The voters of Colorado considered and overwhelmingly approved legislatively referred measures at the 2018 general election to establish balanced commissions to set district lines for both the United States house of representatives and the Colorado general assembly.
The voters were aware that among the protections provided by these referred measures was the incorporation of the protections provided by federal law including the "Voting Rights Act of 1965", as amended.
Because of a misprint in the measures referring these constitutional amendments tothe voters, the federal statute was correctly cited as "the federal 'Voting Rights Act of 1965'" but incorrectly cited as "52 U.S.C. sec. 50301, as amended" when the proper citation is "52 U.S.C. sec. 10301 et seq., as amended."
The general assembly finds and declares that voter intent was clear and should not befrustrated by a clerical error in referring to a federal law that has long been applied by federal courts and the Colorado courts in the redistricting context and was intended to be applied based on the measures' context and legislative analyses provided to voter households in advance of the 2018 general election.
Source: L. 2020: Entire section added, (SB 20-186), ch. 272, p. 1321, § 2, effective July 11.