By The Herald Editorial Board

Elections, we’re told, have consequences.

Which should be a given, because why else would you vote in an election if you weren’t expecting an outcome? Yet, the longer-range repercussions aren’t always clear when we sit down to mark our ballots, without at least some understanding of the results of our choices, either regarding our preference of candidates or support or rejection of issues.

So, we ought to have access to as much information as possible when marking our ballots. Certainly, that’s the conclusion from recent court decisions — upholding a state law — regarding four ballot initiatives that state voters will consider this November.

The initiatives — I-2109, I-2117, I-2124 and I-2066 — are asking voters whether laws passed by the Legislature should be repealed or affirmed; it’s your chance to determine the fate of some of the work of the lawmakers you elected in recent years. Briefly:

I-2109 would repeal the state law that established an excise tax on the sale of an individual’s annual capital gains of more than $250,000;

I-2117 would repeal the law that established the state’s sale and trade of carbon-tax credits and a cap-and-invest program to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and fund climate action efforts;

I-2124 would make participation optional in the state’s long-term care insurance program; and

I-2066, which recently qualified for the ballot, would repeal laws that discourage natural gas utility connections and promote electrification.

What the state Supreme Court determined earlier this month — affirming a Thurston County Superior Court judge’s earlier ruling — was that voters were due what state law provided: a one-sentence statement on the ballot that provides a basic — very basic — understanding of the financial consequences of each ballot measure.

A look at one of the measure’s statements provides an example of the extent of that basic information. For I-2109, the financial impact of repealing the state’s capital gains tax will state: “This measure would decrease funding for K-12 education, higher education, school construction, early learning, and childcare.” No further detail is included, such as how much estimated funding would be lost; specifically $2.2 billion lost over the next five fiscal years if the capital gains tax is repealed.

What such a statement allows is a reminder to the voter that repealing a tax comes with the consequence of reducing the revenue budgeted by the state for the education of the state’s children or ending investments in climate solutions, perhaps encouraging voters to seek out additional information — the voter’s guide, new stories, advertising — about how much funding is involved and what the impacts of its loss or continuation might be.

State Republican Party leaders — loath to allow even that modest voter notification — balked at the inclusion of the “public investment impact disclosures,” initially bringing suit in Thurston County, then appealing that decision directly to the state Supreme Court, objecting to them as “warning labels,” as the Washington State Standard’s Jerry Cornfield reported last week.

We’ll take “warning labels” over “public investment impact disclosures,” just for the sake of brevity and clarity, but their necessity remains.

A look at recent polling might explain why.

Three separate public opinion polls found a range of support for some of the measures in May and July; I-2066 had yet to be approved for the ballot prior to two of the polls.

The most recent poll, released in late July and commissioned by The Seattle Times, found that, regarding I-2117 — repealing the state’s Climate Commitment Act — 48 percent said they “were certain” to vote yes to repeal the law, with 34 percent voting no to keep it and 18 percent uncertain. Likewise, a plurality of those polled said they were “certain” to vote to repeal each of the other three laws.

A second poll by longtime state pollster Stuart Elway for Cascade PBS and released in May found results similar to the Times poll. Regarding the capital gains tax, 47 percent said they would vote yes to repeal, 36 percent planned to vote no and 17 percent were undecided. But when the Elway poll then provided some pro and con statements before asking the same questions a second time, the results for the capital gains tax shifted, with only 40 percent in favor of repeal, 41 percent wanting to keep the tax and no change to the percentage of undecided.

A third poll by pollster GBAO commissioned by opponents of the initiatives and released in May found majorities planning to reject two of the initiatives and a near-majority to reject the third of the first three initiatives. It showed I-2109 with 62 percent polled planning to vote against the measure and keep the tax, and 34 percent voting yes to reject the law; for I-2117, it found 57 percent voting no, and 37 percent yes; and for I-2124, 49 voting against, 41 percent for.

Notably, the GBAO poll provided statements similar to the wording regarding budget effects that will be included on the ballot.

Also worth noting: At least two respondents in the Times poll, who indicated they were “certain” to vote one way or the other, told a reporter that they did not fully understand the initiatives and planned to do more research before the election.

What to take from those three polls? Elway, in the Cascade PBS report, warned in May that predicting how people would vote six months before the election was very difficult, although he’s seen some trends for initiatives and referendums in years past.

“Most initiatives, not all of them, tend to poll well at the beginning of the cycle and lose ground over the campaign,” Elway told CascadePBS. “I would expect these numbers to shift.”

But the polls also show that when provided even minimal information on the potential impacts of an election, voters can and will reconsider their first inclination.

And that information can help voters avoid a regrettable consequence of an election: an outcome they didn’t intend.