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Berkshire Eagle
IRV can reform voting
By Peter Vickery
September 7, 2003 AMHERST GOV.
SCHWARZENEGGER? With more than 100 candidates running in the
California recall race, it's a real possibility. After all, Jesse
Ventura became governor of Minnesota with just 37 percent of the
votes. Just in case we needed reminding, the California recall shows
how our voting system (called plurality voting) cannot cope with the
stress of three or more candidates running for a single office. It
can handle two candidates just fine, but any more than that and the
rest become "spoilers," sometimes throwing the election to the
candidate most voters like least. Remember last year's race for
governor here in Massachusetts? Shannon O'Brien became the
Democratic Party's nominee even though she won just 33 percent of
the votes in the primary. Most people who voted in the primary voted
for somebody else. Not surprisingly, in the gubernatorial election
turnout was low among registered Democrats, and Shannon O'Brien lost
heavily to Mitt Romney. Sending an unpopular candidate into a
general election is unfair to the party's supporters and to the
candidate. We voters have the right to expect our votes to count,
and a party's standard-bearer deserve a mandate. So later this
month, a committee of the Massachusetts Legislature will look at a
reform called Instant Runoff Voting (IRV), a system that is already
in use in some parts of the United States. On Sept. 18, the Joint
Election Laws Committee will hear testimony regarding bills that
would bring Instant Runoff Voting to Massachusetts. IRV is a
run-off election that happens without the cost of a second round of
campaigning. It allows (but does not require) voters to rank
candidates in order of preference, 1, 2, 3 and so on. Essentially,
IRV is a way of telling the person who counts the ballots how you
would vote if your favorite candidate came last and there had to be
a runoff election. If a candidate wins a majority of
first-preferences, that candidate is the winner. But if nobody wins
a majority, there is another count. If your first-choice candidate
comes last, your vote goes to your second choice. This process of eliminating
candidates and transferring their supporters' votes continues until
one candidate has a majority. Nobody gets two votes -- Instant
Runoff Voting is constitutional, legal, and complies with the
principle of one-person-one-vote.
~~~~~~~~~~ Requiring a majority
of the votes, not just a plurality, is not a new idea. Until 1855, a
candidate needed a majority to become governor of Massachusetts. If
nobody got a majority, the Legislature picked the winner. That was
how the original framers of our Constitution set up the system.
Nobody is suggesting that we go back to the days of letting the
Legislature have the final say in who becomes governor, but we can
still abide by the framers' principle of majority rule by switching
to Instant Runoff Voting. In addition to producing
majority-winners, Instant Runoff Voting has another benefit. By
making candidates appeal to their opponents' supporters for
second-preferences votes, IRV encourages them to run more positive
campaigns. You do not win somebody's second-choice by bad-mouthing
their favorite candidate. Instead, you have to emphasize areas of
common ground. This would be good news for those of us who are sick
of the ads that try to demonize the competition. Some may argue
that Instant Runoff Voting is too complicated. The voters of San
Francisco and Vermont do not feel that way. They endorsed IRV
overwhelmingly last year. Nor do the Republicans of Utah who have
also opted for IRV. The state of Louisiana, which for some offices
uses a run-off to ensure that the winner is the choice of the
majority, lets its overseas absentee voters employ IRV. Like other
Americans, Bay Staters can cope with standardized tests, the rules
of baseball, and multiple choices for breakfast cereals. To suggest
that they will be baffled by the option of ranking candidates in
order of preference, 1 through 3, is an insult to their
intelligence. If you're tired of negative campaigns, if you think
that somebody should have the support of the majority to win an
election, and if you want to return to constitutional basics, then
Instant Runoff Voting is for you. Write today to the chairs of the
Joint Election Laws Committee and tell them why you support Instant
Runoff Voting.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Peter Vickery is an Amherst
attorney and president of Fairvote
Massachusetts.
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