[LWVNM Action] Scholars Ask Congress to Scrap Winner-Take-All Political System

Tue Sep 20 13:56:51 MDT 2022

On National Voter Registration Day and on many other days throughout the year, League members across the country are registering new votes, encouraging people to vote, compiling voter guides, conducting candidate forums, fighting voter suppression, protecting fair and accessible elections, and pushing for people power to overcome  corporate influence. 

https://www.lwv.org/elections has more info. 

Lots of places are seeing the benefits of ranked choice voting and other alternative systems in developing more shared leadership and ownership of community problem solving Many potentially great leaders would never run for office because politics today is a win-lose blood sport. We don't need more bloody battlefields filled with losers who then give up on government service.

It is time to end the toxic duopoly and reform the broken system. 

Meredith Machen
505 577 6337
mermachen at cybermesa.com
meredith.machen at gmail.com

-----Original Message-----
From: Action [mailto:action-bounces at mailman.swcp.com] On Behalf Of Akkana Peck via Action
Sent: Tuesday, September 20, 2022 12:31 PM
To: action at mailman.swcp.com
Cc: Akkana Peck
Subject: Re: [LWVNM Action] Scholars Ask Congress to Scrap Winner-Take-All Political System

In case anyone wants the details, Impact on Issues (the national
League's position document) is at
https://www.lwv.org/sites/default/files/2020-12/LWV-impact-2020.pdf
(linked from the beginning of the Positions page on lwvnm.org)
and I found the relevant position on pp. 47-48:

    Whether for single or multiple winner contests, the League supports electoral methods that:
    • Encourage voter participation and voter engagement
    • Encourage those with minority opinions to participate, including under-represented
    communities
    • Are verifiable and auditable
    • Promote access to voting
    • Maximize effective votes/minimize wasted votes
    • Promote sincere voting over strategic voting
    48
    • Implement alternatives to plurality voting
    • Are compatible with acceptable ballot-casting methods, including vote-by-mail

    The LWVUS believes in representative government. The League supports electoral systems that elect policy-making bodies–-legislatures, councils, commissions, and boards—that proportionally reflect the people they represent. We support systems that inhibit political manipulation (e.g., gerrymandering). The LWVUS supports enabling legislation to allow local jurisdictions to explore alternative electoral methods, as well as supporting state election laws allowing for more options at both the state and local levels. With the adoption of any electoral system, the League believes that education of the voting public is important and funding for startup and voter education should be available. We encourage a concerted voter education process.

        ...Akkana

Barbara Calef via Action writes:
> LWVNM has not discussed it.  It's okay with LWVUS.  See Impact on Issues.
> 
> Barbara
> 
> On Tue, Sep 20, 2022 at 10:26 AM Jeanne Logsdon <jlogsdon at unm.edu> wrote:
> 
> > Do we know whether the LWV will support the idea?
> >
> >
> >
> > Jeanne
> >
> >
> >
> > *From:* Action <action-bounces at mailman.swcp.com> *On Behalf Of *Barbara
> > Calef via Action
> > *Sent:* Tuesday, September 20, 2022 10:02 AM
> > *To:* Kathleen Burke <kathleenmariaburke at yahoo.com>; LWVNM Action <
> > action at mailman.swcp.com>
> > *Cc:* Barbara Calef <bfcalef at gmail.com>
> > *Subject:* Re: [LWVNM Action] Scholars Ask Congress to Scrap
> > Winner-Take-All Political System
> >
> >
> >
> > *  [EXTERNAL]*
> >
> > This was Lonna Atkeson's recommendation (and Kathy Campbell's as well).
> >
> >
> >
> > Barbara
> >
> >
> >
> > On Tue, Sep 20, 2022 at 9:57 AM Kathleen Burke via Action <
> > action at mailman.swcp.com> wrote:
> >
> > Excerpted from the New York Times, here below from the Election Law Blog:
> >
> >
> > “Scholars Ask Congress to Scrap Winner-Take-All Political System”
> >
> > September 20, 2022, 7:53 amalternative voting systemsRICK HASEN
> >
> > New York Times:
> >
> > If there’s one thing we know about America’s creaking democracy, it’s
> > this: Whenever it seems fundamentally broken, people get together to try to
> > fix it.
> >
> > That’s happening now. We’re living through one of the United States’
> > periodic bursts of reformist energy, with various groups pushing to alter
> > the structure of our elections even as — or rather because — millions of
> > voters on both sides of our partisan divide question the integrity of the
> > system.
> >
> > The latest entry is a roster of more than 200 American political
> > scientists who have put forward a sweeping proposal to change the way the
> > United States has conducted its federal elections for nearly 250 years.
> >
> > In a sharply written open letter to Congress
> > <https://medium.com/@scholars-redistricting-reform/open-letter-to-congress-to-end-single-member-congressional-districts-and-adopt-proportional-97ad1cf6aa2e> published
> > on Monday and shared in advance with The New York Times, the scholars tell
> > lawmakers, “It is clear that our winner-take-all system — where each U.S.
> > House district is represented by a single person — is fundamentally
> > broken.” They call on Congress to “adopt inclusive, multimember districts
> > with competitive and responsive proportional representation.”
> >
> > The list of signatories includes nine of the 18 living U.S.-based winners
> > of the Johan Skytte Prize, a prestigious Swedish award that has become a
> > kind of unofficial Nobel for political science: Robert Axelrod, Francis
> > Fukuyama, Peter J. Katzenstein, Robert Keohane, David D. Laitin, Margaret
> > Levi, Arend Lijphart, Philippe C. Schmitter and Rein Taagepera.
> >
> > “Our arcane, single-member districting process divides, polarizes and
> > isolates us from each other,” the professors write. “It has effectively
> > extinguished competitive elections for most Americans, and produced a
> > deeply divided political system that is incapable of responding to changing
> > demands and emerging challenges with necessary legitimacy.”
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> > *Kathleen M. Burke*
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> > _______________________________________________
> > Action mailing list
> > Action at mailman.swcp.com
> > https://mailman.swcp.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/action
> >
> >

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