Democrats’ efforts at grassroots withering without participants

The Democratic Party’s State central committee showed two weeks ago that it doesn’t believe in democracy.

The committee voted overwhelmingly to ignore the results of the state presidential primary next year, and to pick all of its delegates to the national nominating convention through precinct caucuses.

The party that traces its roots to Andrew Jackson said it would pick its delegates in a process that involves fewer than 5 percent as many voters as a primary election.

Republicans had told the Democrats that the GOP would allocate at least half its delegates from the primary if the Democrats would do the same.

There might have been a reason to use the caucuses rather than a primary. A primary would cost the state $9 million while caucuses cost the state nothing because the party organizations pay for them. In fact, the Democratic-controlled Legislature passed a budget with $9 million set aside for a presidential primary, and the Democratic governor signed that budget.

But, saving money wasn’t the reason for the decision.

The reason that state party Chairman Dwight Pelz gave for the decision was that a caucus is a “grass-roots exercise” unlike a primary, which he calls “more of a television-advertising kind of event.”

That’s an argument for doing away with elections.

I went to one of those “grass-roots” events three years ago and saw people show little interest in discussion. In fact, when one woman brought up an issue, others told her that their only interest was in picking delegates for their candidates at the county, district, state and national conventions.

I also noted that the caucus system has no provision for the ill, the disabled or the absent to participate, and that there is nothing to prevent me from participating in both Republican and Democratic caucuses.

It’s time to change state law. My proposal would deny major-party status to any party that doesn’t recognize results of state primaries.

Currently, the Republicans and Democrats hold major-party status by continuing to get the requisite percentage of votes in statewide elections. Libertarians held this status for one election three years ago. Major-party-status allows a party’s candidates automatic access to the ballot, without filing petitions, as minor parties must do.

My proposal would add meaningful participation in the primary as a requirement for major-party status. There may be enough Democrats in the Legislature who would support this, but we may not have time to wait. Let’s get an initiative on this year’s ballot to deny major-party status to parties that refuse to recognize results of the state primary.

If this doesn’t succeed, let’s vote in next spring’s Democratic primary in a way that shows that the people have different opinions than the few party activists who go to caucuses. 

Evan Smith is the Enterprise Forum editor. Send comments to entopinion@heraldnet.com.