Here is a picture of the California sample ballot from June 1998, for the office of Governor. At that time, California used a blanket primary. All candidates from all parties appeared on that primary ballot. Then, the top vote-getter from each party advanced to the general election, along with any independent candidates. As one can see, there were 17 candidates for Governor. Each one had a party label, and also an occupation, printed on the ballot in three languages.
If the California “top-two open primary” becomes law, California primary ballots in the future will look like this, except that instead of each candidate’s party label, each candidate would instead have next to his or her name this sentence: “My party preference is the Republican Party” (or whatever qualified party the candidate is registered into). This statement would be printed in three languages in counties that contain most of California’s population. All this verbiage, combined with the long list of candidates for each office, makes for a cumbersome primary ballot.
Because both the blanket primary, and the top-two primary, print all candidates from all parties on the same primary ballot, those systems create very lengthy primary ballots. In June 1998, besides 17 candidates for Governor on that unitary primary ballot, there were 13 for Lieutenant Governor, 9 for Secretary of State, 7 for Controller, 9 for Treasurer, 10 for Attorney General, 8 for Insurance Commissioner, 11 for Board of Equalization (in each of two districts), 13 for U.S. Senator, and as many as 10 for U.S. House and Assembly. Then there were separate primary ballots for party office, distributed to each voter who was a member of a qualified party. The separate ballots for party office eliminate any possibility that the “top-two open primary” would save printing costs for election administrators.
Under a “top-two open primary”, the general election is undercrowded. There would only be two candidates for each congressional and state office, for a very short ballot with few choices. “Top-two open primary” creates a primary ballot that tries to do too many functions all at once, and then a stultifyingly short November ballot. By contrast, the normal system, in which each party has its own primary ballot, provides more balance. Both the primary ballot and the November ballot typically have 4, 5 or 6 choices, in the existing California system.
Equal nominating petitions — to get SERIOUS candidates.
Sorry — NOT all party hack groups, old or new, have a constitutional right to get their party hack nominee on the general election ballots.
See the 2008 WA top 2 case in the Supremes.
The usual suspects will bring up some as applied court stuff by the party hacks.
The LAW says the party hack *prefer* label is MEANINGLESS — except to MORON party hacks and voters — but does give some free advertising at public expense to the party hack gang mentioned.
P.R. and A.V.
NO primaries are needed.
THE problem is the minority rule GERRYMANDERS by the ANTI-Democracy EVIL party hacks.
Top 2 is one more dubious *fix* — which will likely do ZERO about the gerrymander math — or even perhaps make the math a bit worse — esp. if 2 party hacks of the same party are on the general election ballots in the same gerrymander district — some / many of the other party hacks may not vote for either of the 2.
In the governor’s race, #1, 2, 5, 7, 11, 13, and 15 placed candidates qualified. The latter 5 had 3.22% of the vote, less than the 3.38% of the vote who didn’t vote at all. They can’t really be choices if hardly anyone chose them.
If Top 2 had been used:
For Congress (52) seats, 3 Libertarian, 1 Reform, and 1 American Independent would have qualified. 4 districts would have had no Democrat, and 3 no Republican. One candidate would have qualified as a write-in. There would have been 1 D/D race and 1 R/R race.
For Senate (20 seats), 1 P&F candidate would have qualified. 4 districts had no Republican and 1 no Democrat. One candidate would have qualified as a write-in. There would have been 3 D/D races.
For Assembly (80 seats), 2 Libertarian and 1 Natural Law candidate would have qualified. 10 districts had no Democrat, and 9 had no Republican. 2 write-in candidates would have qualified. 8 districts would have been D/D and 7 would have been R/R.
The problem with the analysis in comment #2 is that in 1998, voters knew that the top vote-getter from each party would advance to the November election, and the voters voted using this knowledge. Under top-two, the rules would be different and the voters would know that, so that would alter their voting behavior. The best way to predict how top-two would work in California is to see what happened in Washington state in 2008. In Washington state in 2008, there were no minor party or independent candidates on the November ballot for any statewide state race, and none for Congress. Out of 123 legislative races, there were only five minor party or independent candidates on the November ballot, all in races in which only one major party person had bothered to file.
#3 Did the elected party hacks in WA in 2008 suddenly become any less leftwing / rightwing extremist — after getting a mighty majority *mandate* in each gerrymander district — aka political concentration camp — with the legislator monarch / leader / boss in the each camp — only slightly different than the commanders of the Stalin / Hitler concentration camps.
P.R. and A.V.
NO primaries are needed.
#3 In Washington in 2006 only one minor party or independent candidate even bothered to file in 120-odd legislative races.
