MyDD :: A Look at Fusion Voting

A Look at Fusion Voting

by Scott Shields, Sat Aug 27, 2005 at 02:38:06 PM EST

In a perfect world, third party candidates would be advocates for change. By championing issues and causes too politically radioactive for the two major parties to confront, third party candidates would expose voters to innovative policy thinking anathema to establishment lawmakers.

But this is not a perfect world. In the real world, third party candidates are mere spoilers. How many times have we heard Ralph Nader blamed for Al Gore's loss in 2000? How many times have we witnessed Democrats salivate at the thought of radical rightists like Roy Moore or Jim Gilchrist wrecking Republican chances? There isn't necessarily anything wrong with this. Without instant runoff voting or proportional representation, third party candidates don't stand much of a realistic chance of doing anything but helping to shape the debate. And taking advantage of that system is part of the game, even if one I personally find slightly discomforting.

One system I've always been a huge fan of is New York's fusion voting. For those of you unfamiliar, candidates in the state can run on multiple party lines. The state's Conservative and Working Families Parties typically endorse the Republican and Democratic candidates, respectively, but have also been known to shake up elections by endorsing their own candidate.

Why would anyone vote for a major party candidate on a third party line? Well, by supporting Eliot Spitzer as a Working Families Party candidate rather than as a Democrat, for example, voters send the message that the issues Working Families champions -- universal healthcare, a living wage, strong labor protection -- are very important to a significant segment of their base. It also gives independent voters an excuse to vote for major party candidates that they might not otherwise vote for. For example, CWA polling showed that 80% of New York independents who voted for Hillary Clinton did so by voting for her on the Working Families line.

In the latest issue of The Nation (subscription only), Alyssa Katz writes about New York's Working Families Party and the efforts currently underway to bring fusion voting to states like New Jersey, Massachusetts, and Maine.

The Maine legislature held a hearing earlier this year on a bill that would bring New York-style fusion to the state. There's interest in fusion, explains State Representative Hannah Pingree of North Haven, who introduced the bill, because the Green Party has repeatedly spoiled races for Democrats, siphoning off enough votes to let Republicans win. Democrats control the Statehouse, but by a slim margin. As she works to acquaint her colleagues with fusion, Pingree also has to acknowledge that the benefits may not flow just to Democrats. "People look at this as a way to promote the left, but it also could be a way for conservatives to advance as well," she notes. That concern is particularly acute among progressive leaders considering adopting fusion in Oregon, a state with an active radical right.

I can understand the concern about the right using fusion to their advantage as well. But with the Republican Party already skewing so far to the right, it's hard to imagine that a conservative third party could pull the GOP much further and still win elections. And to the extent that progressive third parties can support progressive Democrats, I'd argue that the risk is worth it. Eric Schneiderman, a New York Democratic state Senator makes a compelling argument about this.

He believes the party is important to progressives' national prospects. "There's a lot of concern among progressive activists that the Democratic Party is too much in the grip of consultants who are always suggesting that they slide to the right and take conservative positions to accommodate swing voters, rather than exciting our own beliefs and animating people," says Schneiderman. "The hope is that the Working Families Party can empower progressive Democrats within the Democratic Party."

Fusion may not be a silver bullet. And it may not be a realistic proposal for every state. But it's an interesting alternative and one that I think reform-minded Democrats should give some thought to.

Tags: Fusion Voting, Democrats, 3rd Parties (all tags)

Permalink :: 26 Comments :: Post a Comment

well in a perfect world... (none / 0)

The Democrats would have guts... oh Ted Kennedy why can't we clone you...

Running the Davis, Nelson Klein team in Florida.

by Liberal on Sat Aug 27, 2005 at 02:46:49 PM EST

Fascinating idea (none / 0)

I'm surprised that this is the first I've heard of fusion voting. Why has New York been keeping this such a closely held secret?

