An Oregon initiative for a top-two system is starting to circulate. See the wording of the proposed constitutional amendment here. It does not mention ranked choice voting. It does not even say how many candidates would advance to the general election, but presumably it means top-two. Without ranked choice voting in the general election, if it were implemented to advance the top three, for example, that would result in many general elections with two Democrats and one Republican, or two Republicans and one Democrat. Almost no one would say that is a workable system, because it would be grossly unfair to the major party with two candidates; they would be at a disadvantage against the major party with one candidate.
The initiative seems to include presidential elections, because it covers all statewide races, and presidential elector is a statewide race. If this initiative had been in effect in 2016, it is very likely the only two candidates who would have been on the November ballot for president would have been Donald Trump and Bernie Sanders. In the May 2016 Democratic presidential primary in Oregon, Sanders got 360,829 votes and Hillary Clinton got 269,846. Given that Oregon Democrats preferred Sanders to Clinton by such a large margin, it is probable that a primary ballot used by all voters would have advanced Trump and Sanders. Therefore Hillary Clinton could not have carried Oregon in the general election. In the actual 2016 election, she did carry Oregon.
It appears that this vaguely worded proposed constitutional amendment is intended simply to provide an “open” primary, and let the legislature fill in the actual details of how it will work.
“Open primary” has been defined in several US Supreme Court decisions as a system in which each party has its own primary ballot and its own nominees, but on primary day any voter can choose any party’s primary ballot. In 2004, a California state trial court ruled that the top-two measure could not be described on the ballot as an “open primary”, because an open primary is different from a top-two system. So no one ought to refer to this Oregon initiative as an “open primary”. Supporters of top-two understand the confusion they cause with the name, but they do it anyway.
https://oregonopenprimaries.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/11/2022-039-Free-and-Equal-Amendment-Electronic-Sponsorship-Signature-Sheet.pdf
ONE VOTER FORM.
One voter forms are a bad idea, as we discussed previously.
Justice Souter in his opinion in Foster v Love referred to the system employed in Louisiana as an “open primary” which is also the name used in Louisiana statute.
It would be more accurate to refer to what Richard Winger refers to as an Open Primary as a Pick a Gulag system, where a voter chooses the ballot where they are confined on election day.
Oregon already conducts open primaries for county offices. This is unremarkable.
OR Const — spacing added
Art. II
Section 16. Election by plurality; proportional representation.
In all elections authorized by this constitution until otherwise provided by law, the person or persons receiving the highest number of votes shall be declared elected, but provision may be made by law for elections by equal proportional representation of all the voters for every office which is filled by the election of two or more persons whose official duties, rights and powers are equal and concurrent.
Every qualified elector resident in his precinct and registered as may be required by law, may vote for one person under the title for each office.
Provision may be made by law for the voter’s direct or indirect expression of his first, second or additional choices among the candidates for any office.
For an office which is filled by the election of one person it may be required by law that the person elected shall be the final choice of a majority of the electors voting for candidates for that office.
These principles may be applied by law to nominations by political parties and organizations.
[Constitution of 1859; Amendment proposed by initiative petition filed Jan. 29, 1908, and adopted by the people June 1, 1908]
——-
PR NOT enforced.
https://www.oregonlegislature.gov/bills_laws/Pages/OrConst.aspx
OR Const as of 2020
Top x is not an open primary election because it’s not an election. An election can elect someone to office or to a nomination. A top X qualifying event can’t elect anyone to anything. It can only eliminate candidates from the actual election. Louisiana actually does have primaries, unlike top X, because a majority result elects a candidate, eliminating the runoff.
Is Oregon an npv state?
@Kevin,
‘primary’ is an adjective meaning first. A primary election is the first election of a series of elections.
Oregon actually does elect county officials at the primary election which you claim is not an actual election.
I know what primary means. My point, in case you missed it, is that a top # qualifying heat is not a primary election because it is not any kind of election at all. An election, in order to be an election, must have the ability to elect someone to something – either an office or a party nomination for such office. It can still have a runoff, but to qualify as an election it must immediately elect someone who gets an outright majority or some prearranged threshold. Otherwise, it’s not an election, and thus can not be a primary, open or otherwise, since as you helpfully point out the word primary implies election.
As for Oregon county elections,I made no claims about them since I’m not familiar with them. If they elect people at the primary, like Louisiana, they are legitimately called elections. This would make them totally unlike top Y “primaries,” which are not elections at all.
election = making choices
Some southern moron States have primary, primary runoff, general, general runoff — mere FOUR *elections*.
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ONE election
PR and APPV – pending Condorcet — RCV done right.
TOTSOP
Approval voting sucks. It’s a total cluster****.
Due to rotted publik skoools —
what percentage of voters can NOT read a ballot and esp can NOT correctly put 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, etc. for choices ???
Need to *analyze* recent RCV elections- esp in urban ghetto areas.
Lee-
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Popular_Vote_Interstate_Compact
So would passing this initiative void Oregon’s participation in the NPVIC?
Demo Rep,
If they can circle, check off, or touch the donkey’s butt on the touchscreen, they don’t have to rank anyone past that. It’s a valid choice for some people. Don’t be a snob, and don’t be a hater.
I expect the Oregon initiative sponsors will claim their initiative doesn’t apply to president. But they certainly have been careless in drafting their initiative.
@Kevin,
A: Have you voted yet?
B: Is there an election?
C: There is no election,
B: Why did A ask if I voted?
C: There is a voting event.
B: Did you vote?
C: I only vote in elections.
A, B (simultaneously as they edge away from C): Let’s go get a drink.
How many foreign regime ballots with candidate faces and/or multi- symbols —
animals, plants, math symbols, etc. ??? — due to lots of illiterate voters.
NOW really needed in the USA in many burgs ???
I am the square root of pi party candidate for universe emperor — vote for me.
D-Z agree with C, and don’t vote in non-elections which don’t elect anyone. The vast majority will reserve their votes and their attention until after the voting event where politics superfans, hobbyists and nerds A and B narrow down the field for them. D, E…Y, Z are aware there’s a qualifying heat which will select their candidates, but since no offices, nominations, or medals are on the line, they’ll skip it along with the Olympics qualifying events and start paying attention when the real race begins.
Compare the prop text with II- 16 — December 17, 2021 at 7:43 pm above.
How many conflicts with it and other election related sections in the OR const ???
@Hal,
It is indeterminate what some voter meant when they made only one choice. If large numbers do so it undermines the basic premise of RCV.
@Kevin,
What does K do when some offices will be determined and others will only advance some candidates?
RCV cannot compel any voter to rank any candidates. If a voter is satisfied with one particular candidate, that voter can give that candidate a number 1 vote, and ignore the rest.
Yes, if enough voters do that, the effect is the same as a plurality election. That’s entirely within the voters’ rights, if they so choose.
In fact, in Maine, many voters do just that.
But, with RCV, the option to rank is always there, if a voter feels the need to use it.
Also with approval voting, no voter is compelled to cast any more votes for any office than that voter wants to cast.
In fact, with approval voting, you don’t even need to use special ballots. Just allow the voter to cast as many votes for candidates for any office that the voter may want to cast.
Jim Riley,
That depends on everything from how busy K is that week to how much K cares about the offices which may actually get decided to how many offices and which offices and who’s running etc etc. The more offices that actually matter to more people are up and may actually get decided the higher the chance that K will pay attention and possibly vote.