A phrase under Jon Keyser’s name on the primary ballot for Republican U.S. Senate candidates is causing consternation among some voters.

It reads: “Signed declaration to limit service to no more than 2 terms.”

“Pretty blatant campaigning ON THE BALLOT,” one voter remarked to the Colorado Secretary of State’s office.

“Electioneering,” one woman complained to the elections staff.

“No,” she was told. “We’re just following the constitution.”

Coloradans in 1998 approved a constitutional amendment allowing candidates who want to choose voluntary congressional term limits to declare so on the ballot and on their election materials.

The candidates most likely to sign the declaration are third-party candidates whose names only appear on the general election ballot in November.

In the 2002 U.S. Senate race, Democrat Tom Strickland was the lone Senate candidate not to sign a term-limits pledge. The incumbent, Republican U.S. Sen. Wayne Allard, signed it and honored it – he left office in 2008 after serving two terms in the Senate. (A big thank you to Arapahoe County Clerk Matt Crane and his staff for finding me that ballot.)

Other candidates in other races have also signed the declaration.

Keyser, a former state representative and one of five Republican Senate candidates in the June 28, primary, signed the pledge in March. After I made the pledge public in May in a blog, he tweeted out:

To read more posts by Lynn Bartels, visit her official blog at the Colorado Secretary of State website.