Oregon passed a Fusion Bill. Fusion voting is a system that allows
political parties a say in the process by way of endorsing other parties
or candidates on the ballot. This method does not complicate vote
tallying, and can be used without any modifications to voting systems
including voting machines, levers, or hand counted paper ballots. Fusion
voting was legal in Oregon and much of the country in the 19th century,
and the Unity Party, Oregon's branch of the Populist Party, often fused
with the Democrats in electing populists to office. New York, Delaware,
Connecticut, South Carolina and Vermont all have some form of fusion
voting.

Fusion voting was legal in North Carolina in the late 1800s until
Democrats, financed by big business and in collaboration with white
supremacists - enacted a violent coup. They ditched Fusion Voting and
set up Jim Crow laws, disenfranchising black voters. And when in use in
NC, Fusion worked to elect populist, republicans and democrats. After
Fusion was ditched, so went the populists. (I disagree with the
article's added endorsement for IRV on the grounds that IRV does not
work and harms election transparency.)

Fusion voting step in right direction
<http://www.dailyemerald.com/home/index.cfm?event=displayArticle&ustory_\
id=8baa3195-0f62-445b-ba38-9de44ec3f115>
by Emerald Editorial Board
<http://www.dailyemerald.com/user/index.cfm?event=displayAuthorProfile&a\
uthorid=2301827> | PUBLISHED ON 7/6/09
<http://www.dailyemerald.com/home/index.cfm?event=displayIssueArticles&i\
ssue_date=7/6/09> IN News
<http://www.dailyemerald.com/news/2009/07/06/News/> Before the
Oregon Legislature ended its session at the end of last month, it passed
an electoral reform bill that will only help make our state a little
more democratic. State senators who voted for and against the bill
acknowledged there are parts of it they would like to change, but they
are in a better position to keep improving ballot access now that Senate
Bill 326 passed. Governor Ted Kulongoski should promptly sign it into
law.

The bill does two things. It repeals a 2005 law that disqualified any
person who voted in a primary election from signing a petition to put an
unaffiliated candidate on the ballot. That law needlessly restricted
both a voter's right to vote for whom they choose and a citizen's right
to run for public office without being a member of one of two political
parties.

The other piece of the bill allows a limited form of fusion voting, a
system by which candidates can list the endorsements of multiple parties
on the ballot.

Fusion voting allows a candidate to show that while he is a Republican,
he has also been endorsed by the Constitution Party, for example.
Democrats might also be endorsed by the Green or Working Families
parties. It allows a candidate to show more precisely what kind of a
Democrat or Republican she is, and lends minor parties a shred of ballot
access and influence in political discourse.

Fusion voting was legal in Oregon and much of the country in the 19th
century, and the Unity Party, Oregon's branch of the Populist Party,
often fused with the Democrats in electing populists to office. The law
was later changed and the kind of candidates major parties were
endorsing changed with it.

In 1997, the Supreme Court said states could do away with fusion voting.
Arkansas and South Dakota did just that. Though its use has waned during
the past 100 years, New York state has always used it. Today, Delaware,
Connecticut, South Carolina and Vermont all have some form of fusion
voting, according to the Capitol Hill newspaper Roll Call.

In some of these states, candidates get separate lines on the ballot for
each party that has endorsed them. The votes from each line are later
added together and given to the same candidate. In Oregon, at least for
now, each candidate would get only one line with the names of multiple
parties.

State Rep. Jefferson Smith (D-Portland) told the Oregonian that fusion
voting gives minor parties a chance to meaningfully participate without
running a candidate who will be labeled a "spoiler." Democratic Party of
Oregon Executive Director Trent Luntz, unsurprisingly, painted it as a
way for small groups of activists at minor party nominating conventions
to buttonhole candidates and force concessions on a particular issue.

The sad part is that Luntz may be right, and such tactics may be as yet
the most effective method those dedicated individuals have of making a
major party hear their concerns.

There are probably more democratic reforms that could be made, from
separate ballot lines to instant runoff voting, which allows everyone to
vote their conscience the first time and political expediency second.
But right now Oregon has progressed enough to be able to protect the
worthy components of this baby step toward reform. The governor should
sign the bill and make our election system a little more open than it is
now.

opinion@... <mailto:opinion@...>
http://www.dailyemerald.com/home/index.cfm?event=displayArticle&ustory_i\
d=8baa3195-0f62-445b-ba38-9de44ec3f115
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id=8baa3195-0f62-445b-ba38-9de44ec3f115>


Joyce McCloy
www.ncvoter.net <http://www.ncvoter.net/>




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