EXCESSIVE
ELECTIONS
It is easy
to cite voting results that prove Americans take the right to vote
too much for granted. We are the oldest democratic form of
government in the world and a model for many others across the globe.
Yet in the past century we have, as voting eligible peoples, not
performed our civic duty very admirably. Closely contested
presidential elections have struggled to tally 62% of the potentially
available, non-incarcerated adult citizens. And presidential
elections garner the best we can do. Congressional midterm elections,
statewide gubernatorial elections and local city/county contests
struggle to attain a sizable fraction of the presidential vote
totals. Many places, however, have initial party primary elections
with subsequent runoffs where the initial contest started with more
than two candidates. Sometimes local school districts will even stage
special elections for bond issues to decide on capital construction
questions. Many such local elections have produced results on the
basis of as little as 10% to 12% turnout. Who can claim with
confidence that decisions made by such paltry representations of the
body politic are indeed decisions made as a form of a democratic
process?
Yet other
than the occasional post-election editorial decrying low turnouts,
little is ever done to reverse these trends or to boost turnout in
subsequent elections. And, in fact, one major party seems intent on
going the other direction, making it even more difficult for turnouts
to rise. They push voter ID laws and restrictions on early voting
while continuing to seek to produce and maintain legislative maps
that gerrymander voter rolls in ways designed to maximize their
numbers in spite of relative parity of voters at the macro level.
Some in that party are more worried about the potential for
undocumented immigrants voting in ways they abhor than they are
ensuring that legal citizens vote in sufficient numbers to express a
common will.
This being
an essay, not a book, I will not offer data validating the
generalizations I have made. Such data does exit and could be
produced. Instead, my intent here is to suggest several simple
changes available that could markedly improve voter turnout at little
cost (if not produce a savings to the overall costs of elections).
We need far
fewer elections. Send the voters to the polls less often.
Presidential and midterm elections every two years in November are
sufficient. They can be preceded by single open primaries scheduled
at the whim and pleasure of various states, but without runoffs.
Instead of separate party primaries, for all offices below that of
President, have a totally open primary for a given office with the
top two vote getters advancing to the general election in November.
This could work for Congress and Senate as well as gubernatorial
offices.
I would also
take many currently elective offices out of the mix and convert them
to appointive positions. This is most easily seen at the local
levels. Why should voters elect county clerks, state superintendents
of education or insurance, even attorneys general? Do local voters
really have any idea who would make the best municipal or district
judge? If we elect the mayor and the governor and the state
legislators with appropriately representative turnout margins, why
can't we trust those elected officials to appoint qualified people
who will administer the various departments of government properly?
And if they err they can be removed by the elected officials. And if
the elected officials fail to act, they can be removed by election.
