers, R-Warrenton, said the Senate bill's sponsor, Sen.
Jill Carter, R-Granby, asked him to add an amendment that undoes May’s inclusion of St.
Louis.
That came a week after interim Sheriff John Hayden Jr. testified in support of the measure that could make his office constitutionally elected.
“The reasons why are ... because of their charter form of government.
Their responsibilities aren't the same as the rest of the counties,” Myers told St.
Louis Public Radio.
“That’s why I added the amendment back in.”
Rep.
Steve Butz, D-St.
Louis, successfully added St.
Louis back on the House floor, but it was stripped again before a final vote in both chambers.
There has been a three-way debate over who should be able to choose the next person for the St.
Louis role.
Former Sheriff Alfred Montgomery was officially ousted in December, not long after Hayden was appointed interim sheriff.
A St.
Louis judge ruled that Mayor Cara Spencer will have the authority but must include the Board of Aldermen and St.
Louis Comptroller Donna Baringer.
The city filed a lawsuit against Attorney General Catherine Hanaway in December, arguing the mayor has the responsibility to make the appointment.
The judge ruled against Hanaway’s opinion that the authority should lie with Gov.
Mike Kehoe.
A competing bill would have put the onus of picking the St.
Louis sheriff on judges of the 22nd Judicial Circuit, but it died in a Senate committee this year.
The legislation is SJR 87.
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