Ballot Measures

[Actaeon]

A brief survey of the internet found my no answer to what's probably not a terribly bright question: why are their no federal level ballot measures in the United States? Could we not handle it? Is there no precedence? Is the legislature just so good at it's job that we don't need anything of the sort?

 

You all seem politically savvy. What am I missing?

[Randomizer]

The Congress when it was set up assume that ordinary citizens were not able to decide such measures and retain the power to themselves.

 

From what I've seen in my own state, Arizona, the government tries to circumvent ballot initiatives. Just because it passed doesn't mean they can't find a way around enforcing it. Which is why I always vote down their pay raises.

[Jerakeen]

From what I've observed, the US legislature is terrible at its job. But looking at the sort of initiatives that get passed in the states, it seems that letting the voting population legislate is even worse. At least, if you care about the rights of minority groups.

[Dantius]

I'm sure that this got touched on somewhere in the Federalist Papers, but I'm too lazy to look it up. It was probably Hamilton saying something about how people have a tendency to passion and irrationality and faction because they suck, or something.

 

Just thinking about it, I'm pretty sure that the reason has something to do with the delegation of powers "not expressly given to Congress" to either the States or the People. Since making (federal) laws is pretty expressly delegated to the Congress, that power is not only not delegated, but any attempts to delegate it would require an amendment to the Constitution. Fortunatly, I'll give Congress some credit in that nobody there is stupid enough to try and let government be dictated by the rapidly changing whims of anybody able to punch a hole in a ballot.

 

The reasons that States can do it is because states can rewrite their constitutions every few decades to deal with changing circumstances, so it was probably just edited in when some people started getting antsy about it.

[Kelandon]

Direct democracy was a big movement towards the end of the 19th century and into the beginning of the 20th. That's when most of the states who have initiative and referendum systems passed them. It was associated with the Progressives of the time, which I think explains why it never succeeded nationwide. Not everybody was infatuated with the Progressive agenda, and a constitutional amendment takes supermajorities that a national direct democracy system could not have garnered. As far as I know, among the Progressive Amendments (16th-19th), no one tried to include a direct democracy amendment, though the 17th was sort of in that direction.

 

In the Founding era, I don't think anybody thought that New England town halls could be scaled up in that fashion — the meeting of representatives was the closest thing they could manage — but I don't know the details of any discussion they might've had about it.

[Student of Trinity]

Direct democracy is really badly subject to the so-called 'discursive dilemma'. The problem is that you can easily get majorities for several different measures — a different set of people composing the majority for each of the measures — such that the set of all the measures together is an idiotic mess.

 

For instance, a ballot measure is proposed, to raise taxes; voted down, of course. Another measure is offered, to borrow more money; voted down, again. A third measure is floated, to increase services. This one is approved. But not because voters are stupid. The problem is with direct democracy itself.

 

No individual voters are being inconsistent. A third of the people want to borrow money and increase services without raising taxes, a third want to raise taxes and increase services without raising the debt, and a third want to cut services to avoid raising debt or tax. Everyone has responsible views, and everyone votes for them honestly, exercising their democratic rights as responsible citizens. But the collective public policy that results is irresponsible to the point of being utterly nonsensical.

 

That's why representatives are important. And since exactly the same kinds of problems can also occur in legislatures, it's why parties are important, too. And since the discursive dilemma can still occur in shifting coalitions in badly divided legislatures, it's why few-party systems are important. When there are effectively only two or three voters, namely the major parties, then any policy that does get enacted is more likely to at least be consistent.

[Aoslare]

That is definitely true, but voter initiatives have taken on a new level of stupidity in the U.S. recently. Well, I suppose there are always stupid ones put on the ballot, but there are some awfully crazy ones that receive majorities.

[Kelandon]

Certainly it is true that direct democracy can take reasonable views and turn them into stupid outcomes. Now, it's staggering what it can do to unreasonable views.