I like this idea a whole lot and I haven't even read the article yet.

by Gary Boatwright on Sat Aug 27, 2005 at 03:04:19 PM EST

Re: Fascinating idea (none / 0)

Check out our effort to re-legalize fusion in Massachusetts at www.massballotfreedom.com

by jflashmontana on Wed Oct 05, 2005 at 04:21:10 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re:Fusion Voting (none / 0)

I think this could be a great incubator for new ideas from the right and the left. A number of states would benfit from this type of multi-party system.

by Demo Dan in Dayton on Sat Aug 27, 2005 at 03:26:34 PM EST

One problem with the NY system... (none / 0)

A problem with the NY system is that third-party nominations are decided either by conventions well before the majority primaries or in primaries held the same day. Therefore it is not uncommon for someone to lose their major party primary but win a third-party nomination. New York was the so called "if your in your in" rule which means you can't pull yourself from the ballot once your a nominee. There you can have a former Democrat candidate still on the ballot in November and he will still draw some votes (even if he has publicly asked people not to do this. This happened in the Governor races in both 1998 and 2002. The then-LG (some party switching Republican the jump ship from the Republican after Pataki dropped her from the ticket) in 1998 and Andrew Coumo in 2002 won the Liberal Party lines but lost the Democratic primaries (actually Coumo dropped out right before the primary) but couldn't get off the ballot and drew some votes in the November. Pataki's margin was greater than these votes both times so it didn't effect the out come, but it has happened in other races in the past.

by Corey Olomon on Sat Aug 27, 2005 at 03:33:56 PM EST

the other problem (none / 0)

is that fusion only works in one direction - if the dems are hungry for a second line, they'll pursue it, if not, they will hire lawyers to try to throw 3rd party candidates off the ballot, which is why when the greens had ballot status from 1998-2002, you never saw any green-dem tickets (and won;t likely in after they get ballot status back in 2006, unless the dems decide to start playing nice)

Vote for a true progressive in November: Cynthia McKinney (GRN) for President!

by brooklyngreenie on Sat Aug 27, 2005 at 04:45:36 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Now we're talking (none / 0)

Franchising fusion is an undertaking somewhere on the highway between ambitious and quixotic. Most states abolished cross-endorsements more than a century ago, as the major parties consolidated their power. Besides New York, fusion remains legal only in Connecticut, Delaware, Vermont, South Carolina, Mississippi and Utah, and in none is the ballot line so accessible and useful as in New York. In 1997 the US Supreme Court ruled in Timmons v. Twin Cities Area New Party that states cannot be compelled under the First Amendment to allow candidates to run on multiple party lines.

So Working Families and its labor and community allies are bracing for a state-by-state slog. In Connecticut the party is already up and running. It has to qualify in each legislative district, by first running candidates exclusively on the Working Families line and getting at least 1 percent of the vote. If it passes the threshold, in subsequent elections in that district it can cross-endorse candidates from any other party, in any race. Working Families is now on the ballot in sixty-five out of the state's 187 districts.

"How many times do we have to pour millions of dollars into the Democratic Party, and thousands of volunteers? And then hoping even if they win, we still have to get them to pay attention to us?" asks Murphy, who is a member of the Teamsters' executive board. He has become a leading advocate for fusion voting in Massachusetts.

"If we do nothing and hope to simply influence the Democratic Party, that's doomed to fail," says Murphy. "How many times do you have to lose before you make a change?"

by Gary Boatwright on Sat Aug 27, 2005 at 03:55:27 PM EST

Reason it won't happen (none / 0)

This would be a good idea, as would ranked voting. Both would allow a person to vote for a third party candidate without it being a spoiler vote. However, that is the reason that the Democrats and Republicans block it at every turn and why it will never happen. I have a different idea: Since the Green Party is ignored and reviled by the Democratic leadership and thwarted at every turn, Green Party members should all just join the Republican Party and try to reshape that party. Their presence might actually drive out some of the Christian right and the Republican Party has a progressive history with Teddy Roosevelt's anti-trust/conservationist approach that is probably closer to the Greens than anything the Democrats are offering.

by steve expat on Sat Aug 27, 2005 at 04:00:55 PM EST

It might help (none / 0)

avoid the slide to extremism. As a party over time slides to an extreme, there would be evidence in each election that more and more of the vote was coming from something like the American Nazi party or the Communist party or whatever. That might convince moderates that there is a problem.

by 8051FSW on Sat Aug 27, 2005 at 04:49:47 PM EST

IRV (none / 0)

Dean has endorsed ranked (or instant runoff voting), which isn't a silver bullet either but means that candidates are elected with majority support, people can vote their consciences without fearing to elect their least favorite choice, and third parties (and their ideas) are legitimate political players.

