Indiana voters will have several qualified candidates with varying ideas in the May primary election for Governor, and I think that’s a good thing. What I’m not good with, however, is that a winner could well be chosen with fewer than a quarter of the votes cast.
Theoretically, if all six of the current Republican candidates remain on the ballot, a winner could be crowned with as little as 17 percent of the party’s voters. The same is true for state and federal legislative races, especially for open seats. In general elections, a third-party or independent candidate can become a “spoiler”, potentially allowing a candidate to be elected by less than 35% of voters even though a majority might prefer one of the losing candidates.
We see results of such elections frequently on the nightly news, with fringe candidates elected from the far right or left who are out of step with the majority of their constituents and who intensify divisiveness, derail the legislative process and diminish democracy.
One solution would be a change in our voting system so candidates must have more than 50% of the vote in order to be elected. Run-off elections can be costly and delay the process by weeks, but Ranked Choice Voting provides an “instant run-off” that guarantees a majority vote.
Here’s how it works – instead of voting for just one candidate, each voter ranks candidates in order of preference. If no candidate has 50% of the first choice votes cast, the candidate with the fewest votes is dropped. Votes for that candidate then shift to those voters’ second choice and new totals are calculated. The process continues until one candidate has at least 50% of the votes cast.
Suppose there are four candidates for sheriff: Smith, Jones, Green and Miller. Your first choice is Green, and you’d consider voting for Smith or Jones, but you don’t like Miller’s views at all. You would rank Green first, Smith and Jones second and third, and rank Miller last (or just not select a fourth). In the initial vote the results are Green 29%, Smith 28%, Jones 10% and Miller 33%, so Jones is dropped and the 10% of votes would then go to the second choice of those voters. In the next round, Green gets 37%, Smith 30% and Miller stays at 33%. Miller drops off, and those votes go to the voter’s next pick resulting in a final vote of Green 49% and Smith 51% with Smith declared the winner.
In the example above, Miller would have won the race with today’s simple plurality even without support of a majority of the voters. While your first preference (Green) wound up losing, your second choice candidate prevailed. More importantly, a majority of voters selected the winner.
This voting method is in use statewide in Maine and Alaska, with more than a dozen states experimenting with local or municipal elections. A few state parties use a variation of this method for primary elections, including presidential primaries. While a bit confusing at first, most voters like the option once they understand it.
Our current primary system, coupled with gerrymandered districts on both sides of the aisle, increasingly results in extreme candidates from both parties being elected, thus fueling the erosion of civility in our political discourse. We need change. With ranked choice voting, candidates will more closely align with the majority of voters, and hopefully reduce divisiveness.
You might not get your favorite candidate, but we also can avoid the extreme candidates that can’t win the general election, or maybe worse yet, that do wind up winning in the fall.
John Torr is a longtime business consultant who previously worked for Gov. Bob Orr’s campaign and assisted Lt. Gov John Mutz in the early 1980s. He has been active in politics for 45 years. This commentary originally appeared on indianacaptialchronicle.com. Send comments to [email protected].
