The voters of California, in their wisdom anger, have turned down the ‘Budget Stabilization‘ measure, giving it barely over one third of the vote. The other measures failed by similar wide margins. Except for the stupid one, which of course passed, with nearly three fourths of the vote.
Now what?
The F-word* has been tossed around a lot at faculty discussions.
I suppose we are about to see what emergency powers the Governator has, because an emergency is what the state faces.
One final note: When my wife and I went to vote, about an hour before polls closed, a poll worker actually was excited to see us. He said to his colleagues, actual voters!
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* Furloughs.
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The maps are nice but I found it a bit difficult to find information about the turn-out. But I recall voting in the Swedish EP election in 1999 in a district where only 35% of the voters bothered to cast their vote (and it should be added that Sweden also has an extensive system for postal voting so many votes have been cast in advance, so there wasn’t too much to do for the officers that Sunday)
Seed planted by Jacob Christensen — 20 May 2009 @ 18:13
Evidently, pollworkers around the state felt the same way as ours did on the rare occasions that an actual voter showed up: Preliminary estimates of turnout suggest it was 23% of registered voters. And, yes, that’s a record low (for a special election; it is not whether it has been lower for some other type, such as perhaps a statewide primary where there was no high-profile competition).
Seed planted by MSS — 20 May 2009 @ 21:19
The preliminary turnout numbers available today include vote-by-mail ballots received before election day, but do not include vote-by-mail ballots received at polling places on election day, nor provisional ballots. In the precinct where I was a poll worker, these will add five percent to the preliminary reported turnout of 25%.
We had a running joke going much of the day. One of us would step outside to enjoy a couple minutes of sunshine, and soon a voter would turn up. A while later, after a period of inactivity (during which I read a little bit of Alan Ware’s The American Direct Primary), someone would say to our magnet poll worker, “You need to go outside again, we don’t have any voters.” She would go outside. Eventually a voter would show up. Post hoc ergo propter hoc.
Seed planted by Bob Richard — 20 May 2009 @ 22:54
Reading about California makes me feel better about the recent B.C. referendum on electoral reform - sorry.
Seed planted by Declan — 21 May 2009 @ 03:11
Matthew, how did you voted? Even if these props did pass, there is still a budget defect albeit not as bad. Going from 22 billion dollar defect to 15 billion dollar deficit is not much of an improvement. If it was 22 billion down to 2 billion, then I would say yes. I would have vote yes on them if these props would have balanced the budget.
Besides it’s too little and too late, and a state wide constitutional convention should be called to fix these ungovernable problems. The two-thirds majority to pass budgets and increase taxes should be scraped and changes to simple majority. There is no two-thirds majority to decrease taxes which is bizzare.
Even though I am oppose to higher taxes, but I believe that the government should enact budgets efficiently, the Republicans are exercising power without responsibility and at the same time the Democrats could win a 2/3rds majority in the state legislature in 2010 and be irrelevant.
There are lots of states in the U.S if there was a two-thirds majority to increases taxes and pass the budget, it wouldn’t do any good because one party has more than a two-thirds majority.
I voted the way everyone else did. I voted no on all of them except the last one.
Do all your faculty members agree with one another that these propositions should have passed?
Should there be a minimum quorum of register voters in order for a proposition to be valid? What percentage should it be set at? I would think at least a minimum of 1/3rd of registered voters voting in a proposition to pass.
If there was this quorum, then none of the propositions would have passed.
Seed planted by Suaprazzodi — 21 May 2009 @ 04:33
Now what? Support for a state constitutional convention will grow, possible by enough to make it happen. The main target is the two-thirds requirement to pass budgets and taxes. That issue creates an opportunity to talk about PR because the two-thirds requirement is defended as providing protection for the minority. PR is the right way to do that, super-majority vote requirements the wrong way.
Having a quorum for initiatives and referenda would have the effect of allowing people to vote No by staying home. They wouldn’t even have to trudge down to the polling place, or put a stamp on an envelope. Talk about loading the dice!
Seed planted by Bob Richard — 21 May 2009 @ 10:51
I wonder if they’d want comments from an Australian… S’pose I could either claim locus standi, on the basis that any trend that originates in the Golden State hits Australia a decade later (quaere though whether this raises ripeness concerns), or in the alternative, offer an amicus curiae brief, on the basis that Australians can offer observations on the actual workings of PR, parliamentary executive, etc, on basis somewhat more recent than either the hysterics of FA Hermens or the euphoria of Woodrow Wilson.
