Once again, I, and every other citizen, was denied the right to vote for all the candidates of our choice by state support of political parties. The election process as it is now set up supports political parties at the expense of citizens by registering voters by party, printing separate party ballots, and restricting the voters to have their votes counted only for one party in an election.
If people wants to split their votes between parties and have them count, it is impossible under the present system. A write-in vote will not count if it is written on a ballot of a different party from the candidate’s, as was explained at poll-workers’ training I attended many years ago.
Further, in the general election, only one candidate from each party may be on the ballot, even though the candidates with the most overall support might be from the same party.
The present system forces potential candidates to adopt a party with which they may not be in agreement on some issues in order to have a chance of winning. Thus we have Bernie Sanders running as a Democrat, even though he isn’t one. The only alternative is to invent a party to run on, as did John Anderson and Ross Perot. Such candidates are usually called “spoilers,” as they are presumed to have no chance of winning and pull voters away from one of the major parties.
I would like to see a radically different system for voting. First, no voter would be registered by party. The parties would be free to decide however they liked which candidates to endorse, just as all other organizations do (ACLU, NRA, etc.), but they would do it without the state’s help. The government should not be involved in labeling voters for the benefit of political parties.
There would be one ballot for the primary, and the top three or four candidates (the legislature could decide) would make it to the final election ballot. There would be no mention of party. This would allow for more than one candidate from what are now the major parties to appear on the final election ballot, if they were the top vote-getters in the primary.
Finally, and most importantly, there would be ranked voting so people would not be forced to watch the polls and pick a likely winner or throw away their vote. I believe under this system, the extreme candidates would likely be eliminated as second and third choices came into play.
There is one more change that needs to happen for really effective choosing of leaders. The media must stop treating elections like horse races on which people are gambling and start educating people about the candidates goals, backgrounds, and character — not just the front-runners, but all the candidates, including researching their records and fact-checking their statements.
There were many good candidates who never made it to the first primary because they couldn’t get any media coverage. We will never get the best candidates if they must be rich, well-known, or outrageous to get attention.
These changes would not significantly impact the presidential elections until many states adopted this idea, but it has to start somewhere. Some states and localities have already initiated ranked voting, and I believe when it is seen to have a significant impact, other will follow.
As an unenrolled voter, I have the privilege of which primary ballot to choose, but it is not enough. In order to vote for the office I thought was most critical, I was denied my right to have my choice counted for other offices on the ballot of another party.
It is time to diminish the power of political parties and give it back to the people.
Judith Truesdell is a Shelburne resident.