A constitutional amendment on statewide ballots April 1 will read:

"QUESTION 1: Partial veto. Shall section 10 (1) (c) of article V of the constitution be amended to prohibit the governor, in exercising his or her partial veto authority, from creating a new sentence by combining parts of two or more sentences of the enrolled bill? "

Don 't be confused by the legal mumbo jumbo. What you 're being asked to do is ban the outrageous "Frankenstein" veto. The clear answer is to vote "yes."

The amendment will stop governors from stitching together bits and pieces of sentences in spending bills to unilaterally create law from scratch, much in the same way that literature's Dr. Frankenstein stitched together his monster.

Good government groups are urging a "yes" vote. So is every major newspaper in the state. So is virtually every state lawmaker.

Jim Doyle even supported the change -- before he became governor. Since then, Doyle has wielded the veto pen as recklessly as any of his predecessors.

Doyle sifted through more than 800 words and figures, vetoing all but a couple dozen in 2005. He then stitched together the fragments to create a single sentence that authorized hundreds of millions of dollars in spending never approved by the Legislature.

The sentence didn't even relate to the section of the budget it sprang from.

That's obviously wrong and must end April 1.

This is only the second time in more than 75 years that state voters have had the chance to narrow the governor's vast veto powers.

The only other time was in 1990, when voters overwhelmingly banned the "Vanna White" veto. The 1990 amendment stopped GOP Gov. Tommy Thompson, and all future guvs, from vetoing individual letters to spell out new words.

The Wisconsin State Journal endorsed the 1990 referendum. Now, after a year-long campaign for further reform, we 're urging approval again.

If you believe lawmakers should make law, vote "yes." If you believe in a separation of powers, vote "yes." If you want to return some sanity to the state budget process, vote "yes."

The April 1 amendment will kill the most outlandish veto trick in the nation.

Milfred is editorial page editor for the State Journal; smilfred@madison.com or 608-252-6110.