California and Washington are among the states in which qualified political parties choose party officers at public elections. In Washington state, Precinct Committee Officers are elected from each precinct at the general election. However, a few months ago, a U.S. District Court struck down Washington state’s system of letting all the voters choose party officers for each party.
In response, the Washington House passed HB 1860 on March 5. It provides that Precinct Committee Officers should be elected simultaneously with the presidential primary in May. The bill also expands their terms of office from two years to four years, which is necessary, because, obviously, presidential primaries are held only every four years. HB 1860 had a hearing in the Senate Government Operations and Elections Committee on March 22. The Committee will hold an executive session on March 24 to vote on the bill. The bill has substantial opposition, and the margin when the bill was in the House was 53-44. An alternative idea is to simply abolish these elections and let parties choose their officers in meetings.
In California, for many decades qualified political parties have chosen county central committee members at the June primary. There is no bill to alter that system. However, the California Association of County Election Officials (CACEO) is conducting a public relations campaign to persuade the legislature to abolish these elections. See this story.
Ironically, however, Proposition 14, passed in June 2010, stands as a legal barrier to abolishing these elections. Proposition 14 amended the California Constitution. Before it passed, the Constitution did not mention elections for county central committee. The old Constitution said, “The Legislature shall provide for primary elections for partisan offices, including an open presidential primary.” The new Constitutional provision says, “The Legislature shall provide for partisan elections for presidential candidates, and political party and party central committees, including an open presidential primary.” (note: “open presidential primary”, as defined by the California Constitution, means a system in which the Secretary of State places presidential candidates on the ballot automatically if they are mentioned in the news media; this is another example of the many definitions of “open primary”).
Just the very obvious –
REPEAL all mentions of party hack stuff in ALL constitutions.
The party hack groups can use mail ballots for ALL of their internal clubby party hack stuff.
P.R. and App.V. — for both public and private stuff.
Thinking some more about this, “provide” does not necessarily mean “conduct” or “execute”, but rather make “statutory provision for”.
So why couldn’t California, as a condition of qualification, require a political party to hold conventions at which elections are held for party central committees. The State could provide notices to voters registered with a party, as to time and location of their convention.
Then for presidential primaries, have a single ballot with all candidates on the ballot, and have the election officials pre-mark the ballot with the party registration of the candidate. Let each party determine whether votes from voters not-registered in the party count. If a party wishes to cooperate with some national political party, and use the results to determine its delegates to some national convention, they may do so (California could require the party to file their rules with the SOS, and get preclearance under Section 5 VRA).
The winner of the primary goes on the general election ballot.
Additional candidates may qualify on the basis of votes cast in the primary, supplemented as necessary by petition (votes plus signatures = 10,000). If the votes plus signatures are from registrants of a single party, then the candidate may have the party name appear on the ballot. If multiple candidates qualify for a party, the party may choose which candidates appear on the ballot with the party name.
With these changes, the number of voters necessary to qualify a party may be made quite modest (let’s say 300 to qualify and 100 to maintain qualification), with sufficient regulations to determine that the name actually represents a political party in some real sense.
With a small qualification number, new parties could qualify by petition only, with petition signers agreeing to have their party preference changed if the petition succeeds. Voter registrations could then be required to affiliate with a qualified party. Other voters would be classified as either non-partisan or undeclared. When voters with those classification ran for voter-nominated office, they could have “Independent”, “Nonpartisan”, “No Party Preference”, or ” ” appear on the ballot.
There could be a transitional period where current groups of miscellaneous voters are permitted to organize. If they don’t do so, they would be reclassified as undeclared.
The party hack gangs, large and small, new and old, can have paper mail ballots for their clubby hack stuff.
ZERO public tax dollars for clubby gangs.
ONE [general] election. P.R. and App.V.
If you were going to have PR, how would you recognize the party hack gangs to which you apportion power to?
# 4
Total Votes / Total Seats = EQUAL votes for each seat winner [party hack or independent] — via pre-election candidate 1,2,3,etc. rank order lists — to move excess votes down and loser votes up.
ALL voters elect somebody = REAL Democracy – both indirect majority rule [putting pressure on the party hacks to deliver on party hack platforms] and minority representation.
in effect —
Party Seats = Party Votes x Total Seats/ Total Votes
Very high tech 3rd or less grade math.
See the more complex P.R. math in Israel, Germany, New Zealand and other *civilized* free world regimes — as compared to the STONE AGE ANTI-Democracy gerrymander regimes in the U.K. [main source of the EVIL], Canada, U.S.A., India, etc.
EXACT P.R. math — each seat winner would have a voting power equal to the final votes he/she receives.
Computer voting system child’s play.
See any computer spreadsheet program – 2 columns – yes or no (for most votes) — possible fill the blanks for number votes — such as number of cops, pay per cop, etc.
# 5 Supp.
Districts would be 2 to 5 times the Total Votes / Total Seats average at the last election — to perhaps have at least 1 seat winner be elected in each district.
Districts to be 1 or more local govts or part of 1 local govt, as nearly as possible.
Ballot access via equal nominating petitions in each district based on number of voters at prior election in the district.
Whether or not “providing for” elections at party conventions meets the constitutional requirement (I suspect it doesn’t), vote-by-mail elections pretty clearly would.
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#7 California may require a political party to engage in certain activities in order to maintain its “qualified status”.
It is a totally reasonable requirement that parties hold biennial meetings for all registrants at which party officials are elected.