In 2008, there were numerous races where candidates were unopposed in the general election, where an independent or minor party candidate would have to do little more than file to get on the general election ballot.
In the 1998 California gubernatorial race, the vote for the minor party candidates in the primary was about the same in the primary and the general election (3.22% vs 3.56%).
Every time Jim Riley mentions the Washington state 2006 election, he always fails to say that the Green Party and the Libertarian Party each ran a candidate for the U.S. Senate. There were also independent candidates for Congress in 2006 in Washington.
The non-major party candidates for U.S. Senate in Washington in 2006 got 70,000 votes, or 3.2%.
#4 Washington elects two representatives and one senator from each legislative district.
Under the blanket primary, it was fairly common to have a bipartisan delegation. An incumbent could get cross-over votes in the primary, preempting a more competitive candidate from the opposite party, so a challenger might well be more extreme. Or it might simply be that a voter would want to vote for a candidate who had been a school board or city council member and be indifferent to the party.
Under the Pick-A-Party primary, a voter who picked their party on the basis of the gubernatorial or senatorial primary, would have been blocked from voting for their choice for legislator. And so legislative selections would be increasingly by more partisan voters even in districts that were relatively balanced.
In districts where one party is dominant, supporters of the minority party are at least allowed to vote for who represents them. I think that is a good thing.
#6 Some people may misinterpret what you wrote, so let’s be more explicit.
There was a Green, Libertarian, and one independent candidate for the US Senate in 2006 who collectively received 66,969 votes.
There was one independent candidate (and no minor party candidates) for the US House in 2006. She received 11,956 votes.
While it is true that Senators are members of Congress, the reference to Congress between two explicit references to the Senate and prevalent usage of Congressman/woman/person to refer to a Representative may have caused some to infer there were multiple independent candidates for the US House, and that the Green and Libertarian candidate for Senate received 70,000 votes.
There was no US senatorial election in 2008, so it is impossible to make comparisons with 2006. There were no Republican or Democratic senatorial candidates in 2008 either.
There was one independent candidate for the US House in 2006, Linnea Noreen in CD 7. She received 11,926 votes.
In 2008, there were 7 minor party or independent candidates for the US House, one each expressed a preference for the Constitution, Green, or Libertarian parties, while 4 expressed no party preference. Collectively these 7 candidates received 23,220 votes.
So for the federal races that may be compared, there was a 600% increase in the number of non-major party candidates, a 300% increase in the number of congressional districts where a voter could vote for a non-major party candidates, and a 95% increase in the votes cast for non-major party candidates. When I tried to calculate a percentage increase for minor party candidates, I got a divide by zero error.
Since the Supremes opinion about top 2 in WA State was in early 2008, is the 2008 stuff of any real use ???
i.e. how many possible *serious* candidates in WA did not have enough time, money and effort to run in 2008 ???
Nebraska manages to survive with a ONE house NONPARTISAN state legislature — since about 1936.
Top 2 in the nonpartisan primary in NE.
Clogged primary ballots in NE only if a gerrymander incumbent is NOT running again ???
Are the party hacks in NE trying to bring back party hack primaries ???
#10: Nebraska holds party primaries for its congressional elections and all or most of its other state offices.
Other than Louisiana and Washington, Nebraska is the only state that elects its legislature on a nonpartisan basis.
The one-house legislature is a terrible idea– which is why no state but Nebraska has it.
#11 So where is the revolt in NE by the party hacks to copy the same old EVIL stuff from the other 49 gerrymander States ???
NE got its ONE house legislature as a result of the MAJOR EVIL corruption by the party hacks in NE — mainly Elephants in the bad old days.
The nonpartisan stuff was deemed *progressive* — part of the progressive election reform agenda to reduce the power of the EVIL party hacks
— nonpartisan local governments, voter petitions for constitutional amendments, laws and recalls — and a bit earlier — even the SECRET ballot and official primary and general election ballots.
How many websites have to have the history of election reforms in the world — before it is too late ???
Wiki folks are working 24/7.
P.R. and nonpartisan A.V. — two more MAJOR reforms — regardless of party hacks, juveniles and overly sensitive folks.
Minnesota began having a nonpartisan legislature in 1913 and restored party primaries in 1973.
In 1915, California Progressives, led by Gov. Hiram Johnson, promoted a ballot measure for nonpartisan (“top two”) elections for state offices. The voters, who several years earlier had approved nonpartisan local elections, rejected the 1915 measure, 58.2% to 41.8%.
Nebraska’s nonpartisan state legislative elections were enacted through a ballot measure in the 1930s.
Now we learn that you are a minor party HACK, Demo Rep.