The Electoral
College
Alternatives
The Case
For The Electoral College
Who Votes
The Role Of
Government
What
We're Looking For In A President
Notes - Section One
Bruce Babbitt
Joe Biden
Mike Dukakis
Dick Gephardt
Al Gore
Jesse Jackson
Paul Simon
Notes - Section Two
Over the years there have been calls for every conceivable election reform. The reforms of the seventies were an attempt to make the nominating process more open and democratic and they have done that, but the price has been increased inefficiency and waste. Most recently Congress has considered bills to substitute direct elections for the electoral college, to provide public financing for campaigns and to limit contributions and spending--with various results. In The Election Process I argue against these proposals and discuss the pros and cons of extended or limited terms of office, Congressional pay, free television time, length and cost of campaigns, the advantages of incumbency and, most of all, the candidates our present system attracts and discourages.
Too many people of all ages have become disillusioned with our politicians and yet we are uncertain how to detect genuinely honorable statesmen. We have been deceived too many times before and do not wish to be considered gullible and naive.
The Watergate tapes revealed the real man behind the public Richard Nixon. We discovered that Joe Biden didn't really thinind the public Richard Nixon. We discovered that Joe Biden didn't really think of the closing remarks to the Dubuque, Iowa, debate on the way to the event but had rehearsed the words borrowed from a British politician . It is hard to see through the flim-flam in order to distinguish the genuine from the fake. We cannot let our chief executive be elected on a manufactured image, but we no longer know whom to believe and cannot trust our heart and sense.
In 1888 Lord Bryce observed that "great men don't become presidents," and that's good because we don't know how to tell great men from con-artists. The good news is that all we need is decent men and women and apparently the office itself (all political offices) can make the man or the woman. Witness the 32-year-old porno star, apparently elected in jest, who sits in Italy's Parliament and is, to everyone's surprise, and some persons' indignation, taking her election and the job she won seriously.
Many of us are unhappy with all the candidates running for the presidential nomination in both parties in 1988, perhaps because we know so many people of higher caliber who are not running. It is true that the type of person who will conform to our present election requirements is not likely to be the type of person we would want as the head of the nation. We have an Alice-in-Wonderland scenario where the only candidate worth electing is one who refuses to run. As I write, California's Secretary of State, March Fong Eu, has withdrawn from the Senate race saying, "" I am, to a significant degree, forced to choose between my marriage and my candidacy for the Senate." It seems her husband refused to make the financial disclosures required of candidates for federal offices and their spouses. Msrs. Laxalt and Rumsfeld refused to incur the large debts that are necessary in order to compete in the lengthy, expensive campaigns of today. Yet to curtail campaigning is not only impossible (where there' s a will there' s a way) it would be an abridgment of our guaranteed right to free speech. Try to imagine an America where it would be illegal for anyone to talk about running for office until three months before the election!
The challenge is to get the best people at the helm for the right reasons and, in my opinion, the most people. There are many fine people in our nation, not so great at tooting their own horns but who could rise magnificently to the occasion. We need to rotate public offices more frequently so that anyone who has a desire to serve can have an opportunity to do so--providing of course he or she can convince voters to give them that chance. And no, we're not quite back to the same dilemma. Limiting terms of federal offices, just as the president's term has been limited, would save us from professional politicians who have little experience in the real world and soon begin to hold an inflated opinion of themselves. In The Election Process I present evidence to refute the contention that a single term would make officials less accountable to constituents. One thing is certain; they would not be campaigning during their term of office if they could not run again.
Joe Biden pulled out of the race after the completion of this manuscript. I have, however, chosen to leave him in the book, as he played a part in the 1987-88 process and is an example of what is good and what is bad about the way we elect our officials.
I care that my views are not being represented by a political party or any individual candidate--that' s why I wrote this book. I also know that I am not alone.
Helen P. Rogers
Carmel, California
November 3, 1987