  Meeting
Report
October 4, 2002
Pete Martineau
Electoral Reform
UUSS member Pete Martineau spoke on the topic of electoral reform and
the need for more citizen participation in elections.
He lamented the relatively low voter turnout in the United States,
compared to that in other developed democratic nations. He attributed much
of the problem to the structure of our electoral system. We have
winner-take-all elections with third party candidates, if they exist at
all, either being irrelevant or serving as "spoilers." Most legislative
seats are "safe" for one party or the other. If seats are not "safe," the
election will be decided by the swing voters, who are the least educated
of all voters on the issues and the most likely to be swayed by negative
advertising. People of the minority political persuasion in a district can
easily feel that they are without representation.
Mr. Martineau proposed a mixture of proportional representation and
instant runoff voting. Instant runoff voting would allow voters to make a
second choice of candidate. At its most simple, if one's first choice of a
candidate ran third or worse, the vote would then go to the voter's second
choice. A majority, not a mere plurality, would be required to win in such
a system.
At the close of the meeting the members present (who were there in
sufficient numbers to qualify as a quorum) ratified the 2002-2003 HAGSA
budget that had been presented by the HAGSA Board.
Report prepared by
Wayne Luney, Recorder
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