#3 A More Perfect Union

Ranked-Choice Voting

In Maine’s 2^nddistrict, there was a historic election. Over 50% of the voters wanted Jared Golden, the Democrat, as their representative. 23,433 voters (8.2%) cast ballots for someone else as their first choice, but their candidate did not win so their second choice – Golden – got their votes. This result is exactly what the citizens of Maine intended when they passed a citizen’s initiative to implement ranked-choice voting. 

The loser, Bruce Poliquin, is attempting to overturn the election in the courts. The judge ruled in a preliminary action asking to stop the counting process that “I am not persuaded that the United States Constitution compels the Court to interfere with this most sacred expression of democratic will by enjoining the ballot counting process…”

Some call voting a right. Other insist it’s a privileged. I think the question is mute when we are talking about votes that have already been cast. The judges’ phrase “most sacred expression of democratic will” really works for me. Voting is an expression of the voters “will” and the ranked-choice option gives the voter greater power over the outcome of the election. Bravo! 

Bruce Poliquin has asked the courts to either declare him the winner because he had a plurality in the first round or declare the election void and hold another election. Our local paper reported that “in a written statement” Bruce Poliquin’s campaign talked about “frightened” voters as well as the use of “artificial Intelligence” and “black box” voting systems to decide the outcome of the race. They say the computer algorithm is “secret” and thus not transparent.  

What is funny is I can’t find the written statement. I have Googled it and I have the whole internet at my disposal and no matter what I try, I can’t find the original document. I have looked at the campaign website and the congressional website, but no copy of the statement. I find that odd. 

Maine passed the ranked-choice option in 2016. The state Supreme Court ruled, preliminarily, that because of a specific statement in our constitution using the word “plurality” for the governor’s race, using ranked-choice in that election would probably be ruled unconstitutional. The legislature, in a perfect example of overreach, voided the whole initiative and passed legislation that said if the constitution was not amended by 2021, the law would just…go away. Voters then placed an initiative to REPEAL the legislative action in front of the voters and won in June of 2018.  

Ranked-choice voting has been utilized to elect members of the Australian House of Representatives since the 1919 federal election. That would be before computers, artificial intelligence or black boxes. They had algorithms – an algorithm is “a procedure for solving a mathematical problem in a finite number of steps that frequently involves repetition of an operation”.  It’s pretty simple. Your ballot has boxes to the left of the candidates’ names. You are to “rank” the candidates. 1) is the person you want to represent you. 2) would be your next choice if 1) does not reach 51%. 3) 4) 5) and so on would be your other choices in order of preference. The candidates with the lowest number of votes are eliminated and the second-choice votes are allocated. This continues until one candidate reaches 51%. It’s simple arithmetic. 

In the 2^nddistrict election, the voters used their sacred expression of democratic will – and simple arithmetic – to elect the true representative of that district. 

In order to “secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity”, the election of representatives that truly reflect the majority of the electorate is essential. Any action to restrict a citizens’ democratic will is an affront to the Founding Fathers and the entire spirit of the republic. Now that Democrats have won a number of seats in Congress and overturned a number of governorships, our next goal will be extending the franchise to voters who are being suppressed by legislative actions that are contrary to logic and common practice. We must take the process of redistricting away from representatives who would use their power to subvert and undermine the elective process through gerrymandering and put that power in the hands of a non-partisan commission. We must fight the administrations’ action to subvert the 2020 census with a citizenship question that will cause people who are living here from not being counted. And we must continue the work of registering citizens and getting them to the polls. 

The 2020 election is more than just a presidential year. It will also put in place the people who will reapportion the electorate based on the 2020 census. 

In many ways, that is far more important than who is elected president.