Hopefully they voted Yes on Question 2 in Massachusetts. Voting Yes would establish Ranked Choice Voting in the state for primary and general elections. According to the Massachusetts Information For Voters pamphlet, “A Yes vote would create a system of ranked choice voting in which voters would have the option to rank candidates in order of preference.” On their ballot voters would rank their preference for each candidate. Every candidate would receive the first place votes. If the no candidate crossed the 50% +1 threshold to win the election, the candidate with the least votes would be eliminated. The votes of the eliminated candidate would be distributed to the other candidates based on how voters had marked their ballots. Here's a simple example with three candidates and forty voters.
Candidate A received 16 first place votes. Candidate B received 13 first place votes. Candidate C received 11 votes. Because no candidate reached the threshold of 21 votes to win, Candidate C is eliminated, because they had the least votes. Then the election overseers inspect the ballots that had candidate C as the first choice. Voters who marked their second choice would have their vote redistributed. Examining the ballots, the election committee determines that 2 people chose Candidate A as their second choice, 8 chose B, and 1 didn't fill in a second choice. The final tally stands at 21 for B and 17 for A out of 39 ballots.
“Wait,” you're saying, “that isn't fair! Candidate A had more first place votes than B. They should be the victor.” But Candidate A didn't have the majority support of the community. B may not be the favorite choice of the State, but at least half of voters think B is a better candidate than A. Some critics of ranked choice voting think this outcome is unreasonable. But they accept the general concept when candidates proceed to a runoff election. A runoff election is required when no candidate among a collection of three or more earn 50% + 1 on the first round. Election overseers eliminate everyone but the top two. Then they plan a runoff election within in the next two to six months. This is a common procedure such as Senate Elections (Georgia is likely to have at least one, and possibly two runoff elections for Senate). In a runoff voters occasionally choose reenact the scenario described above, awarding the position to the Candidate who placed second in the first round. They win because the voters of the eliminated candidate(s) prefer Candidate B over A. Ranked Choice Voting skips the need for a Runoff Election and the two additional months of campaigning (along with the work done by the election committee). That's why Ranked Choice Voting is also called Instant Runoff Voting, because the Runoff Election, instead of being held months away at additional cost, is instant, using the rankings chosen by the voters on their ballot.
Simon Waxman argues that Instant Runoff Voting is wrong, because the person who received the second most first place votes could win, but he also says that Ranked Choice Voting isn't significant because this underdog victory only happens 10% of the time. So which is it? Is Ranked Choice Voting unfair because it massively upends the system, or is it pointless because it doesn't do it often enough? To my mind, 10% is a good rate of change. One would hope that normally the person with the most first place votes would win, but there should be occasions where a coalition forms and helps the second, or even third place candidate triumph in the end.
The same critics of Ranked Choice Voting, or Instant Runoff Voting, don't care about the increasingly absurd Presidential Election. Citizens who are fed up with the political machines of the Democrats and Republicans are told that a vote for a third party candidate is throwing away their vote. They are told their opinion doesn't matter. They are sneered at, slandered, and scorned. For voting the change they wanted to happen. What's more despicable, allowing voters to rank their choices, or mocking those who don't want to vote the corporate line?
I've had the opportunity to vote in four general elections. I didn't vote in 2008 because I correctly believed Obama's message of Hope and Change was political messaging more than governing policy. In 2012 I was naively persuaded to vote for Obama, because the media said “That this is the most important election ever!” In 2016 I realized I lived in a state that last voted for a Republican in 1984, before I was born. Nate Silver's 538 2020 prediction has the state at a X > 99% for Joe Biden, making it the fourth most Democratic leaning state. If Massachusetts flips to Trump the whole country would already be deluged in an ocean of red. So in 2016 I voted for the Green Party and repeated the procedure this year. Anyone living in a safe blue state (DC, VT, HI, MA, MD, NY, CA, RI,DE, WA, CT, NJ, OR, or IL) who feels distraught at the nomination of Joe Biden should vote third party to demonstrate their discontent, because, damn, the Establishment of the Democratic Party (which isn't you, because you aren't benefiting from all the elaborate parties, campaign contributions, and don't wield the levers of power), is going to crow that Biden won by moving to the right. They're going to let Republicans into Biden's cabinet and sit right there, sucking the donations of Silicon Valley, Wall Street, and Medical Insurance companies, saying, “We had to do it to beat Donald Trump, but we can't solve economic inequality, racial inequality, or environmental destruction, because those are unpopular with our donors” (Not an actual quote).
