“The report of the National
Commission on Federal Election Reform,
issued last week, has the unmistakable earmarks of political compromise…The
commission remained squarely within a long tradition of minimal federal
involvement in the conduct of American elections.
, … the prescriptions offered will do little to address the more subterranean
faults in our political life that became visible during and after Election
2000: the alienation and anger of much of the black community; the pitfalls of
the Electoral College and the ways in which it skews political campaigns; the
high rates of nonvoting, particularly among the poor and less educated; the
dangers of partisan control of election administration; the cavalier and
disrespectful treatment of voters in many locales; and the absence, as the
Supreme Court observed in Bush v. Gore, of a constitutional right to vote for
president.”
- from the New York Times, August 5,
2001, Reform and an Evolving Electorate, by Alex Keyssar, professor of history
and social policy at Harvard's Kennedy School, is author of "The Right to
Vote: The Contested History of Democracy in the United States."
“As an optimist, I mined these pages for something that would reflect a need for full representation for all voters and found a few phrases that might be of interest to those whose love of democracy outweighs any religious obedience to the Founding Fathers. From Page 14. “The methods for funding and administering elections… should seek to ensure that every qualified citizen has an equal opportunity to vote and that every individual's vote is equally effective. No individual, group or community should be left with a justified belief that the electoral process works less well for some than for others.” and again from Page 25,”When they choose the president, the vice-president and members of Congress, the American people should expect that all levels of government should provide a democratic process that: .. Operates with equal effectiveness for every citizen and every community; .”
Of course there are no proposals that I saw that even remotely recommends reviewing - let alone changing - the voting system. …” - Nat Lerner, Editor, after downloading the report.
As a practical matter, the commission’s report provides all of us with an opportunity to bring PR and IRV to the attention of those who otherwise would not listen to us, if we include a comment about these fundamental reforms in our letters and conversations about the report.
The
President’s Column
My column this issue is dedicated to Charlotte Woodward (1829-192?), one of the signers of the Seneca Falls Declaration of Sentiments.
My wife and I took a tour of New York State during our recent vacation. One of the places we stopped was Seneca Falls, home to the First Women's Rights Convention in 1848. The convention site is now a National Historic Park run by the National Park Service. In addition to what's left of the Wesleyan Chapel where the convention took place, the site includes a wall upon which is engraved the Declaration of Sentiments and the names of the 100 women and men who signed it (out of the reported three hundred people who attended the Convention).
While the Declaration of Sentiments is modeled after the Declaration of Independence, it is an important document in its own right. I was especially struck by these words near the end:
“In entering upon the great work before us, we anticipate no small amount of misconception, misrepresentation, and ridicule; but we shall use every instrumentality within our power to effect our object. We shall employ agents, circulate tracts, petition the state and national legislatures, and endeavor to enlist the pulpit and the press in our behalf.”
Long-time CPR members know that I am fond of comparing our movement with the women's suffrage movement, in that I expect our progress will be measured in decades, not years. Little did I realize that the parallels go deeper. We, like the early suffragists, have been (and continue to be) subject to misconception, misrepresentation, and ridicule; and we, like the early suffragists, have and will employ agents, circulate tracts, petition the state and national legislatures, and endeavor to enlist the pulpit and the press in our behalf.
There is one parallel that I hope will not hold. Charlotte Woodward was 19 years old when she signed the Declaration of Sentiments. She wasn't the youngest signer -- that honor belongs to Susan Quinn, age 15 -- but she was the only one who lived long enough to vote in the first presidential election after the ratification of the 19th Amendment guaranteeing women the right to vote.
I am hoping that many more of us get to vote in the first election for Congress that uses proportional representation.
For more information on the First Women Right's Convention, the National Historic Site, and the Declaration of Sentiments, you can start with these web sites: http://www.lclark.edu/~ria/senecafalls.rights.html
http://www.nps.gov/wori/
http://www.nps.gov/wori/declaration.htm
http://www.nps.gov/wori/particip.htm
--Steve Chessin. President, Californians for Proportional Representation.
San Francisco Initiative for March 2002
On July 9th, 2001, the
IRV Charter Amendment passed the San Francisco Board of Supervisors by a 10 - 1
vote. This means it will be on the San Francisco ballot in March of 2002.
The amendment is for Instant Runoff Voting
(IRV) for all city offices -- Mayor, City Attorney and the Board of
Supervisors. If passed, it will save the city millions of dollars, because the
city uses separate runoff elections now. It will also introduce a large number
of voters to the choice ballot, where voters mark their choices 1, 2, 3 etc.
Votes of candidates with the lowest votes are transferred to the voters’ next
choices until a single candidate receives over 50% of the votes.
Local Chapters and Contacts
San Diego County Contact
is Edward Teyssier, 858-546-1774/email at
edward@k-online.com
Southern California
Contact is Casey Peters (213)-385-2786/email at proprep@hotmail.com
Monterey County Contact
is Nat Lerner (831)-442-1238/email at natscottl@yahoo.com
South Bay Chapter
Contact is Jim Stauffer (408)-432-9148 /email at jstauffer@igc.org
San Francisco Chapter
Contact is Betty Traynor (415)-558-8133/email at btraynor@energy-net.org
East Bay Chapter Contact
is David Greene (510)-658-3085/email at dmgreene@igc.org (new email)
Sacramento
County Contact is Pete Martineau (916)-967-0300/email at
petemrtno@aol.com
El Dorado County contact
is Paula Lee (530)-644-8760/email at paulalee@jps.net
North Bay Contact is
Wayne Shepard (707)-5520-5317/email at paldebits@juno.com
Co-Vice-Presidents of
Local Chapters are Jim Stauffer (408)-432-9148 /email at jstauffer@igc.org
and Betty Traynor
(415)-558-8133 /email at btraynor@energy-net.org
Do you want the eNewsletter?
Send your name and e-mail address to membership@fairvoteca.org if you wish to receive this newsletter by e-mail instead of on paper. (This will save us time and cost and you will get your newsletter quicker)
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Voice for Democracy is published by Californians for Proportional
Representation (prior to May 2000 Northern California Citizens for Proportional
Representation). Our web site at http://fairvoteca.org may have more current information. Please submit
articles or letters for publication to: c/o Nat Lerner, Voice for Democracy, 68
Penzance Street, Salinas, CA. 93906-1339 or e-mail to natscottl@yahoo.com
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