What would you promise to do in order to be allowed to vote? Would you, for example, sign a loyalty oath to a political party? In Virginia, the government will require voters in the upcoming Republican primary to sign a statement saying “I, the undersigned, pledge that I intend to support the nominee of the Republican Party for president.” This is fundamentally wrong.
The pledge can be interpreted in many ways. It could be read as a statement of current intent with no promise of future support. It could also be read as a promise of future support. That future support could be interpreted as donations of time or money to the Republican candidate, or simply a vote in the presidential election for the Republican candidate. How strong does your intent have to be? If you change your mind after the nominees are chosen, or after you learn more about the candidates or the parties or the world, or simply after thinking more, have you broken your signed pledge? If you believe that Romney will be the Republican nominee and you intend to support him, but you would be unwilling to support Giuliani if he is the Republican nominee, can you honestly sign that pledge? Different people will understand the pledge differently, and indeed the linked article offers two different interpretations just a few sentences apart. What is certain is that the pledge will pressure at least some people toward voting for the Republican nominee in the general election, because some people will take what they are signing seriously.
Worse, that pressure will feel like it is coming from the government, rather than from a political party. While a political party is not required to follow anything resembling a democratic process for choosing a nominee, the Republican party in Virginia has chosen to use the state’s electoral process. That electoral process should clearly follow some basic principles in a consistent fashion, so that voters can be assured of the fairness and integrity of the electoral process. Coercion and bias in the state’s electoral process is incompatible with democracy. When the state requires voters in a party’s primary to sign a pledge that they will vote for the party’s nominee in the presidential election, that is coercive. When the state does that only for one party’s primary and not for the other’s, that is both coercive and biased.
The coercion can easily be reinforced after the primary by reminding primary voters of their pledge. Records of who voted in a primary are public. Sample push poll: “Earlier this year, you signed a pledge to support the Republican candidate for president. Do you intend to vote for the Republican candidate tomorrow? [Yes] Thank you for being an honest American. Please remember to encourage your friends to vote tomorrow as well. [No] Are you aware that you signed that pledge? Are you aware that perjury is a crime?” Voter intimidation 101, made even easier by the state having required voters to sign a loyalty pledge in order to vote.
Let’s assume that it’s reasonable for a party to restrict primary voting to members of that political party. (States have different policies on this.) If I am a member of the Republican party, why should I not be able to vote in the primary even if I have no intention of supporting the likeliest Republican nominees for president? Ron Paul supporters, for example, may well realize that their guy has no chance of becoming the nominee and may not want to support anyone else. Why are they not entitled to vote in the primary? Some Republican voters may want to vote in their party’s primary for other local, state, or federal offices, but intend to vote for a non-Republican presidential candidate. Why are they not entitled to vote in the primary?
These objections don’t begin to address the question of what else voters could be required to sign in order to vote. I don’t want to go in that direction, because it might suggest that this loyalty oath is somewhere near the top of a slippery slope. This country has spent many years struggling up a difficult slope towards more free, more fair, and more open access to the right to vote. Loyalty oaths as part of the electoral process are not a small slip down that slope; they are a wholehearted leap downwards.
The two major political parties are very entrenched in our political system, and are very much majority groups. Freedom of association is usually taken to protect our right to join minority groups, but should also protect our right to register as a member of one of those major political parties without agreeing to join in lockstep with every priority of that party. Instead of respecting freedom of association, instead of recognizing the benefits of including different viewpoints, instead of reaching out to independent voters, instead of any pretense of a Big Tent approach, the Republican party is now willing to actively alienate even Republican voters who do not want to subordinate their will to the will of the party. I hope that is not a winning strategy.
Wednesday, November 28, 2007
Voter pledges
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9 comments:
There’s an interesting discussion of this loyalty oath over at Vardibidian’s blog.
Right, I'm going back over to V's blog to comment both on your post, here, and your comment there, that linked here.
What would you think if you had to (a) be a member of the party to vote in their primary; (b) when you join the party, claim that you intend to vote in general elections for the candidates nominated by the party?
