21 June 2014

MT GOP endorses proposal for ideologically pure primaries

I was wrong. Notwithstanding how far to the right the Republican Party has lurched, I thought the GOP’s conventioneers in Billings this weekend would reject a resolution for a closed primary. Instead, they approved it, not without dissent, on a voice vote.

They also approved a resolution calling for a runoff election if the winner in the general election does not receive a majority.

The legislature can pass a closed primary law, but a runoff will require amending Article IV, Section 4, of Montana’s constitution:

Closing the primary to all but registered Republicans will pretty much eliminate crossover voting by Democrats, and voting by less than ideologically pure self-identified independents. It will also require registration by political party, and thus prevent voters from keeping their formal political affiliation private. And it will make it easier, and thus less expensive, to target voters during campaigns.

The runoff proposal derives from the GOP’s anger that Democrat Jon Tester was twice elected to the U.S. Senate, and Democrat Steve Bullock once to Montana’s governorship, by pluralities in elections in which Libertarian candidates received votes that otherwise probably would have gone to the Republican candidates. A GOP attempt to keep Libertarians off the general election ballot by inflicting a top two primary on Montana failed after a legislative referendum on a top two was kicked off the 2014 general election ballot by the Montana Supreme Court.

Other states require runoff when an election is won by just a plurality. On Tuesday, 24 June, Mississippi’s GOP voters (and Democrats who didn’t vote in their own primary) will choose between six-term GOP Sen. Thad Cochran and upstart Tea Partier Chris McDaniel in a runoff between a bring-home-the-bacon traditionalist and a we-don’t-want-no-dirty-federal-money advocate of de facto civic suicide.

Mississippi’s runoff, and runoffs similar to it, will be largely, but not exclusively, decided by the people who voted in the election leading to the runoff. That defect can be cured by adopting the instant runoff system described by Fair Vote.

I doubt that Montana’s voters will adopt closed primaries once they realize that to vote they must publicly declare their political allegiance, an act making the casting of their ballots a lot less secret than it is now. But to Montana’s Republicans, protecting political privacy means keeping campaign contributions secret, while forcing citizens to disclose their political affiliation or be excluded from primary elections.