Dear Hillary Delegates

[votesparks]

Dear Hillary Delegates,

How about we get together at the convention and write new rules that make all Democratic Party primary elections going forward one-person, one vote elections, all open. Delegates could still be elected and sent to vote on platform and rules, but the will of the people would always be the decider.

My wife is a Bernie delegate, as well as a couple of my good friends. I know they would work with you to get this done.

If that doesn't work for you, then whaddayasay we just get rid of unequal ballot access for third parties and independents because then it wouldn't really matter if the Democratic Party's electoral process looked like the insides of a garbage can in the dishroom of a Denny's.

We can do this. I know the Bernie folks will be easy to work with if actual democracy is what we want to achieve.

Are you in?

[dsc]

1. why should the GOP get to vote in our primaries?

For a group of people who routinely complain that the party isn't liberal enough, I am baffled at the support for the often less liberal general population having a bigger role in our primaries.

[votesparks]

3. In my state, we can vote in theirs

and they can voter on ours. It's not a problem here in Ohio.

Why should non-D and R's have unequal ballot access? Answer this for me please?

[dsc]

6. because you get more moderate candidates in many cases

In Ohio, for instance, on the GOP side it is likely that Democrats and independents sunk trump and helped Kasich win. In California if Pamela Harris loses it will be due to Republicans supporting Sanchez in November after they finish 1, 2 in the primary. There is no other scenario in which the liberal California Democrats would pick Sanchez over Harris but letting the GOP pick our candidate.

[noamnety]

2. When you say one person one vote

does that include getting rid of super delegates?

[votesparks]

4. of course

Power To The People!

[noamnety]

5. I'm not a delegate

but if I were, I would SO be on board with this!

[SheilaT]

7. Keep in mind that it is the individual state parties

that decide if they'll have a caucus or a primary. So if you're in a caucs state and don't like that, you need to work on persuading your state's Democratic Party to change things.

[votesparks]

8. Could it not be written into the party's national constitution

that only one-person, one-vote primaries as I described are accepted?

All that said, if there were fair and equal ballot access for all, then none of this would matter. But that's an issue that the very UnAmerican among our political clubs on each anointed side won't touch. Every time I bring it up with HRC supporters, it's all like crickets.

[SheilaT]

9. Probably not. Does the Democratic Party even have

a national constitution? I've never heard anything about it. Again, this all happens at the state level, and that's why those who care a lot should get active in the Democratic Party at their local level, and hopefully at the state level. It's really not hard.

Frankly, I'm tired of all the bitter complaining that occurs every four years here about how totally unfair the caucus system is, and from people who may declare themselves Democrats but don't get very involved at all, other than voting or posting here on DU. Every time they are shocked, just SHOCKED to learn how the system works, as if someone dreamed up the caucus system just a week ago last Thursday. They need to stop complaining and actually get involved.

[votesparks]

10. It wouldn't matter if the D's and R's

didn't enact unfair ballot access to others. That's where the D's and R's are the same.

Why won't anyone address this fundamental unfairness?

You wouldn't have to listen to everyone bitching if the Demopublican and Republicratic parties didn't put up giant hurdles to other parties and Independents that Ds and Rs don't have to go through. And that's fundamentally unAmerican.

Crickets will continue chirping of course.

[SheilaT]

11. I'm not sure I understand what you mean

by unfair ballot access. Do you mean you think all primaries and caucuses should be open ones?

Personally, I'm of a mixed belief on that. I do register as a Democrat and my state has a closed primary. I'm inclined to think that's appropriate. However, there are states that do not register by party, so their primaries are always open, because you just vote in whichever primary you prefer. But that's different because (to repeat myself) those states don't register by party, but most states do. I also believe that in some states it might be a county by county decision about whether voters can participate in whichever party's primary they want. But I might be confused about that.

Certainly this year, Bernie would probably be at the very least even with Hillary in numbers of pledged delegates if all the primaries and caucuses were open. And see what happened in Ohio, with an open primary that had a large number of Democrats voting on the Republican side for Kasich.

Another question is: should each state do it the same way? I personally have no idea. I do know that Iowa has it written somewhere that there state must have the first in the nation caucus, and New Hampshire claims the right to the first in the nation primary. If Iowa can be persuaded to switch to a primary, what happens?

I know there are no simple answers to these questions.

[votesparks]

12. Unfair ballot access is for example

requiring a candidate from an non D or R party to collect 10 times more signatures to get onto the ballot. Make that fair, and the Denny's garbage can of a process is all yours.

https://ballotpedia.org/Ballot_access_for_major_and_minor_party_candidates

[Karma13612]

13. How do you feel about a

SIX MONTH DEADLINE before the closed primary to change party affiliation to Democrat in New York State??

We hadn't even had our first debate at that point but Independents were expected to be mind readers and consider switching in order to vote for a Dem candidate in a primary that still hasn't occurred.

It has to be standardized otherwise it is a fiasco, the testaments have been thick this time due to increased interest in Bernie as time has passed. And Hillary has lost votes as well I imagine with many women supporting her, regardless of party affiliation.

[SheilaT]

15. Oh, I think that's awful.

I seem to recall that it was common to require registration at least three or six months ahead of election day to be able to vote.

I have limited sympathy for voters in a state with a closed primary who aren't registered with their preferred party in the first place. But then I expect people to be paying attention to stuff like that, and too many people are far more interested in what the hell some Kardashian is doing, or whether or not George RR Martin will ever finish the Game of Thrones epic than in things that actually matter.

I'm strongly in favor of same day registration, and it probably ought to be easier for non mainstream party candidates to get on the ballot.

[Gothmog]

16. I will be headed to my state convention in June and have filed paperwork to try for national delegat

Ballot access rules are part of state law. The Clinton Victory Counsel program had a conference call back in October on just the 50 states democratic primary ballot access rules. In Texas, we killed the Texas two step where two thirds of the delegates where allocated based on primary and one third on the basis of a caucus. The system is working much better now.

In most states, the conduct of the primary is controlled by state law. For example even though 7 federal judges have ruled against the Texas voter id law, we were stuck with in during the March 1 Texas primary. The DOJ and the Texas Party tried to get the 5th circuit to rule on this law before the primary but the court ignored their filings. See http://moritzlaw.osu.edu/electionlaw/litigation/documents/SupplementalAuthoritiesFiledbyAppelleesMsImaniClarkandTexasLeagueofYoungVotersEducationFund1.pdf

Right now, the DOJ and the private plaintiffs are asking the SCOTUS to lift the stay of the Cir See
http://moritzlaw.osu.edu/electionlaw/litigation/documents/Veasey-ApplicationToVacateStay03252016.pdf In addition to the DOJ, one of the lead plaintiff attorneys, Chad Dunn, also happens to be the Texas Democratic Party outside counsel (Chad is representing Congressman Marc Veasey in this case)

It is beyond the control the state or national democratic parties to make significant changes in election laws in many states but you can ask if you want.

See of you can get your platform adopted at state convention and sent to national convention. Most of your proposals will not fly but there will likely be fewer caucuses next cycle