Tag: voting

Categories
ballot access initiative, referendum, and recall

Holding All the Trumps

Idaho, initiative, ballot, Senate Bill 1159, democracy, voting,

Last week, Idaho’s Senate Bill 1159 — “the bill to make it much harder to qualify a voter initiative or referendum for the Idaho ballot,” as the Idaho Press summarized it — passed the Senate on the narrowest 18 – 17 vote.

Now headed to the House, the legislation would 

  • nearly double the number of voter-​signed petitions to place an initiative onto the ballot
  • reduce the time to gather those signatures by a whopping two-thirds 
  • throw up numerous additional hurdles

What’s the point?

The state already has one of the most arduous petition processes in the nation for qualifying a citizen initiative for the ballot. Moreover, without passing any new law, Idaho legislators currently have and have always had a 100 percent veto on any citizen-​initiated measure enacted by voters. 

Idahoans cannot place constitutional amendments on the ballot through their citizen initiative, only statutes. And any statute voters pass can then immediately be repealed by a simple majority of legislators. Or amended any which way those solons so desire.

So, again, why the need for politicians to pull up the ladders? 

Senate Republicans claim — in a news release headlined, “Setting the record straight on initiative bill” — to be “concerned about the integrity, transparency and fairness of the initiative process.”

What does heightening all the hurdles to trip up citizens have to do with integrity, transparency or fairness?*

Voting on an issue is “unfair” to whom … legislators?

Holding all the trump cards, Idaho senators still didn’t want the people to have a say. The politicians are scared to death of democracy. 

Which is why we need more, not less. 

Certainly not none.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

* I do acknowledge that the bill is transparently awful.

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Idaho, initiative, ballot, Senate Bill 1159, democracy, voting,

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Categories
incumbents political challengers

Winning Reform

Ranked Choice Voting, Maine, example, sample

Bruce Poliquin, Maine’s incumbent second-​district U.S. Representative, knows what to blame for his loss this last election: the preferences of Maine voters.

Well, he blames Ranked Choice Voting (RCV) … in which voters rank the candidates by preference, and whose votes are counted so to better tally second- and even third-​favored options.*

The Republican Representative enjoyed a slight lead on election night, but fell short of a majority. When two independent candidates were eliminated, their second-​choice votes put Democrat challenger Jared Golden over the 50-​percent mark.

Maine Republicans are upset. It turns out that losing isn’t as much fun as winning.

Shocking, I know.

So Poliquin sued, arguing that RCV is unconstitutional. He asked a federal judge to stop the ballot tabulation.

Judge Lance Walker, a Trump appointee, was “not persuaded.” He additionally noted that “the citizens of Maine have rejected the policy arguments plaintiffs advance against RCV.”

Twice.

In 2016, Mainers passed RCV by ballot initiative and then, in a 2017 referendum, vetoed the legislature’s arrogant repeal of the voter-​enacted reform.

“While Mr. Poliquin publicly works through the five stages of grief over his election loss,” remarked RCV advocate Kyle Bailey, “the real story is that the implementation of Maine’s Ranked Choice Voting law was smooth, transparent, and in accordance with the will of the Maine voters,”

Meanwhile, Chuck Slocum, past chair of the Republican Party of Minnesota, urges fellow Republicans to “consider” this non-​partisan reform.

Yes, a process that better counts voter preferences ought to help your political party.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

 

* In cases where no candidate gains a majority of first-​choice votes, the last place candidate is eliminated and his or her votes re-​allocated to those voters’ second choice, and this process continues until a candidate reaches a majority.

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Categories
general freedom initiative, referendum, and recall political challengers Popular

Spoiler Season

libertarian, spoiler, porcupine, snake, politics

“Libertarians poll high enough to tip key races,” informs The Washington Times — citing contests for governorships and both houses of Congress.*

Libertarian Lucy Brenton is one example, running for U.S. Senate in Indiana. She grabbed 7 percent in a recent poll, greater than the margin between incumbent Democratic Sen. Joe Donnelly, who had 44 percent, and Republican challenger Mike Braun with 40 percent. The Times says Brenton is just one of “a number of Libertarians whose poll numbers are high enough to more than account for the difference between Republicans and Democrats in key midterm races.” 

She had garnered 5.5 percent in 2016, when she sought the state’s other U.S. Senate seat. 

There is disagreement over whether Libertarians help or hurt Republicans. Most folks suspect that Libertarians take votes away from Republicans, but polling appears to show Libertarians snagging more otherwise Democrat-​inclined voters.

No matter. As often discussed here, enacting Ranked Choice Voting is the rational institutional solution to the so-​called spoiler effect Libertarians present. It’s a win-​win for both so-​called major and minor political parties. 

“Libertarians bristle at the term ‘spoiler,’” the newspaper notes, “saying it’s a belittling term for a party that presents a viable option to voters.”

Which brings me to a second solution to Libertarians luring away your voters. Steal their issues. Take them and make them your own.

There’s no law against it.

No reform required.

“Libertarians are running against President Trump’s tariffs, immigration policy and record on spending …” explains The Times, and “are embracing … less taxation as well as marijuana legalization, criminal justice reform and ending the war on drugs.”