Neither of the two major parties are going to embrace this, however, unless the grass roots holds their feet to the fire (and even then it won't be easy).

by dobbler on Sat Aug 27, 2005 at 04:51:06 PM EST

Re: IRV (none / 0)

How does IRV help third parties, though? It seems like it would just make third parties easier to ignore. As it is now, the prospect of an independent or third party challenge can keep Dems and Republicans from drifting too far to the middle. But with IRV, a DLC Dem could be secure in knowing that however far he strayed to the right, he'd always be to the left of the Republican, so the liberal wing would still put him second on their IRV ballots and a Ralph Nader or Howard Dean first. So what if the Green Party or an independent gets 20% in the first round? He or she would still be bumped, and if all their support gets thrown to a DLC Dem in the second round, what difference does the first round make? How does this help the third party advance their agenda? I'm not asking these questions just as a rhetorical critique of IRV; I'm just confused how this looks so good to so many. What am I missing?

Another point about IRV: regular voting is apparently confusing enough for some people. How many more spoiled ballots would there be under IRV? There would be tons of people who accidentally put down two 3rd choices and spoil their ballots. Or people who get confused and put their choices in the wrong order. And then there's fraud. The last thing we need right now is to make voting more complicated.

by Gpack3 on Sat Aug 27, 2005 at 05:15:36 PM EST
[ Parent ]

It doesn't help third parties win. (none / 0)

It helps the candidate who is most preferred win.

It does, however, give influence to a third party. Under the current system, a candidate should ignore a voter who won't vote for them. But under ranked choice voting, a candidate is better off courting them, because even if they don't rank the candidate first, they might rank them second. The incentive to do so may be small, but it is nevertheless larger than under the current system.

As for spoiled ballots, there really is no excuse for them, no matter what voting system is used; that problem should be resolved regardless of what voting system we have. As for confusion, it can be resolved through voter education efforts.

The last thing we need right now is to make voting more complicated.

Well, we could allow only one candidate to run in every election. That would make life less complicated, wouldn't it?

by Drew on Sat Aug 27, 2005 at 06:12:34 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: It doesn't help third parties win. (none / 0)

"Well, we could allow only one candidate to run in every election. That would make life less complicated, wouldn't it? "

I didn't say make it less complicated, I said don't make it more complicated, particularly unnecessarily or if the problems with extra complication outweigh the benefits.

by Gpack3 on Sat Aug 27, 2005 at 10:03:25 PM EST
[ Parent ]

It's necessary. (none / 0)

The current system does a very poor job of representing the will of the people; ranked choice would do a much better job.

by Drew on Sun Aug 28, 2005 at 06:32:47 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Fusion is great. (none / 0)

I too grew up in NY, and am a big fan of fusion voting. The basic advantages:

to win a major race, you typically need both a major and minor party endorsement - making minority parties a lot more influential (this is why we saw a lot of liberal republicans as mayors in NYC - think John Lindsay)
it's possible, but not common, for a coalition of minor parties to float a winning candidate

All in all, a minor party can have a lot of influence, and potentially position to grow.

I was deeply disappointed by the Supream Court ruling a few years back. Sigh...

by mfidelman on Sat Aug 27, 2005 at 04:52:46 PM EST

The New Majority (none / 0)

A couple of articles I found on line:

The Fusion Solution

Poll after poll demonstrates that Americans are hungry for both "clean" politics and alternative political parties. Yet in our winner-takes-all election system, it is extremely difficult for third or minor parties to attract the votes necessary to have a meaningful impact on elections, let alone to elect enough policy makers to advance a legislative program. The only real impact that third parties typically have on elections is to "spoil", or pull votes from a less desirable candidate, causing their least desirable candidate to win.

Fusion, once legal in all states and commonly practiced throughout the country, occurs when a third or minor party combines forces with a dominant party or other smaller parties to run a single candidate on multiple party lines. It makes possible something that many citizens wish they could do: to cast a protest vote that counts without throwing the election to the candidate they find least desirable.

