Secretary of State Sam Reed, the state’s top election official, agreed to the $10 million budget savings. Gregoire and Reed, instead, will encourage voters to attend political party caucuses – neighborhood meetings where voters can make their presidential preferences known and help write their party’s platform. The caucuses shift costs from state government to the political parties.
No doubt, suspending the primary election will disenfranchise voters. But given the budget crisis facing this state, it’s better to cancel the election than to further rob children of the education they deserve or take away more social services from senior citizens and those living on the margins of society.
The presidential primary was created starting in 1988 when Ross Davis and Joe Murphy of Seattle collected more than 202,000 signatures of registered voters to put the measure before the Legislature. Lawmakers approved Initiative 99 creating the presidential primary on March 31, 1989.
Reed notes that the primary election has been a popular way to engage average citizens, not just the party faithful.
“Both the governor and I appreciate the party precinct caucuses as an opportunity for activists to gather for in-depth discussion of issues and potential party platform planks, and to begin the process of electing national convention delegates,” Reed said. “But it is clear that the primary system, as adopted by a large majority of the states, is an accessible and convenient system that attracts far more voters than our caucuses do, even in a landmark election year like 2008. That year, the primary drew nearly 1.4 million Washingtonians – about 690,000 voting for a Democrat and 530,000 for a Republican – and our caucuses a fraction of that.”
Reed notes – correctly – that the ease of mailing in a ballot is much preferred by voters over the alternative of setting aside a portion of a day to meet with neighbors to debate the strengths and weaknesses of presidential candidates. Many voters find that caucus system intrusive and argumentative and prefer the anonymity of the secret ballot.
But given the budget shortfall of $4.6 billion, state officials must search for ways to save dollars and axing the primary for a single year is a logical choice.
Reed said, “Ordinarily, I would be the last to propose suspending an election, but these are not ordinary times and we all are looking for ways to tighten our belts and live within our means. I look forward to Washington resuming the presidential primary in 2016.”
Perhaps by then, this nation will have a rational and balanced presidential nominating process. That’s not what we have today.
We know that campaigning for the highest office in the land begins a full year or more before the presidential election. Iowa and New Hampshire, the two earliest states, have a disproportional influence in the presidential selection process. Viable candidates regularly abandon their bid for the presidency simply because of poor showings in the Iowa caucuses and New Hampshire primary election.
Tired of getting shut out of the process, other states have jockeyed for position, moving their election or caucus day to January or February in an attempt to lure the candidates to their states and to play a role in the selection process.
The process has gotten out of hand. Party leaders have stripped delegates from states that have tried to push their caucuses and elections ahead of Iowa and New Hampshire.
Why should Iowa and New Hampshire – tiny states that have little in common with Washington and the Northwest – play such pivotal roles in the presidential selection process? It’s not right.
Former Washington Republican Sen. Slade Gorton and Sen. Joseph Lieberman, former Democrat, now independent from Connecticut, teamed up in 1999 to introduce a bill that would create a regional primary system whereby different sections of the country would take turns hosting the first primary election of the presidential election season. It was a national solution to a national problem.
The problem lies with objection by party leaders, the same folks who oppose this state’s open, top-two primary election.
The Gorton/Lieberman proposal in 1999 would have divided the nation into four regions – West, Midwest, South and Northeast – with 12 or 13 states in each region. The four would take turns conducting the first primaries or caucuses in a presidential election year.
That system makes great sense, but party leaders have successfully scuttled the idea.
Suspending Washington’s presidential preference primary is an appropriate response to an immediate budget crisis. But it must be returned in 2016. Meanwhile, the long-term national solution is a regional primary system that is both fair and balanced.