The particulars of this case seem icky to me, but in the abstract, the idea of a party requiring members to promise to support it, and only allowing members to vote on party business, doesn't seem crazy to me.
The fact that the State is mixed up in this seems unfortunate to me, but if the major parties can't hold fair and honest elections for their own nominees, I guess it's better that they admit this and seek help.
Oh, also, about breaking your pledge: I feel like "intend" is a big enough weasel word here to cover pretty much any sin, making the pledge both unenforceable and not even that morally compelling. I can, with perfect honesty, intend on Primary Day to vote for the Democratic nominee when Election Day comes, but decide on Election Day that there's a good reason to do something other than what I originally intended.
AND, I should point out that this sort of pledge would actually have an effect on me personally, if it were in place in MA. I intend to vote for a minor-party candidate in the general election, but intend to vote in the primary for one of the major parties, and to vote for the candidate who I prefer among those who actually has a chance of getting elected. If I were required to say that I intended to vote for the major-party candidate, I'd have to decide whether my meaningless minor-party protest vote was sufficiently meaningless to give up on, or whether to lie about my intentions, neither of which is very appealing. So I'm personally glad that the major parties in MA are willing to let me vote in their primaries, even if I don't plan to vote for their nominee in the general election.
But I don't think it would be crazy of them to say "thanks, but we don't care what you think, if you're not going to vote for our nominee anyway".
Josh: I’d been thinking about that question of whether it would be different to have a loyalty oath to join the party, moving this all a step away from the voting booth. There would be a slight improvement, in that the actual experience of going to vote in a state-run election is not putrefied by a loyalty oath. But party registrations are also handled by the government, so shifting the loyalty oath to that level would also be unacceptable government coercion and bias. I'll cite my actual experience of going into the local election office when I moved to this town. I stated that I wanted to register as a Democrat, and the election office insisted that I should instead register unaffiliated. I don’t tend to go along with nonsense like that from people who aren’t armed, so I did end up registered as a Democrat, but it took some work and the bias and attempted coercion was disturbing.
Should you have to be a member of a party to vote in their primary? (States do currently vary on this point.) I can envision a political system in which I would think that a good idea, but I think our current political system would benefit from open primaries and as broad participation as possible. The electoral process narrows down the field of candidates in a step-wise fashion. Having open primaries should result in candidates with broader appeal, which should then result in broader support for the eventual winner. I don't think that closed primaries are a terrible choice, just not the choice I'd prefer.
I think the entire notion of political purity tests for party registration is terribly wrong. It’s a way to reduce participation, to enforce a conformist mindset, to infantilize the electorate, and to protect a party leadership which no longer represents the party. The party derives its legitimacy from the people who support it, and loyalty oaths deliberately invert that power relationship.
I think Michael's point about the Loyalty Oath being administered by the State is important. I hadn't thought about it, but by putting that into the State's election mechanism, the Party is misleading the Voter about the nature of the Oath—who it's to, what it covers.
I prefer closed primaries, myself, for reasons I go into on my Tohu Bohu. However, of all the possible ways to close the primary, that is, to attempt to make sure that the primary reflects the feeling of the Party (vaddevah dat means), a Loyalty Oath of that kind seems to me to be the worst. Well, OK, I could come up with worse ones. But a Party that likes this idea is a Party I wouldn't want to join.
Thanks,
-V.
Actually, Virginia's Republicans have backed off and say they will not demand this oath, after sufficient outrage was voiced around the state.
a Party that likes this idea is a Party I wouldn't want to join
Senator Harry Byrd left the Democratic party in part because of the similar loyalty oath (I’m curious to see the wording, though it’s the principle that is offensive) that the Virginia Democrats used in their party caucuses in the 1970s.
In any case, I’m glad that the Virginia GOP has decided to back off, even if it was grudgingly. Virginia House Speaker Bill Howell said of the unexpected outcry, “People just don't understand it.” I think people understand it just fine.
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