pudge's Journal: King County Breaks State Election Law

For the presidential preference primary last week, King County gave out a single ballot for the Republican and Democratic parties. So if you signed on the sheet for one party or the other, when you voted, you could choose to vote for either party.

This violates RCW 29A.56.050, which states:

(2) If requested by a major political party, the secretary of state shall adopt rules under RCW 29A.04.620 to provide for any declaration required by that party.

(3) Voters who subscribe to a specific political party declaration under this section must be given ballots that are readily distinguishable from those given to other voters. Votes cast by persons making these declarations must be tabulated and reported separately from other votes cast at the primary and may be used by a major political party in its allocation of delegates under the rules of that party.

Sherril Huff talks about how separate ballots are more confusing for voters (I don't see how having only the choices that the voter chose to have available to themselves could be MORE confusing), and higher costs, but that doesn't change the fact that state law clearly states that voters who sign one party's declaration must be given a separate ballot than other voters.

Whatever reasons Huff thinks she has for doing it this way, it doesn't justify breaking the law.

Cross-posted on <pudge/*>.

Primary Question

[multimed]

Who pays for the printing of the ballots in a primary? Or any other costs that arise?

Re:

[pudge]

Who pays for the printing of the ballots in a primary? Or any other costs that arise?

The county. The people choose to pay for it through government, and the party chooses to accept the result as meaningful in some way (or in the case of the Democrats, for the presidential preference primary: not).

Re:

[multimed]

That's what I figured - and of course disagree with. The parties should be able to use whatever means they want to select their candidate. As a person who chooses to not affiliate myself with either party, I don't participate in the primary. I don't feel I have any right to tell them who they should choose for their candidate (even though I most likely do vote for one of them in the election). Here in WI we have completely open primaries - because of a lawsuit. We also have probably the loosest, most fr

Re:

[pudge]

As a person who chooses to not affiliate myself with either party, I don't participate in the primary.

That's good. But many other people want to. So if the party wants to allow it, I see no problem.

I don't feel I have any right to tell them who they should choose for their candidate

Sure, and nothing obligates the parties to accept the result of the primary. Nothing is forced on the parties.

Here in WI we have completely open primaries - because of a lawsuit.

That seems backward: we have a CLOSED primary because of a lawsuit.

I just don't get how it is at all reasonable to force a party to allow their opponents to have a voice in their candidate selection.

Yep. I don't know anything about the WI case, but the Supreme Court was pretty clear on this in CDP v. Jones: the political party has the ultimate say in how their own candidates are selected, period.

But I also don't get why tax payers should pay for for the process

Simply because they want to pa

Re:

[multimed]

Sure, and nothing obligates the parties to accept the result of the primary. Nothing is forced on the parties.

Well thanks for pointing out an apparent fundamental misunderstanding of the process by me, jerk :) Seriously though, if the parties are still free to do it however they choose then most of my complaints go away.

>>Here in WI we have completely open primaries - because of a lawsuit.
That seems backward: we have a CLOSED primary because of a lawsuit.

Well a large part of my understanding comes

Re:

[pudge]

I'd guess if people really understood what a primary was - if it were actually explained to them that it's a non-binding method for a party to determine it's candidate a majority of people would.

I dunno. People don't seem to care about facts. :-)

Amusingly, I was just starting to look through CDP v. Jones and it refers to the Wisconsin case, Democratic Party of United States v. Wisconsin ex rel. La Follette. I guess it shouldn't surprise me that the Court ruling would refer to prior cases. Yet another one of those times I wish I could freeze everything else in the world so I could sit & read.

Totally.

Also, that as time froze, AIM and video games would stop working, so as to not distract me.