Don't be convinced that you should vote for Biden to run up the score. The popular vote doesn't matter, as two of the last five Presidential Elections, and six of the nine nine Supreme Court justices can attest to. Nate Silver estimated that Biden still has a 25% chance of losing the election even if he wins the national popular vote by 4%! Every disgruntled voter voting blue in solid Democratic states aren't doing anything to change the outcome.
Across the United States, Ranked Choice Voting has been used for a long time, mostly in local elections (like Cambridge, MA which has used RCV since 1941 to elect City Councilors and School Committee members), but is gaining traction in recent years. It was used in five Democratic primaries in 2020. A Candidate had to receive at least 15% of the vote, otherwise they would be eliminated and their votes distributed to second choices. Maine will be the first state to use Instant Runoff Voting for the Presidential Election. After it voters passed the RCV in a 2016 ballot measure, they had to overturn the state legislature's repeal in 2018. Entrenched politicians, Republican and Democrat are afraid of Ranked Choice Voting.
A lawsuit by four Mainers indicates the true absurdity of the anti-RCV position. They claim, “[They] will soon be denied full participation in the 2020 general election,” because some ballots are eliminated after the first round. First, no ballots are eliminated. Only the lowest candidate is eliminated. As long as voters completely fill in their ballot they are never eliminated. But no one is required to vote for more than one candidate on the ballot. People who wish may continue to vote for only one candidate. In the Boston Globe Jeff Jacoby opposed Ranked Choice Voting, saying it was unfair to people who didn't mark more than one or two choices. What's unfair about that? They made their unchoice for themselves. That's like saying elections are unfair to people who choose not to vote. Jeff Jacoby, a conservative, also opposes early voting and allowing D.C. Residents their own Congressional Representation. He and I both plan to vote for a third party candidate. Only I want everyone's vote to matter, and he wants to wait until he can vote for a more palatable Republican, like war hero George W. Bush. Yeah, you should listen to this guy!
I'm not naive, well I am, but that's a different issue. I'm clear eyed about Ranked Choice Voting. It won't cure all of society's ills. It's not a top ten issue, but that doesn't mean it should be implemented. The main argument for it is it weakens, slightly, the power of the two major parties. The corporate parties take voters for granted, and use their immense power to feed themselves on corruption. It's easier when there is no viable competition. The Commission on Presidential Debates, a committee stuffed with a bi-partisan mixture of Democrats and Republicans, mandated that only a candidate which received 15% in national polling could join the national debate stage. To receive public funding, a third party has to receive 5% of the popular vote in the previous election. It's a circular problem. Without the publicity of a debate, and the public funding, third parties can't garner enough attention to be on the debate stage or receive public funding.
We need campaign finance laws and shorter elections. We need the Supreme Court to stop protecting corrupt officials. RCV isn't going to solve any of these on its own. Nor are they on the ballot, because if they were I'd be running all over the state screaming as loud as possible, and Jeff Jacoby would be writing in The Globe opposing them. Instant Runoff Voting is like the eye exam at the eye doctors, or the reflex tests where the doctor at a regular exam hits your knee to see if it will jump up (Do they still even do that?). Neither will find that colon cancer you've got, or cure your heart disease, but on the rare occasion they'll discover an otherwise unexpected problem.
So join me in applying a minor bandage to a gaping wound, because it's the best we can do.
Vote Yes on Question 2 in Massachusetts.
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