Why is collecting petition signatures an effective tactic?

Create public support by having conversations with community members during your petition gathering about your campaign and issue.
Build a list of supporters for your issue that you can ask to take action in other ways later on.
Show public support and put pressure on elected officials by making the breadth of support for your campaign visible to your target.
Get press attention by making an event out of your petition delivery. Press coverage will help your campaign reach more people and put more public pressure on your target.

Note: if you are working on the Let People Vote campaign in Florida, Utah, or South Dakota we are collecting petitions to get on the ballot for specific ballot initiatives. There are very specific guidelines for how these must be collected in order to count, so see the state guides linked above for more information and follow their instructions carefully.

Before your event

Create your petition with all of the information you will need - your ask of who you are petitioning, space for name and contact information to get back in touch with the signer, and jurisdiction that your signer lives in to show they are a constituent of your targeted elected official. Check out this sample petition that you can copy to create your own!

Prepare all of the materials you will need - Multiple blank petition sheets, pens, clipboards, any information about your issue that you want to hand out (keep it simple).

Choose a busy location you will collect petitions - in front of public libraries, grocery stores, community college campuses, or other high traffic public areas.

Note: You can also collect petitions by going to public events like county fairs or going door to door canvassing. You can also set personal goals for your team to collect in between team meetings - ask your friends, family, people at church, school, or anywhere!

Recruit volunteers for your event. Post your event to map.peoplepower.org, share it with your network, recruit family, friends, and neighbors to join you, and confirm all the details with attendees beforehand.

During your event

Train all petitioning volunteers Some people in your group may have experience petitioning. Others may not. The point of a group training is to make sure everyone understands why they’re petitioning, how to do it, and why it’s going to make a difference. A good training has the following components:

Give context - Why are you collecting petition signatures today? Why is this campaign important? How does collecting petition signatures help you win?
Give tips on how to be successful at collecting petitions -

Be friendly and greet everyone with a big wave. A big wave and smile will increase the number of people who stop to sign your petition! Make a strong, direct ask – for example, “Hi, Hi, can you sign a petition to support voting rights legislation to protect our fundamental right to vote?” If you’re going door-to-door, wear nametags and introduce yourself.
Make sure to get complete contact information -- Half the goal of collecting signatures is to build a list of community members who are with us and that we can contact later on to get involved. Be direct in asking for the person’s phone and email if they don’t initially write it down. Something like, “Can you put your contact info down so we can keep you updated on important developments with our campaign, and with People Power?”

Review materials that all the volunteers have in their hands. Talk about what a completed petition signature looks like.
Practice - have volunteers practice the script you’re using, or just practicing stopping people, asking them to sign petitions, and answer a few basic questions.

Send volunteers to their petitioning locations. Have people go to locations with lots of people to make sure you’re asking as many people as possible. Send people in pairs so that they stay motivated and have a better experience. Give each pair a goal of how many signatures they should collect.

Check in with your volunteers throughout the volunteer shift. Ask them how it’s going, remind them how important the work they are doing is, thank them for all their hard work, and give them a big high five. Collecting petitions can be discouraging, because if you’re doing it right you get many “no’s” -- because you’re asking so many people! Part of your role as an organizer is to be a cheerleader for your team, remind them how appreciated they are, and help keep them motivated to keep going.

Take pictures share on Twitter to spread the word of your campaign, post them in your Facebook group later as a way to publically thank your volunteers, and send to us at team@peoplepower.org so we can show off all the good work People Power activists are doing too! Use #PeoplePower to further your reach.

After your event

Collect your materials and debrief with your volunteers. Ask your volunteers to meet back at your meeting spot at the end of their volunteer shift with all of their materials. Make sure to get all the signed petition sheets back. Ask your volunteers how their experience was. Remind everyone how important their work today was, and thank everyone multiple times.

Put your petitions in the right place.

If you are collecting information to add people to an email list or Facebook group, enter your “data” into a spreadsheet or however you are tracking their information.
Put the information for people who want to receive People Power updates into this form.

When you’re ready to drop off of your petitions, organize a petition drop off!

Plan your next tactic and event. Continue your good work and plan your next action. Be sure to post it to the People Power map!

Report back to People Power by filling out this form.

Please note: As a People Power activist, you don’t represent the ACLU as an organization. You represent your own causes as a concerned constituent and community stakeholder. This is critical to our strength as a movement: As you work on your Freedom Cities campaign, Let People Vote campaign, and other causes, your voices will be stronger as representatives of your community. If anyone is looking for a comment about a formal ACLU position, you can refer them to info@peoplepower.org and we can contact the appropriate ACLU representative.