Humpty Dumpty Elections

We don’t do this in general elections for a reason. Some mistakes can’t be undone. In the 2000 presidential election most media outlets declared a winner in Florida with polls still open in panhandle counties. They were wrong, heaven knows how many panhandle voters stayed home thinking their votes wouldn’t count, and the country was thrown into a constitutional crisis. Nobody suggested reopening the affected polls. A vote is a vote, even a decision not to cast one. Now people are suggesting new primaries in Florida and Michigan because of the Democratic National Committee’s blunder in disenfranchising those voters in a dispute over election dates. It’s too late. The votes have been cast. Candidates made their beds when they decided whether to campaign or not. It may turn out to be the best thing that has happened to our nominating process in the past half century. If the party begins its convention with neither candidate having enough committed delegates to win on the first ballot they could begin the rough and tumble of negotiation and compromise that representative democracy is supposed to be all about. It would be the first time since most of us can remember that every state in the union got its fair say. It wouldn’t be pretty. It never was, but it served us well for most of our history. It’s how presidents from Abraham Lincoln to Dwight Eisenhower won their party’s nominations. The system we’ve been using in recent decades can hardly be described as democratic. This is the first time Texas and most other states have had any say in either party’s choice of nominees since the 1960s when we adopted this system of staggered state primaries. It’s no way to run a democracy. The only way to do this fairly is with a single national primary date. There is no other way to ensure every vote counts. With any luck multiple candidates will win enough delegates to either force a runoff or send it to the convention depending on party choice. My preference would be the latter. We can send a delegation to represent our interests, just like we send one to congress. If our first choice is also the front runner after the first ballot they can try to convince other delegations to switch. If not they will be in a strong negotiating position. More than one favorite son has used influence for a state’s benefit. We haven’t had a dark horse since Wendell Willkie lost to Franklin Roosevelt in 1940 but at least four became president, including Lincoln. I’m dating myself by even using those terms in this context but there is nothing undemocratic about either one. It’s how representative democracy works, and among the reasons reason why it works. Direct popular election isn’t always the best solution. Sometimes it malfunctions. I would submit that our current system is not one of popular election. Nor does it necessarily have to be. We don’t elect our congressional leadership directly. We don’t elect federal judges at all. I don’t think we ought to be electing state judges. It’s too late to salvage this year’s process but maybe the mess democrats have made for themselves has a silver lining. Maybe we will finally reconsider a really bad idea after all these years. You can’t blame Florida or Michigan for wanting a voice. We can question how the nation’s interest is best served by having the same handful of states make the critical decision every four years, leaving the rest of us to pick from the only two options they leave us. We can certainly argue that it’s not in Texas’ best interest. When our delegations get to their respective conventions we should expect them to say so, loudly and clearly. If they don’t we ought to remember that in the next party caucus.