Our elections should not be partisan. A partisan election is one in which the ballot indicates party endorsement. In Hamilton County this is accomplished by writing the title “(Democratic Party Nominee)”, “(Republican Nominee)”, or “(Independent Candidate)” next to candidates’ names on a ballot. They create unnecessary drama on top of the usual electoral turmoil. The conflict following the 2022 county mayoral primary and the current troubles in Fort Oglethorpe are but the most recent iteration. Partisan elections provide misleading labels, over-simplify elections, obligate primaries, expose the state to legal liabilities, and elevates political parties relative to other agencies.
Partisan elections provide labels which can be misleading. Labels represent neither philosophy or belief, allegiance or loyalty, past or future action. After election, the elected are free to go along with their endorsing party, disaffiliate, or even change affiliation. The average voter might interpret “(Independent Candidate)” to mean “without party affiliation”; in truth, it means “without party endorsement”.
Partisan elections overly-simplify contests. Voters lose incentive to draw their own conclusions about candidate belief, viability, and executive capacity. Candidates lose ability to hold individual causes as all are lumped into party affiliation. Candidates also lose ability to hold beliefs that go against the party line; there are pro-life Democrats and pro-union Republicans, but they face an up-hill battle attempting to get party endorsement, much less winning.
Partisan elections obligate primaries. Primaries bloat the election cycle; even if a candidate is not running on party endorsement, they must still run in the primaries, and the primaries can entail their own run-off. Primaries increase partisanship; having candidates “out Republican” and “out Democrat” each other makes for candidate pools low on moderates. Primaries force candidates to make good with the local party establishment. Primaries confuse voters; they get confused when asked if they’ll be filling out a Republican, Democratic, or general ballot, and get confused at which elections are decisive. Even more confusing were the signs put up in recent Tennessee elections which reminded that it was against the law to vote in a political party primary if they are not a bona fide member of that party.
Partisan elections put state electoral agencies into legal liabilities. Every election cycle, lawsuits and lawyers fight over titles and party nominations. We saw it in 2022’s primaries. We are seeing it now in Fort Oglethorpe. Across Tennessee there have been multiple legal actions pertaining to partisan elections and primaries.
Lastly, partisan elections elevate private corporations (which is what political parties are) over private agencies. If a ballot can denote the endorsement of a political party, why not the NRA, Planned Parenthood, or National Wildlife Federation? All this so that political parties can give an air of legitimacy via state imprimatur on what are private decisions, as parties may (and have) gone against the results of the primary.
There is no right way of doing the wrong thing. The state should not be doing partisan elections. Let candidates run without titles, parties decide endorsements without assistance from the state, and voters make up their own minds. Continuing to do things as we have done them will only serve to generate additional drama, legal conflict, partisanship, and awkward family gatherings.
Timothy Born