[Dintiradan]

Could this outsider get a clarification on what is meant by "ballot measure"? Does it mean a specially issued ballot (think the Quebec sovereignty referendums) or does it mean questions tacked onto another scheduled ballot (think the Californian propositions in the last presidential election). A quick Google search suggests that the answer might vary from state to state.

 

Sorry to ask, but my opinions hinge on the difference (mostly due to selection bias). I've got a half-raised eyebrow on standby if the above comments refer to the latter scenario.

 

EDIT: Heh, who remembers the

?

[Aoslare]

I believe it almost always refers to California-style propositions, tacked on to already scheduled ballots.

[Kelandon]

Originally Posted By: Dintiradan

Sorry to ask, but my opinions hinge on the difference (mostly due to selection bias). I've got a half-raised eyebrow on standby if the above comments refer to the latter scenario.

Really? I take them as equally bad. Voter turnout at presidential elections tends to hang out around 50-60%, and at anything else around 30-40%, so if it's a separate ballot, a ridiculously small percentage of the population actually votes on it. On the other hand, if it's tagged onto an existing ballot, the ballot extends to some 30 or 40 items most of the time, and you get probably an even smaller percentage getting that far and voting on it.

And that's just considering who actually votes; there's an information problem, and a signature-gathering/advertising/money problem, and....

[Alorael at Large]

And just looking at the ballot, it's remarkably difficult to even figure out what you're voting on, let alone what the repercussions are.

 

—Alorael, who can only see tossing ballot measures into federal politics as a disaster. Either measures not liked by the legislators would get buried, as legislators do even to other legislators' legislation, or they'd turn into another way to leverage relatively high indignant turnout into another way to either crush the minority party or overrule the majority party.

[Aoslare]

'Tam identified “the internet” as the source of information...'

[Actaeon]

Originally Posted By: Kelandon

Voter turnout at presidential elections tends to hang out around 50-60%, and at anything else around 30-40%, so if it's a separate ballot, a ridiculously small percentage of the population actually votes on it...

And that's just considering who actually votes; there's an information problem, and a signature-gathering/advertising/money problem, and....

That's a depressing, if accurate, outlook. I certainly hope that everyone out protesting at least bothered to vote. Doing so gives you a greater right to complain, I think. Myself, I'd like more to vote on, and don't entirely understand why it's usually considered so burdensome. Most likely, that's a function of youth that will wear off in time.

[Kelandon]

Originally Posted By: Actaeon

Myself, I'd like more to vote on, and don't entirely understand why it's usually considered so burdensome. Most likely, that's a function of youth that will wear off in time.

See Alo's point above. I'm asked to vote on things about which even Google knows nothing. I can search candidates and issues and not get any useful information on some of the local initiatives, etc. Regularly (every couple of elections or so), we get asked to vote on two different propositions that are both highly technical and only minutely different, and that would require hours of research just to understand, not to speak of having an opinion on. Most people just don't have the time for this. That's why we elected representatives in the first place, so we wouldn't have to become experts on every last detail of policy, just to know the general sweeps and most important points.

[Alorael at Large]

I like voting when I know what I'm voting on. I don't like trying to figure out what's in front of me on the ballot. Sometimes organizations or major parties do a good job of saying which way they want you to vote, which can help, but even they tend to simplify. "Yes is good! No is bad!" doesn't really tell me if this is a case in which I disagree with the party whose candidates I support.

 

—Alorael, who suspects that most political protesters do vote. But most people aren't protesters, and if a tiny minority are better at drumming up votes they can overrule the passive majority. That's technically a success of democracy, but that's not really a desirable outcome.

[Aoslare]

Originally Posted By: Actaeon

I certainly hope that everyone out protesting at least bothered to vote. Doing so gives you a greater right to complain, I think.

WHY?