Why we need fusion

Fusion was outlawed at the turn of the twentieth century by Republican legislatures as part of a reform initiative to weed corruption out of the electoral process. The reforms, which included adopting the secret ballot, implementing personal registration and ballot access laws, and moving to direct popular election of senators and presidential electors, installed unprecedented obstacles to third-party participation in elections. Combined with the changes that accompanied industrialization, urbanization, and state building, the reforms brought the vibrant third-party activity of the 1900s virtually to an end-except in states where fusion remained legal. When states quashed third political parties, in part by laws prohibiting fusion, they raised the cost of political dissent. They also narrowed the democratic aspirations of the voting public.

How does fusion change the complexion of the established parties? At a time when the "big tent"parties are coming to look and sound more and more alike, fusion can help to mark the dissent that exists within them, and give new leverage to alternative voices within the establishment. Finally, by making a carrot and stick strategy available to third political parties (we join you if you support our causes, we "spoil" if you don't), fusion gives the established parties a greater incentive to differentiate themselves from each another, insofar as running a nonmainstream nominee will garner additional ballot lines and additional votes. Overall, a party system that is responsive to third party organizing also becomes more responsive to changing public opinion.

We may look to fusion as a model ballot reform, one that orients us toward a future where this winner-take-all system is more open to third political parties and to the dissenters who organize them. To my mind, it is even more significant for the way it orients us toward the present. As a once familiar electoral practice that only now seems out of place, the story of fusion dislodges our two-party common sense. It prompts us to consider that democracy as we practice it today may not be an improvement over its practice in the past. It teaches us that a third-party vote is not necessarily wasted, even in a winner-take-all system. And it may even inspire us to work to change what we have regarded as the simple facts of our political world

That's good enough for me. Enough investigation and research. Time to get to work.

by Gary Boatwright on Sat Aug 27, 2005 at 05:07:56 PM EST

IRV (none / 0)

IRV, which will be consistently blocked by Democrats and to a lesser extent Republicans (since they are currently less threatened by third parties), would definitely help third parties. No longer would the Democrats have the excuse that a vote for Green is a vote for the Republicans. With IRV voting, Greens need only to get more votes than either the Democrats or the Republicans (the latter can certainly happen in large cities that are traditionally Democratic). Then they can run head to head with just the Democrat or the Republican. This is why Democrats don't want it around.

by steve expat on Sat Aug 27, 2005 at 08:40:16 PM EST

Confusing voting (none / 0)

"The last thing we need right now is to make voting more complicated."

In the first post-apartheid election in South Africa, the country used a proportional representation system more complicated than IRV would be for a presidential election. Yet they managed to pull it off, despite the large segment of illiterate voters and the fact that no one in the country had ever voted in a real election before.

To crib a line from Sam Smith -- are Americans somehow dumber than the rest of the industrialized world that uses proportional representation of one kind or another?

For those who are interested, fairvote.org has great resources on irv and other pr systems.

by dobbler on Sat Aug 27, 2005 at 10:58:51 PM EST

Fusion voting (none / 0)

I am not really sure if I am for or against fusion voting per say, but having been involved in politics in NY, it is political reality. First, it doesn't empower third parties or grassroots, it empowers party bosses. Almost everything that is decided on the 3 minor lines now is handled by the party bosses. Second, it also discourages primaries in the major parties(for better or worse) because often there can be two different Democrats or Republicans in the race. The most extreme example happened for a short time in the Buffalo last cycle, there was an open seat in the state Assembly, and three Democrats were vying for the Democratic nomination. Pat Hoak had won the endorsement of the Independence Party, Dave Shenck had won the endorsement of the Conservative Party and Fran Pordum had won the endorsement of the Working Families Party, at that point all 3 Democrats were set to appear on the ballot no matter who won the Dem nod. Shenck ended up dropping out of the race and Hoak picked up the Con line, but he ended up losing the primary to Pordum and both went on to lose in the General giving the Republicans a seat that had been held by the Dems. The Executive committees of these Parties have full control over the nomination process, the designate the candidate and you cannot force a primary for the line unless the Party authorizes it or you are a member of the Party, the best you can do is force a write-in primary. Ultimately fusion voting is all about location, location, location. Each of the three minor lines has a certain number of people who will vote for the candidate on that line no matter what, Independence and Con lines carry about 2-3% each, guaranteed, and Working Families 1-2%. Numerous close elections are decided solely on which candidate gets the Independence line. The lines are also useful in getting people who would never vote for a Democrat to vote for you on another line, if you look at Spitzer's numbers on the Ind line, especially in Upstate, he was putting up numbers comparable to Perot and Golisano on the line, and that was the only lines they had. Fusion voting is a major part of NY politics for better or worse, but I'm not necessarily sure it is a good idea for anywhere else.

by upstatenydem on Sun Aug 28, 2005 at 10:43:42 AM EST

I like the System in LA (none / 0)

Seems to work..