Quorums in referenda… Not usually an issue in Aust, given compulsory voting, but since 5-10% either dodge the fine or cast a spoiled/ blank ballot, it could make a difference. The only two egs I know of Dowunda are (a) NSW’s Parliament set an absolute quorum of 80,000 yes votes to approve Federation in the 1890s, and (b) the ACT’s Self-Govt Act requires 50% of all enrolled voters (or else 2/3 of the ACT Assembly) to change “entrenched” matters (including STV). My ACT PRSA contacts tell me that 50% of all voters would in practice mean around 55% of valid votes actually cast.
I would prefer voting in referenda to be voluntary, but with a moderate quorum (25 to 40% - I’d pick 33.3%) so that at least when a referendum is lost because many people don’t know and don’t care, this shows up as “31% yes, 28% no, 41% apathetic” rather than as “69% of all citizens reject the very idea of [equal electorates, a republic, 4-year terms, constl recog of local govt, etc] for all time, so it is lese-majeste against The People even to suggest putting a revised version to a future vote”, which is how lost referenda tend to be construed in Australia.
Some experience from two student unions… At Univ of Qld, the Con & Regs prescribed a ballot form with YES, NO and ABSTAIN squares, but also said a referendum needed 50% of “all members voting on the question” (and 5% of all students) to pass. One result, from memory, was about 1800 yes, 1700 NO and 300 ABSTAIN. This led to much dispute over whether it had met the criteria to pass, and whether ticking ABSTAIN was voting.
On the other hand, Griffith University Union had a much higher quorum (25%) and several uncontroversial all-faction-supported proposals (including countback to fill vacancies) had failed despite large majorities of YES over NO. As a result, the student politicians deliberately put a controversial proposal in the hope it would provoke enough students to vote - whether YES or NO - and finally get the “bipartisan” reforms over the quorum.
(Note that both of these were what I call “approval quorums” rather than “turnout quorums” - the latter are an incredibly bad idea, since opponents of a proposal might, in hindsight, kick themselves because turning out to vote against a proposition may actually help it to pass, which violates monotonicity).
Seed planted by Tom Round — 21 May 2009 @ 19:40
Gosh. I introduced the Abstain square at UQU about a million years ago)
Seed planted by Alan — 21 May 2009 @ 20:19
Well, there you go. Whatever was in your mind, Alan, at the time consitutes the “Original Intent” of the Framers and is binding on subsequent generations (Boomers, Gen-X, Millenials) whenever the text requires interpretation. Now, if only Scalia could channel James Madison so easily…
So was it UQ Union that used the “musical chairs” method of viva STV that you once described?
Seed planted by Tom Round — 21 May 2009 @ 22:06
Indeed. The UQU council became quite enthusiastic and even adept at what we called physical Hare-Clark.
Seed planted by Alan — 21 May 2009 @ 22:13
All preferences can be accommodated…
Seed planted by Tom Round — 22 May 2009 @ 01:11
Consider the horror faced by UQU councillors forced, if briefly, to carry round placards saying .24 or whatever if they were physical fractional transfers)
Seed planted by Alan — 23 May 2009 @ 05:05
They should be required to do that anyway even if UQU went back to FPTP. The fraction should be based on a weighted average of IQ and workload…
I was out of the UQ politics loop [NPI} for a few years then returned, briefly, as a postgrad. Voting for the first time after this hiatus, I was appalled to see that the ballot-papers carried a “warning” along the lines that “It is possible, though by no means likely, that expressing a second or later preference may cause your earlier preference to be defeated.” All UQU elections were by AV or STV last time I looked, so unless they’d adopted some Condorcet or Borda variant while I was out of the loop, someone had been making unusually strong.. tea down in the 4-ZZZ cavern.
Seed planted by Tom Round — 23 May 2009 @ 19:25
I hasten to add that language was not my doing. I will not mention the 18 year old experience of my first attempt to introduce STV which ran along the lines of not understanding the math but having read all the books and this was the best system. That particular speech did not have a high degree of persuasive impact. My second try six months later was a tad better informed and lots more successful.
Seed planted by Alan — 23 May 2009 @ 19:53
I take it you would have had some help from JC - and no, not in the George W Bush sense…
Seed planted by Tom Round — 24 May 2009 @ 02:48