Jill Stein Espouses Instant Runoff Voting Through MA Voter Choice Campaign; National Popular Voting Also On The Table

BOSTON - Today is preliminary election day in Boston, Somerville, Chelsea, and other cities and towns in the greater metropolitan area. Mayors, Selectman, Alderman, City and School Council members throughout the Boston area are facing challenging races. That's good for democracy; especially in a state that consistently features the second greatest number of uncontested races in the country. Arkansas usually takes top billing in that category.

And yet, to state the facts bluntly in political parlance: "winner takes all" in all the races.

Led by political activists who have been fighting for electoral reform for many years - remember "Clean Elections?" - a new campaign called MA Voter Choice has emerged. The immediate goal is to gather enough signatures to acquire a spot on the November 2009 ballot as a statewide referendum question.

The campaign seeks to institute what reformers call "ranked choice voting" also known as instant runoff. According to the campaign's website, this system would allow voters "...to rank candidates in order of preference (first, second, third, etc.) instead of being restricted to choosing only one candidate. If a voter's first choice is eliminated, their vote is automatically reassigned to their second choice, ensuring that no voter is "throwing their vote away" by voting for the candidate that represents their views, regardless of that candidate's chance of winning."

For example, if you really wanted to vote for Boston Mayoral candidate Kevin McCrea in Tuesday's preliminary, but were afraid an "outsider" couldn't win, under ranked choice you could vote for McCrea and a second choice among the remaining candidates. If McCrea didn't receive enough votes to win outright, your vote would then be applied to your second choice which might give that person enough votes to win a spot in the November election.

In any case, say advocates, no one's vote would ever be wasted.

Residents of Cambridge, MA have been using a form of ranked choice voting - called proportional representation - for decades.

OMB Audio: On Sunday September 13th, former MA gubernatorial and Secretary of State candidate and Executive Director of the MA Coalition for Healthy Communities, Dr. Jill Stein, spoke about the campaign with Marc Stern and Dave Goodman of RADIO with a VIEW.

Other electoral reform campaigns to keep an eye on include attempts to change election law in Massachusetts and throughout the 50 states to allow for a "national popular vote." In essence, this system would give U.S. citizens a direct vote over who becomes President by sidestepping the electoral college.

OMB Audio: Dave Goodman speaks with National Popular Vote organizer and former Vermont Legislator Chris Pierson, American University Professor of Constitutional Law and Maryland State Senator Jamie Raskin, and Common Cause MA Executive Director Pam Wilmot at the MA Statehouse on May 5, 2009.