Running the Davis, Nelson Klein team in Florida.

by Liberal on Sun Aug 28, 2005 at 11:11:16 AM EST

IRV Makes Much More Sense (none / 0)

Upstatenydem is right that these lines are actually controlled by minor party bosses (I live in upstate NY, too). As such they can be corrupting because of the kind of game playing they produce, which is a big problem in NY to begin with. Believe me, there is absolutely nothing at all progressive about "bossism" -- that is something to be overcome, not encouraged, and one of the biggest, if not the biggest, blights historically of NY politics.

I personally feel these third parties are a serious problem for New York and there is actually talk in the legislature of ending ballot fusion. It should. It's bad for major parties and it's bad for minor parties. They mainly work to benefit incumbents, never insurgents. Only two states have ballot fusion and there is a real reason for that and it is not some Republican conspiracy against progressives. No minor party has ever gained stature because of ballot fusion -- it doesn't work for them in the long run, either. The Greens did not cross endorse Democrats, and they got father along than the Working Families Party, despite the fact the WFP was massively funded by unions.

I would also alert Democrats and progressives outside NY that the WFP has a VERY checkered history. They are willing to cross endorse ring wing Republicans and have done so. (This is an example of the game playing I refer to.) In the last election they endorsed Spano, a Republican, for State Senate. He picked up 3,000 votes on the WFP line which put him over the top.

This was just awful, because we are only 4 seats away from taking control of the State Senate. NY is very artificially gerrymandered. If Democrats could take control of the State Senate, we could draw up a clean map of Congressional Districts and put FOUR Republican congressmen out of their totally artificial seats -- there is no excuse for them being there -- NY has a 3-2 Democratic Party registration advantage, and they does not include independent voters, who also mainly vote liberal. Four seats in the House would take us a lot closer to making Nancy Pelosi Speaker of the House.

Still think fusion is a good idea?

If liberal and progressives really want to do something positive, they need to get behind Instant Run Off Voting. People then would feel free to make a clean statement of principle of what they really want, and potentially build their own alternative party up, without the risk of delivering the seat to some vicious reactionary. And it would create the kind of pressure on wayward Democrats that fusion is alleged to do, but actually does not. If anybody really thinks fusion is a good idea, they should compare the NY Legislature against almost any other state. It can't be defended.

I would note Governor Dean has endorsed IRV. He's an awfully smart politicians and we ought to be paying attention. If we had IRV in Florida in 2000 Gore would be President today. I have never seen a single person disputed that proposition. But how would ballot fusion contributed to rectifying that situation? Fusion would have changed nothing at all. So why this interest in fusion? Ballot fusion is a distraction. Work for IRV.

by tea in the harbor on Sun Aug 28, 2005 at 11:16:31 AM EST

Re: IRV Makes Much More Sense (none / 0)

I forgot, and I should add, that the Brennan Center of the New York University Law School recently did a study of legislatures and concluded New York State had the worst legislature in the nation. The worst! They came up with a list of reforms which the legislature mostly blew off. The legislators have no fear of the voters. Does fusion help? Not a bit. As the Spano affair shows, it contributes. So why in the world would anyone want emulate NY?

