> The main reason for the verbal atrocity is legislators had to cram a more or less complete description into a single sentence, per constitutional requirements.

Or the other common reason, that they campaigned on getting a measure to the ballot that has voter support, but they don't want it to pass. The first thing you do is come up with a confusing text with extra points for double negatives, and you follow that up with a confusing media campaign.

You may fail, and it passes with 87%, but sometimes if you work hard enough you can get Illinois to vote down a progressive income tax.