This coming Tuesday, November 8, is an election day in almost all the states (I think one or two may not have an annual election cycle). In a few states, Kentucky and Mississippi, Governors are elected and in a few others there are also state legislative elections (NJ and VA). In Pennsylvania there are statewide judicial elections and in Ohio and some states there are statewide referendums on the ballot. (Ohio voters will pass judgment on the right wing Republican effort to curtail public employees’ collective bargaining rights; and Mississippi voters will act on a “personhood” amendment which is a backdoor way to repeal Roe v Wade.)
In most states this election cycle is local - in Pennsylvania county and municipal officials are elected. Not all municipal officials; only about half because the other half are elected in the odd year after the Presidential election thus creating a four year cycle of elections and primaries. Eight elections in four years evidently weary the American electorate. The media both print and video pays little attention to local elections. The PA media pays more attention to the allegations against Herman Cain than to the state candidates. And the citizens pay even less attention than the media.
Americans have fought wars to establish their right to vote and govern themselves but those wars were 235 and 150 years ago; they no longer resonate with people as more than history. In the nations of Africa and Asia, where independence from colonial rulers occurred in the last fifty years, we witness incredible percentages of people voting whenever they are allowed to whether in national elections or local elections. There seems to be a correlation between voting and the proximity to when you weren’t allowed to vote.
Elections have consequences. The 2010 national and state elections ushered in a right wing crew of elected officials determined to impose their conservative moral values on everyone and undo decades of progressive legislation. In addition in many states there have been legislative attempts to retain right wing power by suppressing the vote and reducing the size of the electorate; making registration more difficult, abolishing early voting and using nonexistent voter fraud to justify photo id laws that will reduce the likelihood that poor people, students and elderly folks will vote.
There was for many years a bipartisan belief that voting was a good thing and that the more people took an interest and voted the stronger the democracy would be. Al Smith, a conservative Democrat coined the phrase “the only cure for the ills of democracy is more democracy”. Now election laws and reapportionment of legislative districts (in the name of equality of representation) are being manipulated to reduce democratic participation. It is not enough that our system of government is being sold to the highest bidders, and that Congress is becoming a millionaires club, but to ensure that the oligarchy continues to rein their minions seek to hamper and harass those who would vote for change.
In Pennsylvania’s Delaware County, where I reside, each of the forty-nine municipalities is electing their local legislative officials: boroughs have council members and townships have commissioners (except for two townships that have council members). Over half those positions are uncontested with only one party presenting candidates. The local school districts are also involved in the Nov. 8 election again with over half the seats uncontested also due to a PA law that allows candidates for school director to run and win both primaries thus effectively being unopposed in the general election. The county commissioner races, in my county called County Council, are contested by the two parties but almost all the counties are really one party strongholds (some Democratic and some Republican) and the contests are really just the minority party “showing the flag” (in most counties there is a guaranteed minority party winner). Little wonder that few people pay attention and vote since studies show that even at the national level where our turnout is among the lowest of industrialized democratic nations the levels increase when the election is between two parties or two candidates of clearly differing positions on issues.
I live in the borough of Folcroft where the Republican council has passed a local income tax and put the borough taxpayers 3/4 of a million dollars in debt. Will that be enough to get more than 1/3 of the voters to even come to the polls? My school district, Southeast Delco, has seen program cutbacks, property tax increases and some poor performance by some schools. Will that be enough to get voters to the polls?
Elections have consequences. Failure to pay attention to local campaigns and candidates and staying home on election day puts the result in the hands of a small minority of people - often those most influenced by political party organizations and/or special interest groups. Everyone pays taxes and lives under municipal ordinances not just those who vote.
Exercising rights is also how we retain rights. If more and more citizens forgo the right to vote they may find someday that they have lost that right under mountains of laws and procedures that make voting near impossible. Maybe someday only the 1% that own the country will be voting and the 99% will not only be economically disenfranchised but electorally as well.
5 Nov. 2011
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