Primary elections are the proper means to deal with these issues, not fusion and third parties. If the effort went into primaries that went into these third parties, we'd have real results.

by tea in the harbor on Sun Aug 28, 2005 at 11:31:27 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: IRV Makes Much More Sense (none / 0)

1) The WFP has elected progressive Republicans and stand-alone WFP candidates. When they do support incumbents, they extract commitments from candidates to support their issues. 2) The Greens didn't get farther than the WFP - they lost their ballot status and now the WFP endorsement is the most sought after endorsement in NY politics. 3) The WFP DOES make deals - like the one they made when they agreed not to endorse a candidate in an incumbent's race in return for help in raising the state's minimum wage. In that deal, they gave up their influence in one state senate race and in retuirn were able to raise the wages of almost 1 million low-income New York workers - by most standards, a good deal. 4) IRV simply allows people to feel good about their first vote before the cast their second vote - usually it's their second choice/vote that will really matter in the election's outcome.

by jflashmontana on Thu Oct 13, 2005 at 10:13:57 AM EST
[ Parent ]

another possible problem with fusion voting... (none / 0)

Another possible problem with fusion voting is that third parties can lose their ideological positions over time and simply degenerate into patronage mills. That's what happened to the Liberal Party. Founded in the Depression as a way for Jewish voters to vote for FDR without voting for Tammany, the Liberal Party about 25 years ago or so under the leadership of Ray Harding degenerated into a patronage mill. Without the Liberal Party endorsement, Rudy Guiliani would never have beaten Dinkens in 93 and as payback, one of Harding's sons became deputy mayor! One of the reasons why the Working Families party was founded in 1998 was to kick the Liberals off of the ballot and become the "true" progressive party. In 2002 they succeeded, and unless the Liberals succeed in getting a candidate who can garner 50k votes, they'll stay off the ballot (like the Greens who also got knocked off in 2002 for the same reason).

That being said, as a New York voter I LOVE fusion voting. As a progressive liberal Dem, I have problems with the direction that the Dems have taken the last couple of decades. At the same time, I have big problems with progressives who routinely let the perfect be the enemy of the good and mistake Dems for "evil Republicans"! Voting for Al Gore and Hillary in 2000 and for Kerry and Schumer in 2004 on the Working Families line, I feel, has enabled to register my support for liberal/progressive politics while adding a vote to the Dem candidates in case they need it against a Republican (instead of wasting my vote). Although by no means perfect, I find the Working Families Party a good vehicle for voting for my values and political principles as well as voting pragmatically for the good as opposed to the perfect.

The party, since its formation in 1998, has already accomplished a great deal. We're not far in NYS from having a living wage law, and in several counties and municipalities across the state we already have such laws (in large part because of the ballot line access that Row E provides to politicians who want to attract voters besides straight-ticket voters of their parties). Perhaps the most striking coup, though, was the defeat of the Albany County Dem machine's district attorney last year over the Rockefeller Drug Laws. Dems are also now making serious noises about reforming these draconian laws, which they weren't at all doing a few years back (being largely afraid of being tared and feathered as "soft on crime" by Republican opponents.) Now Republicans may still accuse them of being this, but Dems who stand for changing the laws know that they'll be rewarded with ballot line access and volunteers, money, etc. from Working Families.

To sum up, fusion voting at its best in NYS has led to a more ideologically honest politics, where Dem candidates are not afraid to be liberals and Republicans are not afraid either to be true conservatives or fuzzy moderates. IMHO, this is how politics should be and often isn't in this country--driven by focus groups, and petty non-ideological symbolism about school uniforms and V-chips and the like. At its worst, as in the case of the Liberals (and now the Conservatives), it degenerates into political patronage mills, where parties hold their noses and endorse for 3 times in a row candidates (like Pataki) who aren't "conservative" enough, simply to hold onto valuable patronage for their party hacks.

by jsramek on Sun Aug 28, 2005 at 11:15:57 PM EST

Fusion voting (none / 0)

The New York Working Families Party is the most robust, independent progressive electoral entity in the nation. That is why we're trying to change the Massachusetts' election laws to allow fusion voting and set the stage to create a similar organization. Visit www.massballotfreedom.com for more info!

by jflashmontana on Wed Oct 05, 2005 at 04:17:23 PM EST

...and why we're trying to re-legalize it in Mass. (none / 0)

The effort is on to re-legalize fusion in Massachusetts. A coalition of 26 community and labor organizations is currently conducting a ballot initiative to restore the "lost tool of democracy" to the Bay State. learn more by visiting us at www.massballotfreedom.com

by jflashmontana on Mon Oct 24, 2005 at 05:16:19 PM EST

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