There were two
high-profile election reform issues that failed to pass during the legislative
session that just was: one would have stopped full implementation of Rhode
Island’s controversial voter ID law and the other was the elimination of the
master lever.
It’s too bad because
the progressive/conservative coalition that came together to bind up the budget
process this year probably could have worked together all session to champion a
suite of election reforms.
I suggested this idea to Ken
Block way back on
January 13. “Maybe we should take a big picture look at election law, and
include #voterid in the conversation,” I
tweeted to him after he first asked me to endorse his “abolish the lever”
efforts.
At the time, Block
didn’t want to bundle the two issues, tweeting back to me: “Master Lever already stands alone in bills
submitted in both chambers. Don’t add confusion to a simple effort. #abolish_the_lever”
According to his op/ed piece in Sunday’s Providence Journal, he now knows that how a bill before the Rhode Island General Assembly reads in January has no necessary relationship to what gets voted on in June. Or maybe he knew that then too, and just didn’t want to support voter ID reform for whatever reason…
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| Nobody can talk out of both sides of his mouth between than CCA Party favorite Dan Slattery |
EDITOR'S NOTE: The CCA Party hopped right on Ken Block's band-wagon, with CCA Party Councilor Dan Slattery actually having the gall to testify about the importance of openness and transparency in government, somehow linking that to the "master lever" (but not to his and his partner Boss Tom Gentz's repeated violations of the Open Meetings Act). The CCA Party also rejected any connection between eliminating the Master Lever and Voter ID, as Bob suggests. Instead, they expanded voter ID in Charlestown beyond the requirements of state law to include special town elections.
In either case, few
progressives, for whatever reason, helped Block in his crusade against the
master lever either, even though there aren’t a lot of us (if any) who support
straight party voting. In that same Twitter exchange Bob Walsh of the NEA said
he supported doing away with it:, “Eliminate the lever! Makes down ballot D’s
into real D’s, need progressive/labor support to win in November. ”
An important lesson I
re-learned this legislative session is progressives and conservatives often
have overlapping interests on the issues – Occupy Providence and the Stephen
Hopkins Center proved this late in the session when they worked together to
host a debate on repayment of the 38 Studios bond holders.
Maybe the takeaway
here is that John Marion of Common Cause RI, which supports repeal of both the
master lever and voter ID, has a vested interest in getting progressives and
members of the Moderate Party to work together?
Bob Plain is the editor/publisher of Rhode Island's Future. Previously,
he's worked as a reporter for several different news organizations both in
Rhode Island and across the country.