The Utah Supreme Court on Tuesday gave its stamp of approval to a controversial new law that regulates how groups can get proposed laws on the ballot.

In a unanimous decision, the five justices agreed the Legislature solved constitutional problems when it amended the ballot initiative law in 2003, in response to an earlier high court ruling.

The ruling also means Safe Havens for Learning, formerly Safe to Learn-Safe to Worship, must reconsider its plans to place on the November ballot an initiative banning guns in public schools.

"We're disappointed that we were unable to convince the court that requiring initiative proponents to gather signatures in 26 of 29 Senate districts is a burden on the process and will ultimately" discourage citizen involvement, said John A. Pearce, Safe Havens' attorney.

But he said the group is "just grateful that we had our day in court and that the Supreme Court looked at it carefully."

Tuesday's decision marked the second time the high court has ruled on an initiative law. The original law required signatures from 10 percent of the gubernatorial voters in 20 of the state's 29 counties, but that provision was struck down by the high court in 2002.

Lawmakers responded last year by changing the law to base signature-gathering on voter turnout in the most recent gubernatorial election. Petitioners must collect a number of signatures statewide equal to 10 percent of the number of people who voted in the most recent governor's election. A further requirement, which Safe Havens had claimed is unconstitutional, calls for petitioners to gather signatures equal in number to 10 percent of the gubernatorial vote in 26 of Utah's 29 Senate districts.

Because Senate districts are basically equal in population but counties are not, the high court found that the 20-county requirement had the "effect of diluting the power of urban registered voters" while the Senate-district requirement "ensures that there is support for a particular initiative spread, more or less, evenly throughout the state."

Safe Havens had argued the 26-district requirement treated citizens and senators unequally, as it only takes the votes of 15 senators to create law. The court disagreed.

"By basing the signature requirement on evenly divided, population-based senate districts . . . it ensures that there is support for a particular initiative spread, more or less, evenly throughout the state," Associate Chief Justice Matthew B. Durrant wrote for the court.

Also at issue were provisions that: