Forty-one states have eliminated straight-party voting. It’s time for Indiana to do so too.
Last week, Michigan Gov. Rick Snyder signed the bill that gets rid of the practice in the state to the north. Voters will have to vote for each candidate one by one, even if the end result is the same as voting all Republican or Democrat.
In the most recent election, a huge percentage of voters cast straight-party ballots. In Elkhart, 2,701 of the 5,999 votes cast were on such ballots. In Goshen, 2,481 of the 5,893 ballots were straight-party. In both cities, 40 to 45 percent of those were Democratic and 53 to 55 percent were Republican. Elkhart Party and Libertarian accounted for the rest.
We need more people to vote. Civic engagement needs to be higher. So why remove a popular method that more than 40 percent of people use?
Because we can do better.
Voting can be intimidating. Doing the work to learn about each candidate, to consider their positions and weigh them is, well, just that: work. Yet it’s probably never been easier to do research on candidates and their stances.
Leaning one way or the other or even tending to vote for one party nearly all the time isn’t a bad thing, but in the modern political realm it’s as important as ever to vote for the person rather than the party.
We’ve already been practicing picking the person. The election system in the United States means that people have to declare a party to cast a ballot in the primary. When faced with a ballot of all Republicans or Democrats, you have to choose one over another.
Straight-party voting isn’t necessarily thoughtless. It can be efficient. Yet it makes sense to follow Michigan, and in recent years Illinois and Wisconsin, and eliminate it in Indiana.
In the 2015 Indiana General Assembly, State Rep. David Ober (R-Albion) introduced legislation that would have done away with the practice. “As we revolutionize elections and technology continues to creep into the way we campaign and the information available to voters, it’s clear folks are looking at candidates rather than party affiliation,” he said. “We don’t put donkeys and elephants on our signs anymore.”
House Speaker Brian Bosma said, “We think it best that voters are informed and vote for the person and don’t just check a box.”
Senate Bill 201 passed committee, but didn’t go further. So far, no bill has been introduced this session.
It’s a short session and there are bigger issues to tackle, but the time has come for the Indiana General Assembly to do away with straight-ticket voting.