This is one of my pet peeves. Voting, and protesting, are both ways to participate in the political process. And they are both safeguards against tyranny, as well. However, they do not work in exactly the same way and there are times that one may be more effective than the other. I can think of few things that violate the essential value of freedom of speech more egregiously than suggesting meaningless prerequisites for voicing one's opinion, particularly when the justification is some banal idea that things must be done a certain way just because.

Suppose I suggested that people who have attended protests or rallies have a greater right to vote. Do you see the ridiculousness here?

[Student of Trinity]

I dunno. Protests often inconvenience other people. I concede that I owe it to the community to put up with a little inconvenience now and then, to stave off tyranny. But I'd be happier in putting up with inconvenience occasioned by protesters, if I felt that the protesters had first done all they could to remedy the situation in ways that didn't inconvenience me.

[Aoslare]

1) Meaningful protests (the ones we put up with lame protests in order to protect) generally inconvenience people orders of magnitude of orders of magnitude less (repetition intentional) than the things being protested.

 

2) If voting had a reasonable chance of accomplishing anything intended by the protests, I might agree with you. That is rarely the case. Things that can be accomplished by voting do not generate protests simply because if enough people want them to happen, they will usually vote for people who will make them happen. Here are a few examples of things that voting can't address:

 

- Civil rights protests, whether the big ones led by MLK, or women's rights protests in the 1800's, or gay rights protests in the 90's. In all three cases, there were very few congressional candidates and zero presidential candidates with any shred of a chance of winning who would enact meaningful civil rights reforms for the issues at hand, on their own.

 

- The current "Occupy Wall Street" protests. Whether or not you agree with the protesters, I think it is clear that our political system and our economic system are linked in complex and self-supporting ways, and that none of the dominant political parties, who have an effective monopoly on political power, are seriously interested in reform. Therefore, voting is not a viable remedy.

 

- Protests over constitutional matters that (unless an amendment shows up) are decided by the courts. For example, protests for or against Roe v. Wade. Voting cannot affect the Supreme Court, except in incredibly indirect ways. Protests will not affect their verdict either, but why should not voting have stopped me from protesting Plessy v. Ferguson or Dred Scott v. Sandford?

[keira]

Originally Posted By: Epiphany Without Borders

I like voting when I know what I'm voting on. I don't like trying to figure out what's in front of me on the ballot.

Around here, the (State? County?) has a little booklet that lists all the measures and candidates on the ballot, and what the sides are. Not sure if it's just a local thing or not, but I would assume it's broader since hickville JeffCo, Montana probably wouldn't come up with that.

I'm given to understand they give them to you when you register and put them in public buildings and whatnot.

[Harehunter]

Originally Posted By: HOUSE of S

Originally Posted By: Actaeon

I certainly hope that everyone out protesting at least bothered to vote. Doing so gives you a greater right to complain, I think.

WHY?

This is one of my pet peeves. Voting, and protesting, are both ways to participate in the political process. And they are both safeguards against tyranny, as well. However, they do not work in exactly the same way and there are times that one may be more effective than the other. I can think of few things that violate the essential value of freedom of speech more egregiously than suggesting meaningless prerequisites for voicing one's opinion, particularly when the justification is some banal idea that things must be done a certain way just because.

Suppose I suggested that people who have attended protests or rallies have a greater right to vote. Do you see the ridiculousness here?

I have to agree with you on this one. This country does not have pre-requisites to the right of free speech; not military service, not land ownership, not actually serving on a jury (we have to appear when summoned, but there are many formulas that can be used to virtually guarantee you won't be picked), and not voting. The right to protest is protected by the 1st amendment, unconditionally.

[Actaeon]

Originally Posted By: Kelantron

Around here, the (State? County?) has a little booklet that lists all the measures and candidates on the ballot, and what the sides are. Not sure if it's just a local thing or not, but I would assume it's broader since hickville JeffCo, Montana probably wouldn't come up with that.

There's Ballotopedia for that. It leans libertarian, if anything, but seems generally to give good coverage. Otherwise, I'd say it's the job of the media to provide information for the system to work, but of course that's not happening.