Government by ballot initiative is, at best, a mixed bag, with the occasional modest success temporarily deflecting attention from a steady stream of badly written, poorly focused and mostly unnecessary propositions.

Many passed propositions do relatively minor damage, but every now and then, a proposition comes along that is so obviously flawed, so fully capable of doing serious damage—both in the short term and the long run—that it is difficult to imagine who could possibly be in favor of it.

The current disaster-in-waiting is Proposition 121, which would destroy the way Arizonans conduct elections (with party primaries) and replace it with a ridiculous top-two system where everybody (including people from all parties and those from no party) is thrown into a big pile, with the top two finishers moving on to the general election. The most generous assessment of it is that it is a solution in search of a problem.

I could give you three mathematical scenarios where the system could be subverted, but the people behind this monstrosity probably aren’t moved by the logic of math … or reality, for that matter.

Prop 121 is being backed by something called the Open Elections/Open Government campaign. This, by itself, should send you screaming into the street. Open Elections/Open Government sure sounds purty, don’t it? Then again, so did Clean Elections, and what has that gotten us other than the worst TV commercials of all time? It’s like someone channeled the spirit of Ed Wood and then gave him a bunch of taxpayer money to play with.

Have you seen the latest Clean Elections commercial? It has the mere mention of the word “politics,” turning Granny into a Mexican wrestler, complete with luchador mask and cape. Then there’s a narrator who, for some unknown reason, is dressed up like Barry Manilow. He says that Clean Elections will help us watch debates. I didn’t know we needed help with that.

Anyway, just because something has a good-sounding name doesn’t make it good for us.

One of the few redeeming qualities of California—the place where good ideas go to die, and bad ideas become part of the state’s Constitution—is that the people in that state tend to try out crackpot notions before everybody else, and the rest of the country can observe and take notes. California is currently operating under a law that is the model for Prop 121. Let’s see how it did.

In the recent California (“top-two”) primary, only 14 of the 80 races for the State Assembly resulted in the top two finishers coming from the same party. In the state Senate races, it was even more stark: Ninety percent of the races resulted in one person from each party making up the top two. And, oh yeah, voter participation was down, with only about 5 million of a possible 23 million eligible voters (22 percent) bothering to vote. Not exactly a smashing success.

The main problem with the proposal is that it’s based on two false premises. The first is that it would somehow be better if partisanship were removed from the political process. While we are certainly in a bad place in American politics—with shortsighted and selfish people on both sides refusing to act like adults—it hasn’t always been that way, nor should we automatically expect it to stay that way. America has a history of producing visionary leaders when we really need them.

Then there is the truly cockeyed idea that moderates are somehow wiser, more politically astute and better able to get things done. This sounds like something that should be right, but it isn’t.

Let’s look at the great presidents we’ve had in this country. I assume that most of us agree that Abraham Lincoln was our greatest president. If you think about it, Lincoln was probably the least moderate president in U.S. history. He was willing to squoosh half the country like a bug just to prove his point that it wasn’t OK for some people to own other people.

Teddy Roosevelt took on people who were rich enough to buy the country because he knew that too-big business wasn’t good for the country. He also created the national parks to help keep the fat cats from raping the land for short-term gain.

Teddy was no moderate, and neither was Franklin Roosevelt, who steered the country out of the Great Depression and then successfully waged a world war on two fronts. (Despite his flaws, I also consider Lyndon Johnson to have been a great president because of what he did for civil rights.)

Some may even consider Ronald Reagan to have been great. Whatever the case, these men were not moderates. They couldn’t have been even if they had wanted to; the times in which they served required a clarity of vision and a stiffness of backbone.

This does not mean that moderates don’t have the right to run for office and to serve. But this quest for a homogeneity of elected officials, all moderates squeezing toward the middle, is not a recipe for success. It’s a capitulation of ideals.

This article appears in Oct 25-31, 2012.

11 replies on “Danehy”

  1. Tom, it’s about blind adherence to party loyalty, not moderation. You sound like a career politician railing about term limits. What makes you and all the other political hacks so scared of not seeing party affiliation beside a candidate’s name?

  2. The current mishmash of voting strategies adopted by individual states seem to be driven by dissatisfaction with previous election results. When Arizona became a state, its radical Initiative, Referendum and Recall for progressive legislation was in reaction to do-nothing legislatures who refused to pass bills on even essential issues. Arizona has one of the weakest governors of any state simply because in 1912, populism was the rage and distrust of elected officials was at an all time high. Arizona already has an “open” election system. Independents can vote in Democratic or Republican primaries if they so choose. Most city and county elections are open systems (but not Tucson). Prop 121 will do nothing except weaken political parties and disenfranchise independent candidates for office who will never have enough votes to beat more popular candidates. The current system gives voters a real choice. A top-two system would create a stagnant system of lowest common denominator candidates. If you think voter turnout is low now, wait till you switch to this system.

  3. It is interesting to observe WHY we have a two-party system, or, stated another way, why third/minor parties never succeed. The source is in the constitution, in a place not obvious. The constitution describes what to do if the electoral college is deadlocked: Force the House to elect a President. This is the origin of the ‘winner-take-all’ system – and it forces the power-seekers to form as few coalitions as possible: two! Tom is right about the CA/Prop121 system not working. It can’t.
    There is a better approach to any perceived problems in the AZ legislature: re-draw the District lines so that the two Representatives each have their own geographical area. We should have 60 House Districts and 30 Senate Districts. Write me at cjprintwell@msn.com for more discussion.

  4. Prop 121 has nothing to do with nonpartisan elections but rather with ending the current practice which makes it so possible for candidates to be chosen by small minorities of voters and. in safe districts, regularly sliding into office.

  5. Really, this has to be the worst political article I have ever seen in TW. How is it ‘proving’ from California’s experience that “the ‘top two’ elections system is a bust”? The only consequence cited from California’s open-primary law is that sometimes two members of the same party reach the ‘finals’, and sometimes two members of different parties do. Isn’t that exactly what we would expect, and want?

    And as for ‘moderation’: In Arizona? In 2012? Yes, please, I’ll take more of it, thanks!

  6. I disagree and will vote for Prop 121. What could be worse than the current system where two parties direct the legislature through their surrogates (elected “representatives”) who are part-time merely adding to their paychecks and give no evidence they even read what they vote on or much less discern what “their” constituents want because we never see them! Stuff both major parties and let’s get down to business. Put the R and D out to pasture.

  7. I’m unconvinced, Tom. The way it works now is that only extreme candidates can get through a primary and then maybe win by a handful of votes, supposedly representing everyone in their district but ticking off nearly half of them and making us more disillusioned about politics. Moderates could govern better if there were more of them instead of just people who won’t work together.

  9. I vehemently disagree that prop 121 is not a good thing Tom, (although I do agree that often ugly props are given really nice sounding names) and further co-sign RJ’s comment, in that it is about blind adherence to party loyalty..

    Its like the friggin Bloods and Crips nowadays.

    I mean blind party loyalty produced a SECOND George W. term. Obviously something needs to be done.

    Yes on Prop 121

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