Fresh elections. Happy voting.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

 

* It won’t change the outcome, but on Monday the Boston Globe endorsed Libertarian Dan Fishman for state auditor, writing: “An auditor without any partisan axes to grind could shake up the state.” That’s a different kind of spoiler.

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Categories
Accountability ballot access folly general freedom ideological culture initiative, referendum, and recall media and media people national politics & policies political challengers responsibility U.S. Constitution

Should Non-​Citizens Vote?

voting, elections, democracy, illegal, aliens, migration, borders, citizens

“A lot of people would like to say this is an immigration issue. It’s really not,” offered Gary Emineth, the head of North Dakotans for Citizen Voting and a candidate for state senator. 

“It’s really about preserving the right for U.S. citizens, and in our case, North Dakota residents, to only be the voters in all elections across the state of North Dakota,” added Emineth. “And that’s why we want it in the constitution.”

Turning in more than 35,000 voter signatures on petitions last Friday, Emineth and others placed a constitutional amendment on this November’s ballot that, if passed, would make voting the exclusive right of U.S. citizens in North Dakota.

Elsewhere in the country, Emineth points out, non-​citizens are already voting — in Chicago and San Francisco, and in 11 cities across Maryland. Moreover, campaigns are underway across the country to give non-​citizens the vote — in California, Connecticut, New York City, Boston and Montpelier, Vermont.

Opponents claim the North Dakota measure is completely unnecessary, as the state doesn’t currently allow non-​citizens to cast a ballot, nor has any city yet attempted to allow non-​citizens to vote. But Emineth’s goal is to keep it that way.

Moreover, University of North Dakota Law Professor Steven Morrison acknowledged to The Forum in Fargo that “the proposed amendment does clean up what could be a grammatical loophole since the word ‘every’ doesn’t conclusively exclude non-​citizens from voting.…”

It is a very simple proposition: Do you want voting to be the exclusive right of U.S. citizens? Or should non-​citizens be allowed to vote?

Coming to a ballot near and Fargo.*

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

 

* With some help from Liberty Initiative Fund.

 

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Categories
Accountability general freedom government transparency initiative, referendum, and recall local leaders national politics & policies political challengers term limits

The Other Maine Thing

ranked choice voting, democracy, initiative, referendum, election, voting, Paul Jacob, voting reform, Maine

Tuesday’s biggest election news was the victory for Ranked Choice Voting (RCV) in Maine. This is the second statewide vote for this reform, which allows voters to rank the candidates by first choice, second choice and so on.*

Voters first passed it in 2016, but the next year the voters’ “representatives” in the legislature repealed the law, overturning their vote. 

Undeterred, RCV supporters filed a referendum and again went out and gathered enough petition signatures to refer the legislature’s repeal to a vote of the people. On Tuesday, Maine’s voters vetoed the legislature, keeping Ranked Choice Voting. 

Initiative and referendum sure are helpful.

RCV is not partisan; it requires the winner to have some level of support from a majority of voters and fixes the wasted vote problem. In Maine, however, the Republican Party opposed. On election day, Republican Gov. Paul LePage even threatened not to do his duty and certify the results.

“Paul Jacobs (Vice chair of the [FairVote] Board) whom I once knew and thought was a good American,” a Republican friend posted on my Facebook page, “has helped unleash the hounds of Hell” … adding that “now the voters are so confused by the terrible procedure that voting will be a nightmare this Tuesday!”

Yet voters used the new voting system for the first time Tuesday in candidate primaries before deciding Question 1 on their ballot — about keeping RCV. As one Portland voter put it, “It’s pretty easy to do, despite the negative publicity.”

We need more control over government with our vote. And when voters speak, politicians should listen. 

It wouldn’t hurt political activists to listen, too.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

 

* I’ve discussed the idea in this space many times — there’s more information on how it works here.

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Categories
education and schooling general freedom ideological culture moral hazard nannyism national politics & policies too much government

Grading Democracy on the Curve

public schools, education, democracy,, propaganda, ignorance

Voters, we are told, are amazingly ignorant. So, what to do?

“Ultimately, the ideal democracy is one in which as many citizens as possible vote,” writes Dambisa Moyo at The Guardian, “and the voters are armed with the most objective information. Yet today only a fraction of the electorate are voting, and many are armed with a diet of hyped-​up statistics and social media propaganda.” Among her proposals is a voting booth access test: “why not give all voters a test of their knowledge?”

I can think of a whole bunch of reasons, as can Ilya Somin, over at Volokh Conspiracy, who considers just a few. One of the more interesting is this: whereas Moyo has no wish to shove poor people out of the voting booth, and so envisions public schools to teach to the test — “the knowledge needed should be part of the core curriculum” — Somin quotes John Stuart Mill about the very political dangers of the very idea of public schooling: “A general State education,” wrote Mill in On Liberty, would inevitably be devised to please and serve “the dominant power in the government, whether this be a monarch, an aristocracy, or a majority of the existing generation” and must constitute “a despotism over the mind.”

Though Moyo does observe incumbency and political careerism as big problems, she is innocent of the more fundamental issues.

Indeed, she does not consider the obvious: today’s voter ignorance of politics and government is in no small part the result of government schools.

For politicians, general ignorance is not a bug, it’s a feature.

Let’s look for solutions to political problems that do not give politicians more power.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

 

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